Modern American literature. Accomplished but hard to love - Rated 
If you pick up this book because you loved the Coen brothers' film, then you will either adore it or loathe it. I'm torn between the two. 'No Country' is a mix of blunt-force trauma and philosophical debate. It's a study of how brutal, awful violence has pervaded American society, and how it blights the lives of the very ordinary people it touches. If you've seen the film then you'll know the plot and be familiar with the main characters -- all were faithfully drawn from the novel, although you get a deeper understanding of their back story and motivation in the book than you do in the film.
However, much as I love the plot, philosophy and characterisation, McCarthy's use of language drives me insane. He abandons large chunks of punctuation to capture, I assume, the speech patterns of the region. But attemping to read an entire novel written without speech marks in patois is extremely trying. It disrupted the whole flow of the text for me. I could just about manage the didnt couldnt wouldnt, but trying to understand whether a line was speech or not nearly ruined the book entirely. If you can cope with an entire novel written in text-message English then you'll be fine. But if I had not known the plot, and grit my teeth and determined to see it through, then I would have stopped reading after the first couple of chapters.
So it's left me feeling very wary of picking up any more books by Cormac McCarthy. Perhaps I'm just not cut out for modern American literature...
Either 1/10 or 9/10.
no fun for old men - Rated 
I had to read a few reviews before i set down to write one for a very good reason -i wanted to know If I was the only one who didnt know what happened.
Spoilers here - beware.
I will be the first to admit I have been reading way to many kids books of late- but I am fairly well read and enjoy a challenging read.However after a very slow start - I started to get into the meat of the piece. I found the characters enjoyable If a bit stupid in there actions. I mean if you find 2.4 million and you intend to keep it- you high tail as far from your hometown as you can and leave a blur behind your tail - you do not dawdle on the outskirts of the state and make life hard for yourself.
Then when i finally think Im getting to grips with his writing style the author starts making leaps in narrative with no explanation of what has just occured - He invests your time with the character and then drops him off the page. I am sure their is deeper reason for this but Im not studying the book at school so I dont want to over analyse his symbolic slaughter of everything that moves.
And the preachy sheriff - much too preachy and i have no idea what his job involved he just seemed to appear at murder scenes and did a little home spinning on the philosphy of we have all gone to hell in a hand basket kind. Well excuse me but i do not own a gun and if you want to stop folks being shot there's your first order of business.
Mildly enjoyable - slightly confusing and i will not be reaching for the authors back catologue - if you want a great fun read set in the mid west try Stone Junction - its great.
Great Piece of Work - Rated
I was highly satisfied with this book. First item from McCarthy's collection i have read, undoubtedly won't be the last. Very intriguing, if somewhat complicated use of language in parts. Would definately recommend reading.
All is vanity - Rated 
I saw the film first and then I read the book. The film stuck pretty close to the original story and both are gripping. The story is fascinating and the central character, Sheriff Bell, bemoans the loss of values in society that results in monsters like Anton Chigurh, a murderer such as the world has never before seen and whose kind is making the world unfit for "Old Men" like himself to live in. I think there are people like Chigurh in real life, look at Richard Kuklinski for example, but such freaks will never become models for the rest of us, not while they exhibit hairstyles like Chigurh anyway.
The road to Hell begins with a decline in good manners and Sheriff Bell suggests that good manners consists in saying "yes sir", though being Scottish I think this is obsequious rather than respectful. Bell is old fashioned and does respect others and will not even treat the dead with contempt by labelling them "Mexican drug dealers". The only man Bell does not respect is Chigurh, as he considers him more demon than man and he is afraid of him.
Sheriff Bell is past it and is due for retirement. He is a good man but his belief that the world has become corrupted within his lifetime is mere vanity.
Gripping, Somber, Violent, and Brilliant - Rated
I'd never read anything by McCarthy before, but am a huge Coen Brothers fan -- so when I learned that their next project was an adaptation of this book, I made a mental note to check it out. Of course, about a year came and went before I actually read it, and by then the movie was in theaters. So the day after finishing the book, I went out and saw the movie, with the result that my impression of the book and the film are completely intermingled in ways I would have a very hard time untangling. That said, the film version is one of the most faithful adaptations I've come across and a very large portion of its brilliance can be directly credited to McCarthy's novel.
Set in the early 1980s in Texas, the story revolves around three men. First is Llewelyn Moss, a rugged, capable Vietnam vet in his late '30s or so, who lives an honest life, likes a good time, has a sense of humor, and is the kind of handy everyman that makes for a good protagonist. The story opens with him out hunting antelope near the Rio Grande. in the course of which he discovers the aftermath of a heroin deal gone bad: several shot up pickups and a lot of dead Mexicans. He also tracks down a case containing several million dollars, and doesn't hesitate to grab it.
The second main character is Sheriff Bell, a rugged, reflective, weary old-timer in whose county the killings occurred. He speaks to the reader directly in monologues throughout the book, tying the country's history of violence to the violence of the story's events as he tries to figure out just what is going on. These can be rather cheesy and hokey at times, but that's part of the point -- their style established the Sheriff's as a man of the past. The future is embodied by the final man in the trinity, Anton Chigurh. Forget your serial killer or gangster stories, this very odd hit man is among the purest incarnation of evil to be found in modern fiction. He has been hired to track down the missing money, and by his logic anyone who causes him any delay simply needs to be deleted.
Moss's is a classic moral dilemma: what would you do if you found a lot of money. Would it matter where the money came from? Would the amount matter? Etc. In theory, Moss could have gotten clean away with the money, however his own code of ethics betrays him. His return to the scene of the carnage to fulfill a dying man's meaningless request both exhibits his humanity and makes him the prey of this story. Soon he is playing a deadly hide and seek with both Mexican drug dealers and Chigurh, with Sheriff Bell perpetually a step or three behind the action, cleaning up the bodies. Moss's sense of honor isn't his only problem though -- he also suffers from the sin of pride -- in believing he can handle Chigurh, he is responsible for a portion of this tragedy.
For some readers, Moss's decisions may be so improbable and at odds with the stakes involved that they will be frustrated. However, it's important to realize that this isn't a straightforward crime story. McCarthy's clearly using the genre to speak to larger themes, with each of the three main characters as almost mythic figures in a moral landscape of good and evil. Meanwhile, he also subverts the genre in several ways that oughtn't be revealed here but may also greatly frustrate some readers. Nonetheless, told with simple, almost staccato language, this a gripping, somber, and very violent story -- one that makes for both and outstanding read and an outstanding film.
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