12 Books To Read If You’re A Fan Of Cormac McCarthy
Add ‘em to the pile
I don’t know if Cormac McCarthy is my favourite writer, but he’s definitely the one I keep returning to again and again. There’s something comforting, even in books like The Road about his absolute mastery of language, his humour, and his depth.
All of which are qualities I enjoyed in the below.
The Long Home by William Gay
Gay, another Tennessee native, was a huge fan of McCarthy, and it shows. This reads like McCarthy’s earliest works, with a strong sense of place and a deep foreboding. It’s also incredibly funny. And, in his descriptions of the woods, storms and the changing seasons, Gay is almost unparalleled.
Euphoria by Heinz Helle
In this novel – translated from the original German – a group of middle-aged, middle-class friends emerge from a skiing vacation to find the world around them has ended. Think of it like the early days of The Road. It’s just as brutal, and like McCarthy, Helle is interested in big, philosophical questions as well as the science holding the universe together.
Beloved by Toni Morrison
What to say about one of the best novels ever written? It’s harrowing, it’s haunting, and it’s beautiful beyond measure. McCarthy might have written bleaker novels, but this is more sorrowful, personable, and human.
Woe To Live On by Daniel Woodrell
A young boy grows up in the brutal American South during a period of historic change. This time, it’s the Civil War and Jake Roedel is part of a gang of outlaw Confederate mercenaries. Like Blood Meridian it’s brutal, bloody and really sets you down in a specific period of time. From a writing perspective, there’s much to admire among the carnage.
O Pioneers by Willa Cather
Alexandra Bergson is chosen to run her family farm on the Nebraskan prairie, much to the anger of her brothers. It’s a slim book, but Cather is able to do so much in so little space, making every detail feel fleshed out and lived in, without needing to expound upon every single ideas for pages and pages. Wonderful stuff.
The Devil All The Time by Donald Ray Pollock
Another book about blood and religion set in the US backwoods. There’s everything here: family, the Vietnam War, serial killers, morality, bone-dry humour. If you saw the film and weren’t quite convinced, I’d still recommend reading this – even on this list, the writing stands apart.
The North Water by Ian McGuire
Blood Meridian references don’t get much more overt than beginning your novel ‘Behold the man’. Thankfully, McGuire is upfront about the homage. The style might lilt heavily towards McCarthy, but in this near-mythical story of whale hunters adrift, McGuire has a lot of his own points to make. Again, it’s one where the writing is brisk, colourful, and enveloping.
Deliverance by James Dickey
Brutal, taut, and tough. You probably know the story, but you might not have read the book. Ultimately, it’s about men trespassing in the wilderness and paying the price. To me, it read as the ultimate deconstruction of the frontiersman and the male ego. Dickey was primarily a poet, and it shows. The writing here is brilliant. See also, his later novel, To The White Sea, which the Coen Brothers once planned to adapt.
Guns Germs And Steel by Jared Diamond
This pop-science history of the world might not contain many cowboys, but McCarthy was always been interested in the natural world, the innate qualities of humankind, and our ancient history. Diamond explores all of this and more, in prose as compelling as any novel.
Tree of Smoke by Denis Johnson
A massive, surreal book about a US military ‘psy op’ set across two decades – this is perhaps the sort of paranoid literary spy tale a different writer would have given us in The Passenger. There’s a lot to wade through here, with repeated readings rewarded.
The Pugilist At Rest by Thom Jones
Arguably tied with Carver as the finest American short story writer, the late Jones was an under-appreciated master of the form. With themes ranging from the Vietnam War to boxing and mental health, this is another great book exploring the fragility of the human mind – not to mention the male ego.
Barkskins by Annie Proulx
The most recent novel from our greatest living writer is an epic, tracing one Canadian logging family over hundreds of years, during which all manner of successes and failures befall them. Like Richard Powers’ The Overstory, it’s a book concerned with trees first and foremost and is all the better for it. Like McCarthy, Proulx is incredibly dry, incredibly well-researched, and incredibly funny.