Mumsnet Talk

Have a voucher to spend and I wondered if this was a good read?

DH and I have both read it. DH thought it was harrowing in parts, and said he couldn't describe it as enjoyable, although he was glad he'd read it. I enjoyed it immensely, found it monotonous in parts but I wondered if that was intentional to add effect. Not sure that helps!

DP has just finished it and thought it was excellent. I am halfway through it and am pretty gripped too, although I was sceptical to start with. It's worth reading for his use of language alone. Would recommend.

thanks will order

Yes, one of the best books I've read in the last few years. Has stayed with me, as they say. Truly sobbed like a baby at teh end, found it very frightening.

i tried, i failed

I couldnt get into it
DH loved it thhough

I've just ordered it from the library to read next, since reading a bit about it when I saw it suggested for MN bookclub.
It's being made into a film just now too, starring whatsisname? Aragorn from Lord of the Rings. Out autumn, so a good time to get the book read.

It's very good. Very harrowing. I cried buckets but was transfixed.

DH loves Cormac McCarthy and has read all his books. I don't like them.

Message withdrawn

it is fantastic - read it and weep.

Yes, and it nearly killed me. It is brilliant, but SO harrowing.

Oh, I only got to about page 3 and he's written "off of"
I hope the writing's okay - as I think I'll enjoy the story.

I read it in a oner and was petrified but totally gripped. I'm normally an optimistic person but it really made me fear for the world. I read PD James' 'The Children of Men' around the same time, thank god they both have a glint of hope. Must try to read something more cheery.

I think it is either someting you can't put down because it is so harrowing or something you can't read for more than ten mins for the same reason. I'm in the second category. Brilliant book but it was just too real to take in in large chunks for me. I'd recommend it!

I read it twice and wrote a 3000 word essay on it as part of my degree. I loved it, but if your looking for a book to cheer you up maybe its a bad choice. I found parts of it very scary the first time round.

I thought it was really gripping but really horrible at the same time iyswIm. I didn't actually 'enjoy' it. I read it quickly & I believe it's a good, quick read once you get into it- it took me a while- but it was bleak & sad. Devastating really.

I do wonder what the catastrophe was? Nuclear war? Some virus?

We're actually discussing it at our book club tonight

Update to say that everyone in our book club seemed to love this! So I suppose I should highly recommend it. They all said the writing is really striking (it is). It's spare, bleak but gets the point across. As I said before, personally I didn't enjoy it nor did I think it's destined to be a classic, but I did appreciate it as a good, very well written book.

I know what you mean Maria, it isn't exactly a book you could use the term "enjoy" with is it? I read this, stopped and then managed to finish it a couple of months later - my dad had just died the first time and the book was just too awful for me to continue.

I'm thinking nuclear war, and if I said why it would spoil the book for anyone who hasn't read it. <cough cough>

I have just finished this and did "enjoy" it. I expected to plod through it as something worthy but I was surprised at how accessible and gripping it is.

I couldn't get through it, too harrowing and really nothing happens.

It was recommended to me by someone who's opinion I trust though, so I'm obviously not up to it.

Just finished it. Feel like I've been kicked in the stomach.
leaves a lingering feeling for a while after.

Looking forward to the film
Says it's the same screenplay writer that did Enduring Love, I'm expecting it should be okay.

Oh God, a film. I don't know if I could watch it but probably will.

It is represented in pictoral form here

God it was so depressing. I finished it, but couldn't sit through the film of it.

Really, she's captured it well

The film trailer is interesting; who is the woman?? Anyway, I'm dreading the idea of them making it into some kind of romance (particularly with Charlize Theron as the woman, pleeeeeease!)

oooo just going to look that up.
I'm dreading them making it too much about the more horrible incidents.

the mum/wife I think
before they hit the road.
Looks like the film picks up the story a bit earlier than the book.
Looks exciting

Paisleyleaf, yes, I do hope they don't show the most horrifying scenes (e.g. baby on spit / people trapped in cellar etc....ugh!) But then again if they don't it won't be very true to the book will it...

I don't mind them showing those bits
just hoping the don't make more of them than they are in the book. Milking it. iykwim. You know what hollywood can be like - and it's not really just about that.

it quickly became one of my favourite novels. the relationship between the father and son is so poignant. i read it in two sittings and in between i had to go and hold my sleeping son.

ragged robin,.. i did the same as you but in three sittings so had double the number of cuddles with my son

gripping, sad, awful, dark book but oh my, i didn't/couldn't stop reading it

i read it in a book club too and it had votes from 0.5/10 to 9.5/10

I got bored.
not harrowed
just bored
but then I am very neurotic and always imagining post apocalyptic scenarios and how I would cope

so i didn't finish it

I think oryx and crake is better
less poetic, more annoyingly smartarse, but more thought through

but I like this line from the kid

"What are our short to mid term goals?"

Or is it mid to long

It's very cute, obviously something he has learnt at school and very poignant under the circumstances

Read it in one go as I couldn't put it down without knowing how it ended. Think it would take a long time before I could read it again though - is v harrowing.

Robert Swindell's Brother in the Land is another good book, but slightly dated and aimed at teens, if you want something in a similar genre.

when everybody on here has read it, can we have a chat about the ending? obviously not yet though!

Oooh, yes, have just read this at our Book Club and have a lot to say about the ending! [Arti holds self back..]

Maybe start a thread with a 'spoiler' warning to talk about the end.

Wickerman, I read Oryx and Crake about 6 years ago, so can't remember it so well.But yes it was good - i really enjoyed it and recommended it to several people.
I think Thats what the MN book club voted on this month
I also love post apocalyptic stories and have a stack of books.

new thread with spoiler warning here

Wickermum the boy never went to school as far as I am aware.

I just finished the book and feel rather like I've sufferd post traumatic stress.

I have just seen the film in New York (yes CT is the mum in it).

I read the book the day before we saw it, so was still feeling VERY sad.

Have to say the film is brilliant and very true to the book, however I did cry the whole way through (but was probably worse as had just finished reading it).

haven't read it yet partly as a protest against dh who keeps banging on at me to read it but it sounds so bleak!

The Road by Cormac McCarthy was voted the best book of the last decade by 'The Times' recently. In case that is relevant to anyone!

I have just finished it tonight- started it yesterday!
Very harrowing, and bleak, and intensely moving. Not sure what to read next- maybe something completely different1

I just finished it last night.
The people in the basement and the roasted baby will haunt me forever

Movie trailer here

Sjolly good. In similar vein and better in many ways (philosophically principally) is Jose Saramago's Blindness.

Agree re debatable ending

It was wonderful - I took frever to read it I found I had to keep putting it down to digest it.

I really can't see how a film version can to it justice.

The film really does do it justice - it's really good.

You will be happy to know that the roasted baby is the only part they left out. That would of just been too much.

Loved it. Howled through the end. Thought it spare and beautiful and interesting.

I'm glad they left out the roasted baby. That's not something I want to see, even if it's not real.

I'm guessing that means the cellar full of food people and the half eaten man are in it.

I was going to read this but after hearing about roasted babies think I will give it a miss,

Just one. it's a short but powerful scene. Don't let it out you off.

I have heard great things about it, maybe I'll just try and skip that part

Don't let the baby bit put you off, it was one paragraph. It really is a worthwhile read.

It really, really frightened me. I cried quite a bit.