As the year comes to a close I thought I would summarize what I thought the meaning of some, but not all, of the novels we read were. To start off with, A Farewell to Arms is mostly about how love can change people and the randomness of life. Both Catherine and Frederic Henry are improved by love but become too centered on each other and ignore the other problems in their relationship and life. One major theme present throughout the novel is the randomness of life and death. Throughout the novel characters are injured or killed seemingly at random; whether it be from war or illness nobody seemed safe and their lives could end at any moment. The Grapes of Wrath seems to be both a denouncement of capitalism and an illustration of how natural altruism is. Those who are not controlled by capitalism in the novel act kindly and selflessly, while those who have wealth are cruel, even if they don’t want to be. Lastly, Pudd’nhead Wilson is mostly meant to point out the flaws in the claim that white people are superior and to denounce slavery. It also, to me, claims that somebody’s character is formed by their experiences more than their nature and birth.

All of the deaths in No Country for Old Men are in some way, either first hand or second hand, a product of a drug related conflict. Drugs are a major problem in the United States and Novels and Show’s like NCFOL, breaking bad, Narcos, etc. do a great job oh highlighting what actually goes on in drug cartels and distributers. I think it is important for Americans to get a sense of how big the problem really is. I think that these shows also show the Prisons are not and cannot be the only solution to drug related problems. Punishing both distributers and users is necessary, but I also think that sometimes these punishments can go to far. Some of these newer drug shows can also humanize the drug dealers and users and a lot of times the audience can relate to the bad choices that these people have made, even if the audience members haven’t made these choices themselves. I think that we need to place a greater focus on rehabilitation and realizing that fixing America’s drug problem isn’t as simple as locking up the bad guys. I think another way to help drug related problems is to place a higher focus on mental health. A lot of times when someone uses or sells drugs, there mental health isn’t the greatest. I think that by emphasizing these measures, America’s drug problems can be greatly reduced.

In No Country For Old Men, I find the character of Chigurh to be the most interesting. I often wondered, what makes a man like that tick, obviously he is not only driven by money. Like any famous serial killer, Chigurh genuinely enjoys killing people. The concept of him flipping a coin to decide someones fate is a creepy and makes me wonder more about his backstory. We don’t know very much about Chigurh and I wish that we learned more. I always find it interesting to explore if someone is born a killer or if they are made into a killer with how they are raised and what they experience. Chigurh’s character is probably one of my favorite parts of the whole novel. It is so mysterious and every time he is mentioned I wonder more and more about how he became the way that he is. Llewellyn Moss’s character resembles a classic do it yourself mentality and almost every one of his decisions seems like one that I would chosen a different way to approach. He refuses help and is always running back into danger. The audiences frustration with and inability to predict Llewellyn’s decisions is another thing that makes this book so interesting. I think that the combination of these two characters is what really keeps this novel intriguing and sets it apart from others.

My favorite book that I have read this year has been American Assassin. I was the only one that could keep my interest through the entire thing. In our modern society it is fair to say that the majority of people in the upcoming generations would rather watch a movie or tv show than read a book. This is because modern movies and tv shows plunge the watcher into a world that is similar to one they would dream about with nonstop action. This keeps the watcher intrigued the whole time. Movies and tv shows are always looking for a way to build suspense and often this leads to watcher begging to know what happens next. In my opinion American Assassin has been one of the few books that can keep attention similar to a how a movie can. The dialogue keeps it moving, there is a clear favorite couple of characters and their is always a situation that the reader wants to keep reading to find out how the main characters got out of it. I think slow books that are stylistically or thematically famous could never match a movie or show with newer generations because most of them don’t care. They just want to be entertained. American Assassin is truly one of the few books that can still top some shows and movies.

This is the second half of my ranking of novels I read this semester. While I enjoyed all three of these I’d put a gap between the top 2 and number 3.

#3– Pudd’nhead Wilson

I’ve written quite a few blogs already on this one but I found the premise to be super amusing. The switcheroo of Chambers and Tom generates plenty of irony which I always enjoy. I was constantly waiting for Tom’s true identity to catch up to him and the ending, while admittedly anticlimactic, achieved that. 

#2- The Hate U Give

It had been years since I had sat down and read 200+ pages in one sitting. I didn’t think I would ever do it again but one night I ended up not being able to put this novel down. Revolving around Starr Carter, a teen who watches her best friend get shot and killed by a police officer, I found it to be especially relevant to much of what is in the news today. While I thought the dialogue was a bit cheesy at points it was far from enough to get me to stop reading. Thomas delivers a powerful message, culminating the novel by relating the events within to real life victims of police violence. It has the makings of a modern GAN and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

#1- The Grapes of Wrath

When I first saw the list of novels for the semester I was dreading this one. It seemed like the classic 700 page mammoth that would become a chore to sit through every night. I couldn’t have been more wrong. I paired it with an audio book I found online and started to grow attached to the characters. Normally 700 page books tend to drag on for me yet I enjoyed the length here because I felt more attached to the characters. Alternating the chapters between description and action also kept it fresh as I never felt as though either part overstayed its welcome. Combine this storytelling with themes of desperation and hope in times of struggle and it becomes pretty clear to see why The Grapes of Wrath is heralded as the Great American Novel. I fully agree.

For this blog I will be exploring the idea of if Henry really did love Catherine. Henry told himself he loved her and he told her that he loved her but I do not think that Henry knew what actual love meant. The priest knew that actual love is unconditional which means that you wish for and do whatever you can to best serve the person that you love unconditionally. I do not think that Henry truly loved Catherine unconditionally. He did not love the baby which was a part of her and he did not care about her happiness. He only cared about the fact that keeping her happy would make him happy. He needed her for his happiness but if her being happy didn’t benefit him then he would not care, therefor his love was not unconditional.

Since today was our last class day of the year I decided to rank my favorite novels from this semester. I’ll break this into two blogs so I don’t have to completely condense my opinions on each one. 

#6- Day of the Locust

While it’s my least favorite of the novels we read this semester, I don’t hate it by any means. It is more a victim of unfortunate timing as with school being moved online while we were in the middle of it I got a bit caught up and probably didn’t give it the full attention it deserved. However, because of this I found it hard to engage with and frequently got myself confused with all the comparisons between the characters and the roles they played. I would probably have to reread to solidify my opinion.

#5– A Farewell To Arms

After not reading at all for school during first semester, this was the first book I had read on a set schedule since 11th grade. I wasn’t captivated by Frederic and Catherine’s love story and found it a bit dry until the last part of the novel. I finally started to really enjoy it by the last section where Catherine goes into labor but by then it was already wrapping up. 

#4- The Color Purple

While the content, especially at the beginning, is really dark, I thought it was powerful how Celie transformed over the course of the novel. The abuse she describes is definitely hard to stomach but I think that was Walker’s intent. It isn’t my favorite because of this reason but I can’t deny that it was masterfully written.

“The pigeon house pleased her. It at once assumed the intimate character of a home, while she herself invested it with a charm which it reflected like a warm glow. There was with her a feeling of having descended in the social scale, with a corresponding sense of having risen in the spiritual. Every step which she took toward relieving herself from obligations added to her strength and expansion as an individual. She began to look with her own eyes; to see and to apprehend the deeper undercurrents of life. No longer was she content to “feed upon opinion” when her own soul had invited her” (pg.7, chapter 32). 

This quote is a turning point in the book The Awakening. Edna now realizes that she is an individual in life whose actions are for her, and not for others. She is growing closer to herself, but away from her family and society. She is learning that she likes it best when she can act the way she wants to act, and do what she wants to do, not what others or society wants her to do or to act like. This quote is showing that Edna is starting to become more independent, which could also be foreshadowing Edna’s suicuide.

Pudd’nhead Wilson presents many ideas about how a child’s race, birth and nurturing will affect their character years later. I’ll leave out the premise since you should already know it if you’re reading this. The two boys switched at birth look almost identical even to Roxy, so nobody can tell which child is white and which is black. I’ll call them by their original names just to avoid confusion from now on. Anyway, Collins is spoiled rotten and is extremely cruel towards his slaves, just as a white slaveholder would be. Had the twins never been switched I’d imagine that Tom would do the same thing. I believe that Twain was trying to say that your birth and race have permanent effects on your identity but that the way you were raised matters far more. The idea that whites have superior genetics is put down immediately by the fact that Collins and Tom look nearly identical and that Collins is Tom’s master. Of course, there are inevitably ties that bind them to their true identity as it is eventually found out who they truly are. There are things that neither characters can hide that have simply always been a part of their identity, this being fingerprints. Ultimately this discovery ruins Tom’s and Collin’s lives as their identity up to this point had been completely different from the one they were supposed to have. This proves that despite Tom supposedly having superior genetics, he is far more used to being a slave due to his experiences.

Cormac McCarthy has grown to be one of my favorite authors throughout the past year. His style has been the key in keeping me hooked and making sure that the book moves along at a breakneck pace. Perhaps I relate to his simple sentences and seeming lack of respect for syntax, punctuation and grammar but I can’t help but like it for its efficiency. So far, I’ve read The Road, All the Pretty Horses, and No Country for Old Men, all of which have the same general style, with a few minor details changed. I’m going to take a more general look at McCarthy’s style rather than focusing on any of the three in particular, but I will try to draw more from No Country for Old Men since that is the one I read most recently (and the one I can do a long blog on).

In my Junior year I went through the joy that was AP Language and Composition. While I did enjoy the class, the book choices were far from my favorite. For example, in contrast to McCarthy, Frederick Douglass chose to drag out his sentences for as long as humanly possible using semicolons. I recognize that this is actually extremely good sentence structure, and that his use of Logos, Ethos and Pathos were nearly flawless. Yes, Frederick Douglass is a genius when it comes to writing, but it just feels painful to have to read a sentence that is a page long and then sit there and analyze it for the next 10 minutes to fully understand its meaning. The themes in McCarthy’s writing are communicated clearly and artistically without being too unsubtle. Rather than posing arguments like other authors, he chooses to get his point across mostly through dialogue and actions of characters. One clear example is the idea of “carrying the fire” from The Road. It’s something that the boy and the father talk about somewhat rarely throughout the book. Most of the non-dialogue sections only talk about very physical things like food, cold, rain and other people. Ideas such as carrying the fire can’t really be brought up all that much as they struggle to meet their basic physiological needs. This is present also during No Country for Old Men when he is fighting for his life after returning to where he got the money: 

“He got out his keys and his billfold and buttoned them into his shirtpocket. The cold wind blowing off the water smelled of iron. He could taste it.“

 But you can clearly see the man and boy carrying the fire and keeping their morals throughout the book, even when there isn’t explicit dialogue about it. The dialogue is only there to make it clear that the man is passing the fire to the boy and to help make it clear what purpose carrying the fire accomplishes. 

Again, I want to emphasize that just because McCarthy uses short sentences doesn’t mean that his writing lacks complexity. His use of vivid imagery, metaphors and similes help me actually imagine what it is like in the novels as well as the novel’s mood. The Road’s depressing and lonely atmosphere was palpable throughout the entire novel; the beauty of nature and the sense of adventure in the beginning of All the Pretty Horses sucked me in and made me want to keep reading; the desperation and hopelessness in some of No Country for Old Men’s scenes made it impossible to stop reading. One example of the use of simile in McCarthy’s comes from The Road:

“By dusk of the day following they were at the city. The long concrete sweeps of the interstate exchanges like the ruins of a vast funhouse against the distant murk”.

Out of all the novels I will say that All the Pretty Horses was the best in terms of imagery and mood. Each part in the novel had very distinct moods and each one was extremely successful in communicating it.

Maybe my love of McCarthy really just stems from me being bad at reading, but I won’t lie by saying he isn’t one of my favorite authors. Had his novels been written by Frederick Douglass instead I would never have chosen his books if offered the choice. In the future my goal is to perhaps learn a little and work to improve my own writing using his. Although, maybe you would prefer if I did use punctuation.