Always Judge A Book By its Cover!

When I got the book, The Road, I did not even want to open the book. I thought the novel would have some relation to the poem I read and had to recite in midde school called "The Road Not Taken", by Robert Frost. The cover seemed sad and colorless. To be honest, it reminded me of an old person's book, that would most likely have a huge life lesson that they could relate to,or something like that. Because in the assignment I had to read the book, I got over my laziness and began.

The beginning of the book was very confusing for me. I could not understand why everything seemed to be so empty. The author, Cormac McCarthy, describes everything as gloomy, dark, full of ashes, and lifeless; although, he does not mention why everything appears to be this way. My guesses are wars, a huge fire that wiped out the area they are in, or possibly, but with much doubt, the end of the world. Whatever really happened got exterminated all the people in the world, or most of the people, but then possessed the rest of the people still living in the world. After reading the first few pages of the book, I realized the novel had absolutely nothing to do with the poem by Frost.

McCarthy also mentioned that the two main people in the book were a little boy and his father. Where was the boy's mother? Why was she gone? Was this all of what was left of the human race after whatever happened? I continued to read and the book explained about the shooting scene and why the mother had suddenly disappeared from the face of the earth. personally, I could never make a decision like that. I naturally am a very maternal person. I take care of all of my things, I am always watching over my little sister, and I am a neat freak when it comes to my personal belongings. These are all characteristics of being a mother. I have a farm in La Calera, in which my family owns many animals. We have sheep, cows, geese, turkeys, chickens, horses and rabbits. Of these many animals, I personally own one of the bunnies and one of the horses, but I do not pay to feed them, or keep them in a sheltered home (that is what my father does.) With my animals, I always make sure they have enough food for the time I am gone, I make sure that their homes are sturdy and good enough for them to live comfortably. I also do not let them get into situations where they could easily get in danger's way. If a nuclear bomb went down or something, I could never shoot any of my animals, or shoot myself... 1) because I would be too scared to actually shoot myself, and 2) because I would always want to know that my babies are safe and ok.

In conclusion, I saw that my gut feeling was right. The cover of the book told me as a reader that the book would be weird and hard to understand. there would be many hidden meanings that only people who are prepared to teach the book would know of and understand.