The Blood Red Road

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While I think the Blood Red Road tells a story of overcoming obstacles through trust, friendship and perseverance that rings true to how such trials and tribulations would be experienced by adolescents, Young's message to the reader can become muffled due to the stylistic choice of writing with no punctuation. Young commits to the choice of using dialect to narrate the book from start to finish which I think works towards the goal of the novel to displace the reader from the language of here and now to that of Saba and the other characters who live in a post apocalyptic world. An argument could be made for Young's decision to write without punctuation throughout the novel because in the world of that time, there seems to be no formal education or rules governing items such as language, but a focus on survival; a lack of punctuation mirrors the lack of prescriptive rules in the world of which the novel is set. While this mirror of text and reality in the novel speaks to the reader's experience of this world, this lack of punctuation and single dialect does murky the waters of clear understanding of the reader. During exchanges of dialogue, the lack of punctuation in many cases requires the reader to second guess who is speaking to whom, and as a result, character development, full comprehension of the meaning of what is being said between/among characters and what the text is trying to say as a whole suffers because of a lack of clarity. Young fails to clearly delineate the separation of dialogue throughout the novel, and I believe that this not only causes confusion, but really hinders the reader's ability to gain further insight into the different characters, their relationships to each other and Young's overall message of the book to the reader. I think this confusion could be addressed through particular care taken to break up dialogue in a way that assures understanding of who is speaking to whom as well as creating separate dialects for various characters from different parts of the world within the novel. Jack, the Free Hawks, Saba, etc. are all form different areas of the world, so why not have them speak in different dialects to delineate the dialogues? Not only would this allow for clarity in the novel, but would allow us to better trace character development within the novel. The novel contains wonderful elements to pull in adolescent readers such as suspense, murder, love, loyalty, control etc. through its ability to speak to the experiences of adolescent development, but due to stylistic choices, fails to provide readers with text that is easily read and understood from beginning to end.

Comments

  1. TashaTOnlineApril 7, 2017 at 10:26 AM

    You make a very strong point regarding the use of dialect. I agree that it can be distracting. I also like your idea that the author could have used different dialect ranges for different groups in the novel. My main issue is that the book leaves so many holes. How far in the future is it set? What caused the apocalypse? Who are the "wreckers?" While the reader can make suppositions, these holes still leave open ends--which I am guessing are tied up in subsequent books. I look forward to reading the others and really appreciate you suggesting this trilogy!

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