Rating: 
Summary: No superlative too great
Review: Many readers have written many things about this book, and some of their comments I find curious. But the single word I feel comfortable using to describe this work is stunning, because I was truly stunned by its beauty, its pace, its ability to capture the human spirit.If this is a coming of age tale, then it is the quintessential example of this genre. McCarthy's style is so unique, yet bears well when compared to the eloquence and characterization of Faulkner and the rhythmic beauty of Marquez, as McCarthy's style encapsulates the best of these authors while retaining its own voice. Reading this tale is enthralling and exhausting.
Rating:
Summary: Despite slow start, powerful, beautiful story
Review: In retrospect, this novel is one of my favorites in a long while. I found the structure a little daunting at first (somewhat Frank McCourt-like, to my eye), and it took a few pages (no chapters here; just four "volumes" within the novel) to get going, but once I got into the rhythm of McCarthy's stylistic prose, I found the plot riveting, and LOVED the characters. Speaking of the characters, they are developed through spare, telling dialogue and their actions, a refreshing change from the too common technique of authors outlining of characteristics. It's funny; as I was reading it, the Brad Pitt character (Tristan?) of the "Legends of the Fall" film came to mind for John Grady--then I saw that he reads on the audio version and, I surmise, will star in the film. Wish this had been my assigned reading in AP English--beats Joseph Conrad, in my opinion!
Rating: 
Summary: a teacher's voice
Review: McCarthy writes using dialogue and extremely long sentences, reminding me of Hemingway. It is an excellent "story". I loved the intertwined languages and often encourage my students using that format. The Spanish vocabulary is wonderful! It is obviously a good book for English classes but could also include further research on horses and the plains in U.S. History. I enjoyed the book though it did take a little while for it to roll around in my mind. Carmen A.
Rating: 
Summary: READING THIS BOOK WAS A WASTE OF MY LIFE
Review: for chrissake, choose a good book to read while you're still alive. this is the most wretched piece of TRASH i have ever made the mistake of considering literature worthy of my attention.
Rating:
Summary: Contemporary Literature at its Best.
Review: A western, coming of age novel, a transformation from innocence to road-worn. One quality remains unchanged throughout this story of two young men that leave their home in Texas for adventures in Mexico, friendship. McCarthy's Mexico is a vast other-world with it well described life styles of the vaqueros and the breaking of wild horses. The prose is sparse and haunting, prompting the reader to use their imagination. A refreshing approach from the contemporary American way of reveal it all in the most graphic and shocking detail. The story is intense and riveting, I couldn't put it down. All the big themes are depicted here: friendship, maturation, love, survival and family. It did remind me of Faulkner's work, in that, the story unfolds in a series of almost orchestral movements. An important author who should not be missed.
Rating:
Summary: Classic good book
Review: In a nutshell: beautifully written and the characterizations were perfect. The author did a perfect job with both. You knew the characters from what they said and how they said it. You saw the surroundings from the clear descriptions. I read many books, and I must recommend it to people who love both a good story AND great writing. It had both, many books do not. A classic, good book.
Rating: 
Summary: Rich in mood and detail but distant characters
Review: All the Pretty Horses is the story of John Grady Cole and his friend Lacey Rawlins, two teenage boys who leave home in southern Texas and cross into Mexico on horseback, seeking adulthood and independence. They find it through a series of adventures that take them deep into Mexico and back again. Skilled with horses, they wind up working at a horse ranch owned by a wealthy family. Cole falls in love with the daughter, but despite the respect he's earned from her father, the family intervenes, and Cole is arrested and put in jail. On his way back to freedom, he has to fight for his life, his love, his friendships, and his horse. This book is more about mood and character than it is about plot. Despite all of Cole & Rawlins' adventures, the book is slow moving. McCarthy writes beautifully, paying attention to the details that make up the simple action of putting a saddle on a horse, for example, or lighting up a cigarette. At times I found this relaxing, but other times it made me restless. I can see why this book received such praise, since the writing does create such a peaceful atmosphere, even when talking about violent events. However, it didn't work for me that well. I ended up feeling distant from the events and the people in the story, never fully understanding their motivations or reactions to events. I enjoyed the read, but I didn't especially look forward to getting back to it each evening.
Rating:
Summary: A new classic
Review: I'll keep it short. This is the best novel I have read in a long, long time. McCarthy's prose has been praised to high heaven before, let me just say it deserves every superlative anyone's ever granted it. But my love for this book stems from my awe at the hero, John Grady Cole, who is probably the best person, in every sense, I've come across in literature. As one of the characters does, I can only sit and gape at John Grady, not quite understanding who he is or how he does as he does, but knowing he's a better man than I could ever have expected.
Rating:
Summary: go get em
Review: I've been readin' books since I could read and I read a lot of books that've made me doubt my faith in humanity, but this ain't one of 'em.
Rating:
Summary: McCarthy's Best
Review: This is the first novel in the set of McCarthy's so called "Border Trilogy," and by far, the best. It stands on its own as a classic American novel. It is the story of a taciturn 16-year old Texan, with a love for horses and a gift for training them, who sadly (or so it seems; his emotions are never explicitly revealed) comes to the realization that there is nothing for him in Texas anymore to keep him there. With a friend, and on horseback, he embarks upon a journey to Mexico. Plotwise, the story is unusual in that, unlike the usual standard western, it takes place in 1947, an era way beyond cowboys and Indians. Reminders of this are contained throughout, such as the sudden appearance of a noisy automobile, or the description of a line of telegraph poles stretched across the distance, as far as one can see. Yet Mexico even in 1947 is still in many ways a savage land, and the young men's adventures there are the subject of the novel. I can tell you that when I use the term "adventures," I mean exactly that. This is an exciting novel, a page-turning novel. The lads finally reach a place they wish to call home: a large, sprawling ranch in central Mexico, where they become hands, and where the protagonist ultimately achieves a somewhat exalted position training and breeding horses. I'm not going to give away too much of the plot here, but it's moved to a large degree by the presence of the ranch-owner's daughter, a well-educated, headstrong, black-haired and blue-eyed 17-year-old beauty. Suddenly confronted with the arrival of this lanky, brave, adventurous and mature-for-his-age American . . . well, you can almost guess what will happen, but the story nevertheless veers from cliche and instead becomes fresh, believable and extremely moving. More than the plot, though, is the simple, almost sparse nature of McCarthy's prose. His descriptions of the landscape through which his characters travel is poetic, almost dreamy: "They'd ride out along the cienaga road and along the verge of the marshes while the sun rose riding up flights of ducks out of the shallows or geese or mergansers that would beat away over the water scattering the haze and rising up would turn to birds of gold in a sun not yet visible from the bolson floor." The spare language, and also the lack of punctuation, lend to the almost surreal nature of his prose, which, I should add, is never difficult to digest. It's similar in many ways to the best of Hemingway both in style and in subject matter. Both authors write rough-and-tumble, outdoors adventures; both of them use stark prose; both of them spare the reader layer after layer of psychological analysis, and simply tell the story. Hemingway may have had a better grip on character development, but McCarthy is by far the more poetic. This is fiction of the first drawer, and not to be missed.
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