Child of God | Cormac McCarthy | Mesmerized with every word. Couldn't put it down.

Child of God | Cormac McCarthy | a dark star, with prose capable of healing the world!

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Child of God

	Child of God Cormac McCarthy Vintage, 1993 - 208 pages average customer review:based on 61 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Mesmerized with every word. Couldn't put it down.

I feel like I have missed out on one of the most incredibly talented authors alive today. I now plan on reading all of Cormac McCarthy's books.
I began with "The Road" because of Oprah. I was then drawn to "Child of God" because of the title. I thought perhaps it was spiritual. To my surprise it brought me inside the life of a poor sad soul who is deeply disturbed and incredibly lonely.I lived in his cave of darkness with him and identified with his morbid existence as I cooked and cleaned house for my seven children and husband. I would look up from the deep dark book in my lap and gaze around at my family. How could I read such a grotesque book? How could I not? I couldn't put the book down. I wanted it to continue when it was over. It was inspirational and led me back to my writing. I admire the mind of Cormac McCarthy. This book let my mind travel down a road I couldn't have possibly imagined traveling on. A must read.

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a dark star, with prose capable of healing the world!

One among the many of Cormac McCarthy's luminous early works that created his cult following and positioned him as a modern icon of lyrical precision, Child of God delves into the horrific center of American ignorance and human indignity. An early counter-cultural reflection of two of his most recent and more accessible works, The Sunset Limited and The Road, Child of God casts the utter depravity of McCarthy's character Lester Ballard into an increasing dispossession resonant of the dark core of violence that has always accompanied American life. The title redeems both Lester and the reader.

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Hard to Look Away

To call Letser Ballard an outcast or a loner would not even come close to properly describing him. He is someone totally at odds with society and his fellow man. He lives alone, uses others' property for his own needs and shows little concern for the emotional needs of others. And that is the good side. The darker side is his taste in what companions he does decide to have and how he goes about getting them. CHILD OF GOD is at once an easy read due to McCarthy's writing style yet a difficult read based on the subject matter. At times, one can barely believe the words one reads on the page.

Yet underneath the horror of Lester Ballard's life are some signs of something more. McCarthy refers to him as a child of God early in the novel and, lest we do not get the picture, adds that Ballard is such a child of God just like the rest of us. McCarthy often imbues his writings with religiosity and wants us to know that, despite the extreme differences in behavior between Ballard and the reader, God's grace is present in us all. Indeed, if Lester Ballard is a child of God, then God's love must truly be universal.

That McCarthy portrays Ballard so simplistically adds to this. We know Ballard is in his upper 20s. But besides that, we know very little of him. This universalizes Ballard in a way that makes it more difficult to portray him as the "Other" rather than as a general metaphor for humanity. His status as an outcast can be read as symbolic that we are all outcasts from God unless and until we willingly receive his grace. Ballard's close personal association with death reinforces the notion that the ideas interwoven into this novel are not concerned merely, or even primarily, with this world.

McCarthy is an excellent writer whose style is probably more accessible than that of other authors in his league. That has the benefit of allowing readers to explore the ideas he presents without struggling too hard with, or being bored by, the actual text. McCarthy has a reputation as being a writer who explores dark areas of humanity. Certainly CHILD OF GOD can be described that way. It may not always be a pleasant read, but it is a recommended one.

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Less than what I expected

This is the first early book of McCarthy's I've read, and part of me is curious to read "The Orchard Keeper" and "Outer Dark," his first two books. But I don't know that I will. The main reason is that "Child of God," when compared to "All the Pretty Horses," "The Crossing," or even "City of the Plain" (which I thought was the least interesting of the border trilogy) comes up short. Though perhaps comparing "Child of God" to the trilogy is unfair. A better comparison would be "Blood Meridian." But when measured against "Blood Meridian," "Child of God" appears shallow, interesting only for its mood, moments of brilliant imagery and grotesque content.

Child of God hints at McCarthy's future works and is interesting within the context of those works, as a measure of the writer's developing craft and vision. But, unlike his later work, "Child of God" never really gets off the ground. The facts of the story are credibly wrought, the writing is stylistic and at times engaging, there are several striking images. But that's it. The story of the recluse, Lester Ballard, and his necrophilia set against a backdrop of a mountain community in the gothic south, would appear to be enough. But there is no transcendence. The novel is little more than reporting of events. We do not know Lester's motivations. His movement from simple recluse to murderer occurs almost coincidently. There is no struggle within Lester. There is no moral clarity offered by the narrator. The reader is not encouraged toward sympathy for Lester. There is no real tension. And for that, the novel fails.

When I consider "Child of God" within the context of "Blood Meridian," trying to point to where the one book succeeds and the other fails (they both after all deal on a fundamental level with the extremes of violence and human depravity) I think of two fundamental differences that work to create the tension and transcendence necessary in a successful novel: character insight and exploration of theme.

In "Blood Meridian," The Kid and The Judge slip farther and farther into a world that is violent and chaotic. As they slide farther into that world, they work to define it and themselves within it. They work to define the world through their own explications in thought and dialogue coupled with the writer's use of imagery, action and fable-like anecdotes. The result is a sense of movement and struggle, a wrestling with grand ideas, a fully formed world in which fully formed individuals--with motivations, with pasts, with futures--are driven toward action.

The protagonist in "Child of God" is not entirely sane, and though I don't believe it is ever stated, Lester is most likely mentally retarded or at least slow. There is no exploration of grand ideas. No theme. His past and future are only sketched. I suppose perhaps McCarthy might be suggesting that Lester is a child of God, and that the reader must then work to make his own moral judgments regarding Lester. But the guy is so awful and his actions so undeniably reprehensible, I doubt that very many readers spend all that much time wondering just where Lester belongs. Rather than reading his earlier works, I may pick up his latest book.

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