Very bleak, but nonetheless a must read. Wouldn't recommend reading it during a depressive episode or existential crisis though.

I didn't like No Country for old men. It started off great but lost me toward the middle.

The Road, however, is a classic.

> how grim is the the Road?

Not all that grim, at least compared to some of his others. Grimmer than No Country for Old Men, less so than Blood Meridian or Outer Dark. There is at least one very grim scene, though, and maybe some others I'm not thinking of at the moment. Been a pretty long time since I read it.

Grimness aside, I'd rank it simpler, at the level of reading difficulty, than some of his others.

It's a good book but personally, I don't think it's among his best.

It's a very grim book, but it's also fundamentally about the goodness of people. The setting and the plot are bleak, but its outlook is, in a way, hopeful.

At least that's my takeaway. If someone else found it purely depressing I would understand, but I feel differently.

It is bleaker than bleak but incredibly rewarding. Unlike, say, Child of God where you are wallowing in filth, in The Road there is humanity and warmth and love it’s just the environment that is hostile.

I read it when it came out in a day or two.

Then I tried to read it again a few years later but my boy was about that age and I could not put myself through what reading it was taking out of me.

Not that grim. As a dad it brought me to tears. It’s so good.

Bleaker than bleak is an accurate description but it actually ends on what I would consider to be a hopeful note, a moment of true kindness. Worth the read.

It’s been a decade but from what I remember, it is very dark. It was my first McCarthy book and have been hooked since.

As grim as it gets, with rare glimpses of light.