fairywhispers's "2008 Bookshelf"

If you read any book this holidays, make it The Road. Set in a future America, after some unknown apocalypse, it is the story of a father and son – ‘each other’s world entire’ – trying to move south to warmer climes. Starving, exhausted and constantly alert for roaming cannibalistic brigands, it sometimes seems as though they are sustained by love alone.

The language in this novel is beautifully evocative and the complete absence of quotation marks adds to the haunted quality that permeates the book. The characters inherently believable – who among us could not empathise with a father trying to shield his son from the horrors of a world gone mad?

Sad, depressing, despairing and all too believable, The Road nevertheless manages to end on a hopeful note. This is a definite must-read!