A review by vhindy
Blood Meridian, or the Evening Redness in the West by Cormac McCarthy

adventurous challenging dark mysterious reflective tense slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? N/A
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

I usually write reviews immediate after finishing but I needed to sit with this one a bit.

There’s many things to say about this one. Is it the most violent book I’ve ever read? Yes, with the only thing that comes close being Dante’s Inferno. Is it a challenging book to read? Yes, i spent longer with this one than I have with books that were much longer. Are there any characters that are sympathetic? For me the answer is yes but for most I’ll probably say no. Is the
judge a man or is he something else entirely?
that is up to the reader. As for me, I think he is
the devil himself
and there’s plenty in the story the alludes to that. 

For the very first page you are immediately taken in, the language is old and difficult. It’s easy to miss key details if you read to quickly. There are many untranslated bits of Spanish, German, and Latin, etc scattered through out the book that require lots of effort on the readers part. McCarthy uses limited punctuation and sometimes this includes very long sentences.

That being said, it’s one of the few books that has left my jaw dropped open and it did so on a number of occasions. 

It’s a book that answers as many questions as it leaves open. I’m sure if you ask every person who has read this book they all interpret various parts of it differently.

There was a point at in this book where I continually wondered why a very notorious character is as notorious as he is and then the last 70-100 pages make it very clear.

The book is haunting and out of all the gross and seemingly out of this world imagery we get throughout the book. The ending of some reason was the most nauseating for me. It’s like I spent an evening in hell and then I’m left with just the aftermath.

I feel like there’s so much to still know about it and will need to return to it again in the future. Anything less than 5 stars would be a disservice. This is a rare time i wouldn’t recommend a 5 star book to everyone. It’s not for everyone but for those that make it through the ride is a wild one.