The Road

First published in 2006, The Road follows an unnamed father and his young son as they travel through the ruins of a world devastated by an unexplained catastrophe. Moving south towards the coast, they cross a landscape of ash, abandoned towns and dwindling supplies, encountering the remnants of humanity in its most desperate and brutal forms. Their journey is governed by hunger and danger, but also by the father’s determination to protect his son and preserve in him a sense of goodness.

In this spare, haunting novel, Cormac McCarthy explores love, memory, mortality and the fragile persistence of moral responsibility when civilisation has collapsed. Its stripped-back prose and biblical cadence give the desolate landscape an almost mythic force, while the relationship at its centre offers a moving meditation on what it means to remain human. Awarded the 2007 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, The Road stands among the defining works of contemporary American literature.

From the book

“What’s the bravest thing you ever did?”

“Getting up this morning,” he said.

— Cormac McCarthy, The Road

On The Road

“The Road is a novel of transforming power and formal risk.”

— Alan Warner, The Guardian