Near the American-Mexican border, young game hunter Moss stumbles upon the aftermath of a drug deal gone south and finds himself alone in the desert with a suitcase holding a life-altering sum of money. He takes it, and as he heads back to his car, he's shot at. Thus begins the hunt of the hunter by multiple parties seeking the money, the drugs, or just him. Local sheriff Tom Bell mostly arrives on the scene after the dust has settled, the bodies have cooled, and he pieces together what happened...

Cormac McCarthy's No Country for Old Men is a true masterwork of modern American literature. McCarthy's prose is razor sharp, and the novel possesses a haunting depth. He crafts a gripping, philosophical thriller that fearlessly explores fate, violence, and morality. The novel's pacing is relentless, the characters unforgettable—especially the chilling Anton Chigurh—and the moral questions it raises linger long after you've turned the final page. A brilliant and beautifully bleak tale, No Countr...

‘I just have this feelin' we’re lookin' at somethin' we really ain’t never even seen before’Sheriff Ed Tom Bell is having a bad day. A bloody body has been found in the trunk of a car.Arriving at the scene, Bell, an aging WWII vet, feels an awful sense of foreboding. Stuff like this doesn’t happen in sleepy Terrell County, on the Mexican border.Llewelyn Moss, a thirty-something veteran of Vietnam, is out hunting in the desert. In a barren landscape of rock and dust, he comes across some SUVs ful...

“How does a man decide in what order to abandon his life?”― Cormac McCarthy, No Country for Old MenMy first encounter with Cormac McCarthy's *No Country for Old Men* came via a 'Partially Examined Life' podcast featuring three young philosophers and Eric Petrie, a university professor specializing in McCarthy's dark Texas-set novel from 1980. Their fascinating discussion inspired me to both read the book and listen to the audiobook, narrated by Tom Stechschulte. I'm so glad I did. Stechschulte's...

PHILOSOPHY OF JUSTICE The three main characters from the Coen brothers' film. I find Bardem so unbearable that I couldn't enjoy the movie, even though it took home four Oscars, including one wasted on Bardem himself.It's an easy read, surprisingly smooth.But that's not necessarily a good thing.I missed the snags, the need to reread, to stop and imagine and evoke, that *Blood Meridian* and the *Border Trilogy* had. I'm fundamentally disappointed; I expect and demand more from Cormac McCarthy. He ...

So, are we gonna talk about *No Country for Old Men*, he said. Why not, she replied. Then we gotta do it like McCarthy, he said. Short sentences. Southern dialect. No punctuation. I can drop the punctuation, she said. But I can't do Southern. You can try. Well then I cain't. That good enough for you? You're tryin'. That's the important thing. Cain't do more than try. Thank you. I wish I could speak it. It's a beautiful language. But I ain't got his ear. He's got the best ear for dialect t...

Columbo would have nailed Anton Chigurh.

Columbo: Just one more thing… how'd you rig that coin toss?
Anton: It was fate.
Columbo: [chuckles] Well, that’s the most I've ever won on a coin toss. Ever.
Anton: I am very happy for you.
Columbo: Looks like there's still some country left for old men after all. Alright, straight to jail.

Anyway, amazing book. If you're looking for a gripping read, Cormac McCarthy's "No Country for Old Men" is a must.

Cormac McCarthy has created – again – the perfect villain, this time in the form of a former special forces killer named Anton Chigurh. Like Judge Holden and Glanton in *Blood Meridian*, Chigurh is intelligent, resourceful, and utterly devoted to violence and chaos. Yet, like the antagonists in *Blood Meridian*, McCarthy has imbued in Chigurh a strange integrity, a devotion to a natural order that I think is McCarthy's embodied illustration of evil – a man cut off and separated from the love of...

“The dead man was lying against a rock with a nickelplated government .45 automatic lying cocked in the grass between his legs. He’d been sitting up and had slid over sideways. His eyes were open. He looked like he was studying something small in the grass. There was blood on the ground and blood on the rock behind him. The blood was still a dark red but then it was still shaded from the sun. Moss picked up the pistol and pressed the grip safety with his thumb and lowered the hammer. He squatted...

This is officially the 1000th review I’ve written on Goodreads, and I wanted to make sure that the book would fit the occasion, so that’s why I decided to re-read this one. What better novel could I choose than this heartwarming tale of human kindness from one of the most optimistic men on the planet, Cormac McCarthy?** Note - That statement is sarcasm done in the interest of humor. 1000 reviews have taught me that I apparently have to explain that or someone with poor reading comprehension will...