The Passenger

Bobby Western is a proficient diver working on a boat crew that has been called in on a possible search and rescue mission. A small plane crashed off the Mississippi Gulf coast, no survivors were found. Western is inclined to forget the whole job, except for being interrogated by two cops. Western is questioned about a possible missing passenger, and their questions only stoke his long-simmering paranoia.

His father had worked on the Manhattan Project during World War II, but his only reward for his efforts was a likely government-sanctioned theft of his work papers. The mysteries continue to pile up and soon Western is under the thumb of the IRS and other government agencies. Escape is the only viable option, but the destination and the resources to make that happen are a deeper mystery.

The Passenger is the newest novel by the esteemed author Cormac McCarthy. McCarthy paints every scene with vivid imagery, beauty often obscuring deep darkness within his characters or the locations they inhabit. The dual narratives of Bobby Western and his troubled sister Alice are laced with a vast array of emotions, but tragedy is their commonality. McCarthy continues to conjure up magic with his pen.