Cormac McCarthy

In this taut, chilling novel, Lester Ballard--a violent, dispossessed man falsely accused of rape--haunts the hill country of East Tennessee when he is released from jail. While telling his story, Cormac McCarthy depicts the most sordid aspects of life with dignity, humor, and characteristic lyrical brilliance.

Child of God

Kwan Ann Tan

Melody Izard

This is one of those books that, when you read it, and really like it, it makes you wonder if you should be worried about yourself. 

I mean it’s kind of like finding something brown and wondering if it might be chocolate and tasting it and discovering that it really is something vile and disgusting. But then you should have known better. I mean you found the brown thing on the floor, so there was no way you REALLY could have been expecting chocolate and then, Oh look! There’s another something brown and you taste it again! 

I mean this book is written by Cormac McCarthy – so I knew what it would be like. The main character is like those people you try to avoid in 
  The Road
 but this book takes place before whatever catastrophic happening brings down civilization. There’s necrophilia, incest, cross-dressing with a creepy twist and plenty of stinky bathroom references. But I might just read it again.

If you like this you should also read And the Ass Saw the Angel by Nick Cave and 
  Ironweed
 by William Kennedy.

Summer Stanley

Unusual and a bit disturbing, but completely engaging throughout.

Neva Davies

By the author of the critically acclaimed Border Trilogy, Child of God is a taut, chilling novel that plumbs the depths of human degradation. Lester Ballard, a violent, solitary and introverted young backwoodsman dispossessed on his ancestral land, is released from jail and allowed to haunt the hill country of East Tennessee, preying on the population with his strange lusts. McCarthy transforms commonplace brushes with humanity - in homesteads, stores and in the woods - into stunning scenes of the comic and the grotesque, and as the story hurtles toward its unforgettable conclusion, depicts the most sordid aspects of life with dignity, humour, and characteristic lyrical brilliance.

Caitlyn Johanna Bolton 

Not gonna lie, not my thing and I would not have picked this up if it weren't part of my TBR swap challenge this month.

With that said, I did enjoy the complex development of Ballard, I thought the way McCarthy's narrative matched the character was really interesting and a really good way to add a little extra development for him. 

I could also see some inspiration from the modernist genre which may have been an accident, but I did find it interesting.

The main thing that put me off was the way that he went on and on about certain, small events in the novel, such as the part with the blacksmith making the axe and the butcher packing up the meat cuts. I understand why they are there, but at the same time I felt like that level was unnecessary and got tedious. 

Overall, I didn't hate, but I didn't like it and it hasn't motivated me to pick up more of his work.

Child of God

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