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Cormac McCarthy: Blood Meridian (1985, Random House) 4 stars

An epic novel of the violence and depravity that attended America's westward expansion, Blood Meridian …

I got through half of it. With Cormac McCarthy in the news recently, I realized had never read the book that was considered his masterpiece. Unsurprisingly, it is nihilistic and violent, and despite the beautiful prose, is a grim slog about man’s affinity for violence. I feel like I got the gist without having to finish the emotionally exhausting and gratuitously violent remainder.