Blood Meridian, or the Evening Redness in the West
I'm gunna be harsh. Why not? McCarthy is. I novel is hanged with the fancy rope so many other reviewers extravagantly embroider for it: monotony, flatness, and one-dimensionality. Hold on there illiterate scum, you say, what about all that blood dripping symbolism (and bold historical perspective). But by the time you'll be done saying that (I'm politely pausing, in fact, to let you finish -- I'm more considerate than McCarthy), your scalp will've been ripped from your head and stuffed, clotted with blood, back in your mouth to choke on until your eyes pop from their sockets like boated exploding mules, shoved from dark, high, mist enshrouded ledges, strewn with coyote bones. Out of time. That is all.