On the flight back from the USA and battling jet lag, I used the time to finish Cormac McCarthy’s
“All the Pretty Horses”. He is one of my favorite authors, and his other novels, “Blood Meridian,” “The Road,” and “No Country for Old Men,” rank high on my all-time book list. My son Oliver loved Blood Meridian, and I noticed that his storytelling resonates with young men. It might be that his stories usually focus on male characters moving through an adventurous landscape (American West/Post-Apocalypse) mixed with violence and captivating writing.
This book is set in South Texas in 1949 and follows John Grady Cole, a 16-year-old cowboy who is dealing with the end of agriculture and ranching in America. The book starts with his grandfather’s funeral and the news that his divorced mother is selling the ranch he grew up on. Cole rides away with a friend to Mexico to seek his fortune and keep his ranch hand lifestyle. Cole eventually finds work at a Mexican ranch and falls in love with the patron’s daughter. I could certainly relate as I made a similar move early in my teaching career, living in small-town USA and finding work at an international school in Colombia. It was my first exposure to upper-class Latino families and differed greatly from the life I lived in the USA. I don’t want to spoil the book, but unlike Cole, I ended up marrying a beautiful Latina.
McCarthy focuses on the details of the landscape and how the boys make their way, sleeping outside and taking care of their horses on their way south. The deserts of northern Mexico are similar to Uzbekistan. I liked how modernity, the sound of cars on the freeway, is in the background as the boys find wild pathways through Texas and Mexico. This symbolizes the dying days of horses as the main form of transport. They have a series of challenges, ranging from finding water, being trapped in storms, getting put in jail, etc.
I am not sure if I am going to read the other two books of McCarthy’s Border Trilogy, “The Crossing” and “Cities of the Plain”. I might watch the 2000 movie based on All the Pretty Horses starring Matt Damon and Penelope Cruz.
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