Reviewed by Bill Sheehan

Sometimes, you can actually believe the hype. A case in point is Justin Cronin’s massive new novel, The Passage, which, in the months before its official release, has generated an enormous amount of anticipatory buzz. Publication rights have been sold in literally dozens of countries. Director Ridley Scott has purchased film rights for a considerable sum, and writers as diverse as Stephen King and Jennifer Egan have been lavish in their praise. The question then arises: Is this a smoke-and-mirrors attempt to create another vacuous publishing “event,” or is the novel worthy of the money and attention it has received? Fortunately for all of us, the answer to the latter question is a resounding Yes. The Passage is absorbing, inventive, and supremely well written, the kind of book that gives commercial success a good name.

Cronin, a professor of English at Rice University, has published two previous novels, The Summer Guest and Mary and O’Neil, which earned him modest sales and a large “literary” reputation. In interviews, Cronin has said that when he asked his young daughter what sort of book he should write next, she replied that his first two novels were probably “boring” and that he should try to write a book about “a girl who saves the world.” In a display of uncommon parental wisdom, Cronin took her advice, and The Passage–the first volume in a projected trilogy–is the initial result.

The Passage combines two popular sub-genres, the post-apocalyptic epic and the vampire tale. The narrative begins in the jungles of Bolivia, where a group of scientists, following a trail of rumors and legend, hope to find an answer to “the greatest mystery of all–the mystery of death itself.” Instead, what they discover is a virulent, highly contagious form of vampirism, which destroys some members of the company and contaminates others. When the surviving remnants return to this country, they are quarantined and co-opted into a secret government research project aimed at creating a new–and unstoppable–military weapon. Among those caught up in the project are FBI Special Agent Brad Wolgast, who “recruits” death row inmates to serve as expendable raw material, and an extraordinary young girl named Amy Harper Bellafonte, whose unsuspected powers will one day help her to save the world.

Inevitably, the best laid plans of men and governments go badly wrong. Infected test subjects breach the quarantine and find their way into the outside world. Over time, the geometric spread of vampirism devastates the country, killing most of the population outright and turning a smaller percentage into bloodthirsty “virals,” leaving only tiny, isolated human enclaves behind.

The Passage tells the story of one such enclave: First Colony, a self-contained frontier society in the San Jacinto Mountains of California. Trapped behind a vulnerable barricade, the residents of First Colony live in constant fear of the encroaching virals, and have created a community with laws and customs suited to their precarious existence. Unexpected occurrences–the appearance of the Girl from Nowhere, the imminent failure of their electrical system, and the discovery of a radio signal from an unknown source–lead a group of Colonists to venture into the Terra Incognita beyond their walls, where they hope to find–and reconnect with–whatever pockets of humanity remain. Their long and hazardous journey forms the dramatic centerpiece of the novel.

Reduced to such a bare bones summary, the events of The Passage might seem overly familiar or even hackneyed. In lesser hands, that might have been the result. But Cronin is absolutely committed to this material and treats it without a trace of condescension. True, there are echoes of certain prominent exemplars of this sort of story. (Stephen King’s The Stand is an obvious example, and one of Cronin’s characters, Ida “Auntie” Jackson, is close enough to King’s Mother Abigail to seem like a deliberate tip of the authorial hat.) Still, Cronin’s vision is clearly his own, and he elaborates that vision with great precision and absolute control. The large cast of characters is highly individualized and drawn with empathy and insight. The pacing is patient and deliberate, but never plodding. The entire structure rests on a bedrock of cumulative detail, and every scene, however ordinary or apocalyptic its subject, comes sharply into focus, propelled by Cronin’s vivid, deceptively effortless style. On its own, The Passage stands as a formidable accomplishment, the product of a writer with exceptional gifts and great narrative energy. If Cronin can sustain this same level of invention through two more volumes, the result will be a work of genuine, perhaps permanent, importance. The next installment can’t come quickly enough for me.