Stretches the subject matter of fiction to its limits

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	• Child of God Cormac McCarthy Vintage, 1993 - 208 pages average customer review:based on 57 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

McCarthy's Argument with God

The works of Cormac McCarthy, America's greatest living writer, brim with violence, cruelty and depravity. However, McCarthy is fundamentally a religious writer, whose great themes are sin, wonder and the presence (or absence) of God. Here, his narrative concerns the dark pilgrimage of one Lester Ballard, a Tennessee hillbilly who slips into murder and madness, but is still "a child of God, much like yourself." McCarthy finds his mature and distinctly American voice here, a lyrical distillate of Joyce through Faulkner, tempered with the more clipped cadences of a Hemingway, and steeped in a Catholic Jansenist gloom. A brief, riveting masterwork.

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Stretches the subject matter of fiction to its limits

I have read sevral of McCarthy's other novels. His best ones stretch something to the limit. In it was violence. Here it is simple depravity and lack of concern for other human beings. Lester Ballard is the ultimate user. Other people exist for him only to meet his needs, even if they are dead. I have never before read a book about necrophilia, and yes, as many of the other reviewers point out, reading this book takes a strong stomach. Yet McCarthy achieves something only the greatest writers can pull off, which is making an unsympathetic character sympathetic. Totally in spite of myself, I found myself cheering Ballard on when he outwits the lynch mob and gets away. The only thing I can imagine more outrageous than this book is a sympathetic portrayal of a child molester. Yet, I believe that this is ultimately a spiritual book. I don't think the title is meant to be ironic. I think we are meant to see that even Lester Ballard really is a child of God.

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Intense and disturbing

This is a gripping novel that probes the breadth of human depravity and perversity while plunging the reader into a malevolent and sinister world. Lester Ballard is a deeply deranged and demented individual with sexually perverse lusts that resides in the Eastern Tennessee countryside. He's accused of rape, imprisoned for a short time, then released after which he commits unspeakable acts against his fellow man. It's doubtful his incarceration had anything to do with his behavior since it's obvious from the start this man is troubled. This is a wonderful novel filled with effective imagery and stunning descriptiveness. I found the chapter where the town sheriff, deputy and old Mr. Wade rowing the boat through the flooded town streets to be quite interesting. A recommended book, but beware the subject matter is quite graphic and might not be suitable for those without strong stomachs.

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the bond of depravity

McCarthy has taken not just the grotesque, but the disgusting, and worked wonders. He points us to our own human depravity through the example of the grendel-like character of Lester Ballard, and by making us care for so lost and lonely a soul. I was horrified not just by Lester and the other characters in the book, but by the realization McCarthy created in me that the line between me and Lester is a thin one, and it may not even exist. If you have a strong stomach I encourage you to read this book, and if you don't, you might want to think about making the sacrifice for the sake of seeing something beautiful and profound in the filth of humanity and reality. -sc

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reviews: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, page 9, 10, 11, 12

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recommendations

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Modernist to Neo-Traditional Literature
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Best of the South
McCarthy Books~

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