The Road

[exchangeandmart]

I just recently finished reading the road and really really enjoyed it. I was however confused on the last page! Would love to hear other peoples thoughts on this! :-)

What did you think on it, I mean what confused you?

I wondered if the sudden discovery of what the boy wanted (a family, or basically nice people) just after his father died was more wishful thinking or a daydream of the boy. After all everyone else they had met were nightmarish in comparison. Perhaps he couldn't cope with the fact that his father had left him alone in that awful place.

I don't know if I could watch the film.

I think the end tried to give a glimmer of hope. A normal, natural event - the trout. I saw the family as salvation for the boy although the endless fear and ultimate hopelessness are still there. A Brilliant terrible book

I agree - it was a glimmer of hope in a very bleak book.

It was the best book I have read this year - loved it.

If you liked it then please recommend me a book - I'm unispired at the moment and need to get stuck into something (~sorry highjack)

Goodness, I imagine a film of this book would be very dark indeed, I did not know they were making it; when will it be released? I too found the ending somewhat ambiguous as throughout the entire book (which I did thoroughly enjoy) it was the realism and bleakness of the situation that was so apparent where as the end was all of a sudden full of hope and was quite abstract. One wonders was the family really real, had they followed all along? It really does make you realize how much we really do have at the moment in this world.

It's already made release date keeps being pushed back

www.imdb.com/title/tt0898367/

Hmm interesting about the idea that it was a daydream. I was so into the book until literally the last page and then I felt the ending didn't quite satisfy me. Like you mention, all other human encounters were really quite grisly, even the boys father (the good guy) seemed to turn bad when he essentially left the trolley thief to die when he took all his clothes out of spite; only the child was truely innocent. Also, if the family knew about them all along, why did they leave it until the father died to approach?

I read it and loved it - but msr 'trout' ? I don't remenber a trout !

Dophus - try Engleby by sebastian Faulks - fantastic !

It didn't occur to me that it was a dream. I interpreted the end as a glimmer of hope but also felt unsatisfied by the end. It felt too 'Hollywood' ie must end positively.

I just re-read the last paragraph -' there used to be river trout ...'
hints at natural disaster and that perhaps in time the earth might repair itself.

Dolphus - have you read any Rohinton Mistery (Sp?)

It will be interesting to see how the film handles the ending as it seems to be the case that the book is more of an interpretive ending

I can't imagine the film of this! I liked it too, but was a bit freaked out by it! I got over that by writing an essay on it for 'imaginative geography' There is so much in this book that can be discussed and interpreted in different ways, which is cool.