Our critics discuss The Road. 

To listen to the Slate Audio Book Club on Cormac McCarthy's The Road, click the arrow on the player below.

You can also download the audio file here, or click here to subscribe to the Slate Audio Book Club feed in iTunes.

This month, Slate'sAudio Book Club looks at Cormac McCarthy's best-selling post-apocalyptic road novel, The Road. Is the book a lyrical meditation on existential questions of survival? A gimmicky parenting manual? An exploration of the role of religion in modern life? Meghan O'Rourke, Katie Roiphe, and John Burnham Schwartz discuss these and other questions in the podcast.

And for our next selection, the book club is picking The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream, by Barack Obama.