What Fiction are you reading this week, January 22, 2023?

[Orrex]

12. The Passenger was very different from what I was expecting

McCarthy's been my favorite author for decades, and I can recite whole passages from memory. Heck, his grocery lists are better written than a lot of published fiction.

So The Passenger is very well written of course, with McCarthy's trademark quirks like scant punctuation and no quotation marks, etc., and the style is in place the story itself didn't really thrill me. Some solid characters and great interactions, but the text is very dialogue-heavy. I'd guess upwards of 75% of the text is spoken, and although me writes terrific dialogue, that's not where his real power lies IMO, and it's not why I return to his books again and again.

Stella Maris, the companion piece (as you note), is in fact 100% dialogue. I'm about 40 pages in, so I'll be curious to see where it goes and how it gets there.

Definitely don't regret buying them, but they're not entirely the works I was anticipating.