
When Cormac McCarthy writes something, it’s considered an instant classic. It’s like his newly released work has been in the fabric of US literature for decades, yet it’s a fresh release. I had previously read his most well-known books, The Road and No Country For Old Men. The former brought me to tears and the latter kept me on the edge of my seat. Check out our review.
It’s not only his storytelling, but his style is iconic. His minimal use of punctuation makes for a unique experience when reading his work. It’s incredible how reliant we are on speech marks, apostrophes, and the like, but McCarthy makes you rethink how to read and pay attention to conversations to ensure you know who is speaking. He also puts the onus on himself to ensure one does not get lost in the conversation or flow of prose. It is artistry.
But let’s stop gushing over McCarthy and get to the book, The Passenger. All in all, I was gutted to be disappointed with it. The blurb has an excellent hook: a plane crashes into the sea and our protagonist, John Western, is a diver who discovers that one passenger is missing from the plane with no evidence of how they escaped. This sets up a great mystery novel, even a thriller. But for me, it just didn’t get there.
The book moved slowly and never really gained pace.
Also, there are a large number of peripheral characters which, rather than serving the purpose of the story, more so allowed the opportunity for McCarthy to share some ideologies that he may or may not believe in, but wanted to talk about nonetheless. I felt that this allowed for a lot of info-dumping that wasn’t really necessary. There was also one part of the book where Western spends time on an oil rig. McCarthy goes into pretty intricate detail on the mechanics of oil rig machinery and functionality. Great if you’re into oil rigs, but info-dumping if you’re not. I felt that he pulled too much of his research into the final product.
I sensed that the book was more than a “where is that passenger?” mystery, and that it was more of a psychological study into the mind of the protagonist who seemed like a very lost, introverted, lonely soul who missed his deceased sister. But by the time I had worked out that this story was trying to be something deeper than I had gathered from the blurb, I was pretty deep into the book. I found myself reading a book I wasn’t really interested in. I stuck with it because I have an intrinsic guilt for not giving up on books, but once I got to the last page, I still had no idea what had gone on.
I understand that the arty types will regard The Passenger as an intelligent piece of work that misguides, redirects, and makes you think about the world’s existential questions. However, call me old-fashioned, but when I see a book that discusses a missing person on a sunken plane, I kinda wanna know what happens.
I still don’t know.
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