No Country for Old Men

Outstanding book, but not at all what I had expected.

I expected a rather straight forward, Western style thriller in the genre or a John Wayne movie or a Louis L'Amour novel. It was anything but.

The book is several things at once; it is a study in understatement, it is a philosophical commentary on today's society and politics, and it is a dark yet conflicted account of what is probably a fairly common situation at the Texas-Mexico border with a sincere and heartfelt tribute to a solid marriage mixed in.

It is also a complete rebellion against the writing rules espoused by every college in the country. The author writes in a very disorganized style, seemingly opposed to quotation marks, paragraphs, apostrophes, and dialogue clarifying pronouns. He will also launch into a back and forth dialogue that often lead me to backtrack to the beginning so I could keep track of who said what. Ironically, the book felt like a quick read so maybe the author has successfully proven that all those grammar rules just slow us down.

If you like tidy endings, closure, and a prevailing sense of justice and order, this is not the book for you. If you'd like to step inside the head of an imperfect man trying to balance enforcing the law and protecting the public with his desire to enjoy spending the rest of his life with the woman he adores, then it's an easy choice.