CITIES OF THE PLAIN

One of the pleasures of listening to, rather than reading, this final installment of The Border Trilogy, is not having to struggle with Cormac McCarthy's stylistically challenging prose. McCarthy's unattributed dialogue, disregard for standard punctuation and sometimes page-long compound sentences often force readers to pay more attention to his words than to the story itself. Frank Muller's performance, however, fully realizes both the story and the beauty of McCarthy's language--leaving only pleasure for the listener. Muller's characterizations are flawless, and he has seized upon the sonorous qualities in McCarthy's prose, turning long descriptive passages into delicious riffs of narrative poetry. Listeners who have also read McCarthy's work may conclude that McCarthy should first be heard read out loud (by Muller), then savored a second time on paper. G.B.C. Winner of AUDIOFILE Earphones Award ©AudioFile, Portland, Maine [Published: FEB/MAR 99]