Rule breakers unite!

[Bruce]

As a writer with a developing talent that is devoid of professional training in a university setting, I've been hammered with new issues with less than familiar names; tropes, character arcs, targeted vocabulary. Writing coaches speak in absolutes of the rules that should be followed.
McCarthy throws most of those out the window and writes beautifully about people you probably don't want to know. ( but wish you did).
I'm about three-quarters of the way through with this book and have yet to discover a character arc. Suttree's story develops in vignettes with time breaks from one day to the next season separating episodes. Backstory is minimalist, a sentence thrown out at seeming random lets us know that Suttree has been to college. It takes several chapters for us to determine the time period is post WWII, but how post will remain a mystery.
His vocabulary is immense and well and creatively used. Never has the broken back of a brickpile southern metropolis been so brutally described in such achingly beautiful prose. Sentences fragmented, Thoughts, images, and suggestions of poetry catch and dance rhythmically in typographic splendor. I'm definitely going to finish this book. I still haven't decided if I would want to meet Suttree in his element.