Sherriff Ed Tom Bell, an old man fixing to retire (although he doesn't know it at the start of the book), muses in short bursts about the incursion of pure evil into his jurisdiction. What he doesn't know is that on the side of the bad guys is the baddest guy ever. Llewelyn knows that this suitcase is his best shot at life, and his best recipe for disaster and death. It is there, somewhere in the rocky wilderness, that Llewelyn Moss, a cocky local with not much on his mind but his pretty wife and his prowess at hunting, happens on the remains of a Mexican drug deal gone wrong: dead bodies everywhere and a suitcase full to the brim with money – about 2 million in all.

Sanderson, with its surrounding bleak landscape, provides the setting for No Country for Old Men. I can attest to the barren, colorless and seemingly endless vistas that could turn a good man crazy with the promise of a way out. I once spent a few rather depressing days in Sanderson, Texas – our car broke down on the way to California and we were stuck in a West Texas burg with little activity or charm to recommend it. If you have seen the movie you will like the book even better, because McCarthy has an ear for the cadence of ordinary speech, a talent shared by few (Elmore Leonard comes to mind), so that you can hear the characters talking. The film paid no better homage to McCarthy than to keep his intention intact – no happy ending, no sloppy characterizations, no loose ends. Book review: Cormac McCarthy's *No Country for Old Men*Ĭormac McCarthy is one of America's best writers, and this is one of his better books, honored by being produced as a film by the renowned kings of dark thrills, the Coen brothers.

Book review no country for old men