Blood Meridian - Cormac McCarthy.
Worth reading for the landscape descriptions alone, McCarthy transforms the American west into a hellscape of inhuman violence, savagery, and evil; and yet, it's a beautiful descent into madness.
His character of the Judge is as captivating as he is horrifying. Some choice quotes from him:
> "Whatever in creation exists without my knowledge exists without my consent."
> "War is the ultimate game because war is at last a forcing of the unity of existence. War is god."
> "Moral law is an invention of mankind for the disenfranchisement of the powerful in favor of the weak. Historical law subverts it at every turn. A moral view can never be proven right or wrong by any ultimate test. A man falling dead in a duel is not thought thereby to be proven in error as to his views. His very involvement in such a trial gives evidence of a new and broader view."
> "The freedom of birds is an insult to me. I'd have them all in zoos."
> "All progressions from a higher to a lower order are marked by ruins and mystery and a residue of nameless rage."
Just be prepared for McCarthy's writing style if you decide to read him. He uses long sentences for effect; the long sentences where words seem to tumble over one another in an endless rush evokes movement and the distant horizon of the open desert as well as traditional oral ways of storytelling. His diction is also...archaic.
