The Passenger by Cormac McCarthy
The best-selling, Pulitzer Prize,winning author of The Road returns with the first of a two-volume masterpiece: The Passenger is the story of a salvage diver, haunted by loss, afraid of the watery deep, pursued for a conspiracy beyond his understanding, and longing for a death he cannot reconcile with God. Look for Stella Maris, the second volume in The Passenger series, on sale December 6th, 2022 1980, PASS CHRISTIAN, MISSISSIPPI: It is three in the morning when Bobby Western zips the jacket of his wet suit and plunges from the Coast Guard tender into darkness. His dive light illuminates the sunken jet, nine bodies still buckled in their seats, hair floating, eyes devoid of speculation. Missing from the crash site are the pilot's flight bag, the plane's black box, and the tenth passenger. But how? A collateral witness to machinations that can only bring him harm, Western is shadowed in body and spirit by men with badges, by the ghost of his father, inventor of the bomb that melted glass and flesh in Hiroshima, and by his sister, the love and ruin of his soul. Traversing the American South, from the garrulous barrooms of New Orleans to an abandoned oil rig off the Florida coast, The Passenger is a breathtaking novel of morality and science, the legacy of sin, and the madness that is human consciousness.
- Author - Cormac McCarthy
- Publisher - Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
- Publication Date - 10-25-2022
- Page Count - 400
- Hardcover
- Adult
- Fiction
- Product Dimensions - 6.5 W x 9.3 H x 1.5 D
- ISBN-13 - 9780307268990
Web ID: 15190981
Profound...
(This applies to the two books of The Passenger and Stella Maris, which are parts of the whole story.) If you want a novel with a beginning, middle and end, The Passenger is not for you. This is a story of human existence, with all its challenges. The passenger in the title is a symbol. It was there, but no more... Two siblings, both with remarkable minds, geniuses, whose father is a physicist involved in the development of the atomic bomb and whose mother has a more modest rural background. The story is that of the relationship between the siblings and how the world affects them. The prose is spectacular. The conversations contain profound observations. Kudos to McCarthy for the complex scientific subjects he deals with without distracting from the main focus. Overall, quite an experience that requires serious reflection...
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Customer review from barnesandnoble.com
McCarthy's most intentionally challenging yet
Challenging read that rewards close reading, particularly if you are familiar with the author's other works.
This book moved me
I have not read a book that moved me in a long time. This one did. I borrowed it from the library, finished it and find that I have to own a copy of my own. The language is incredibly rich, luscious, at times hilarious, at times movingly descriptive and emotive. The themes of loss and belief, of man's search for meaning, inspire and provoke us to ponder our lives and life itself. A beautiful book.
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Customer review from barnesandnoble.com
Wandering Musings.
I did not like McCarthy's new novel 'Passenger'. It starts off very well with an intriguing story line of a salvage diver working on a sunken small plane, finding dead passengers except one and that the black box has been taken out. The next few chapters move this along a bit, but from there the book spirals down to meaningless chatter, involving his father and sister and even a chat with a friend about the JFK assassination, of all things. The story line wanders all over but never touches the interesting opening theme again. I understand McCarthy hasn't written a book in a while, but perhaps he should have quit while ahead. I definitely do not recommend this book.
Customer review from barnesandnoble.com
Elegant, but an Absolute Bore.
McCarthy has the ability to turn a phrase better than anyone, and has an absolutely beautiful way of structuring his sentences with a command of his words. These reasons, amongst his enthralling tales, are what make him my favorite author. However, this story is anything but enthralling, as it loses steam early on and becomes an aimless, lackluster mess. This book holds within it's pages all his skills within the writing world, unfortunately, the story itself is an absolute bore. Western's tale begins with intrigue but finds no resolution, instead relying on a pondering mindset on the idea/concepts of existence and understanding. Simply stated, nothing really happens in this book, resulting in this being my least favorite of all his works. While this book carries with it his beautiful skill in writing, (the only thing that kept me reading,) the story leaves the reader feeling as if they've just wandered through an aimless path that led them to a destination they really could care less about. I can not bring myself to boast about this book simply because of my love for McCarthy's previous works, or for the man's standing in literature in and of itself. I've thrown this caution to everyone who has asked, and to those who read this review as well; If you love McCarthy's work to the extent that you feel you cannot miss out on his beautiful writing, you may find a reason to finish The Passenger, however I feel most will be much happier to simply avoid this story altogether.
Customer review from barnesandnoble.com
Dark
Decades ago, I picked up my first Cormac McCarthy book, Child of God. It was disturbing. It was gorgeous. It blew my mind. I read the Border Trilogy as it came out, and all his subsequent novels. His style always made me swoon. They are dark novels, and thought-provoking. I was thrilled to receive a finished copy of The Passenger. What a strange experience it is. You travel between two realities. There is the stunningly beautiful child genius Alicia Western’s last days, visited and cajoled by beings arising from her mental illness. And her brother Bobby Western, haunted by his beloved Alicia, pursued by unknown men who think he has something they want, and who travels deeper into alienation and solitude. Alice accomplished her longed for demise, but Bobby only longs for it. While Alicia’s visitations from the Thalidomide Kid are filled with absurd conversations filled with malaprops, Western’s friends expound upon big ideas and theories. There is a long passage about physics that made me blurry eyed, and another probing theories about the Kennedy assignation. Frankly, The Kid was more entertaining with his snarky attitude and colorful misuse of language. But, Western’s friends also probe the existential. “The world’s truth constitutes a vision so terrifying as to beggar the prophecies of the bleakest seer who ever walked it,” one acquaintance tells Western. “Once you accept that idea then the idea that all this will one day be ground to powder and blown into the void becomes not a prophecy but a promise.” Which, in effect, means it will be a tragedy, for no one will be left to name it as such. Even the role of the writer is commented on by Western’s friend John Sheldon: “…any number of these books were penned in lieu of burning down the world–which was their author’s true desire…The legacy of the word is a fragile thing for all its power.” The later part of the novel finds Western hiding from men who have already ransacked his apartment, confiscated his car, and closed his banking account. He has no idea what he has done or what they want. In the opening chapters, Western was part of a diving team that found a downed airplane with anomalies no one can explain. His father worked on the Manhattan Project. His sister had mathematical problems solved only in her head. If any hold secrets the men are pursing is unknown. One man even asked Western if he believed in aliens. As the novel veers away from conversations and people, with Western alone in the landscape, the writing becomes beautiful, if stark. “In the end you can escape everything but yourself,” Sheldon had told Western. Alicia could not escape her illness and her love for her older brother, except in death. Western can not escape his grief for the loss of the love of his life. Thanks to A. A. Knopf for a free book. My review is fair and unbiased.
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Customer review from barnesandnoble.com
Passenger thoughts
I don't know.. probably exactly the way McCarthy wants the reader to respond..it's a great read..a difficult read..an interesting read..and a what the heck? read..many avenues in this...I didn't put it down..but I also got "lost"...huge fan of The Road..this will make me ponder for a bit
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Customer review from barnesandnoble.com
The Passenger - Cormac McCarthy
There are books and authors that booksellers are beyond passionate about. It isn't just that we love them, its that we live with them, alongside them, within them. Cormac McCarthy is one of those writers. For this reader he sits next to the likes of Toni Morrison; giving us books that are more than just pages filled with writing. It has been 16 years since McCarthy's Pulitzer Prize winning novel, The Road. So much has happened to us as human beings in those nearly two decades. To sit down and open this gift was one I had longed for, one I had needed, and one I devoured. The Passenger (the first of a duology) is filled with the fiery language McCarthy is known for, the vivid imagery and the stark dialogue that bring us to the edge of the worlds he creates; our world yes, but also not. The New York Times Review of Books said "McCarthy has been accounted as a secret master and the rightful heir...to the American Gothic tradition of Poe and Lovecraft". I could not agree more. Often he is linked to Hawthorn, Hemingway, Melville and the like, but when you dig deeper there are parallels to cosmic horror and to psychological terror. The Road may well be the best example of that, but in The Passenger it is as vivid as the beautiful sunset on the book's cover. So close to heaven and nature and beauty, but with the desolation of the mystery of time and space, of human violence and hope. This along with its companion novel, Stella Maris, puts the reader on a path of science, sin, morality and madness; giving us glimpses of things we dare not look upon. But a novel that also allows the reader to find solace, grace and solemnity in its hieroglyphic telling. Sorry to be so vague, but trust me this is a wonderful novel, one to savor, to relish and to swim in.
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Customer review from barnesandnoble.com