The Road by Cormac McCarthy

This has to be the grimmest post-apocalyptic tale I have
ever read. A man and his son journey through a wrecked world - the air is full of ash, it's freezing, and nothing grows. The few survivors the duo encounter as they journey towards the sea are cannibals, murderers, and the like. When the little boy says, "Oh, Papa," after
seeing a charred baby rotating on a spit, you realize there may not be any light at the end of The Road. McCarthy won the Pulitzer for this book and the film adaptation starring Viggo Mortensen will be released this October. The ultimate anti-beach read.

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