The Passage (preorder)

(preorder—to be published in Spring 2027)

Dust jacket and interior illustrations by François Vaillancourt.

Stephen King says The Passage “has the vividness that only epic works of fantasy and imagination can achieve.”

Lividian Publications is proud to be publishing a deluxe signed and slipcased Limited Edition hardcover of The Passage by Justin Cronin. Weighing in at 840 pages, this is one of the largest books we’ve ever published. François Vaillancourt provided stunning full-color wrap-around artwork for the dust jacket and twelve black and white illustrations for the interior, making this special edition a true work of art.

About the Book:

IT HAPPENED FAST. THIRTY-TWO MINUTES FOR ONE WORLD TO DIE, ANOTHER TO BE BORN.

First, the unthinkable: a security breach at a secret U.S. government facility unleashes the monstrous product of a chilling military experiment. Then, the unspeakable: a night of chaos and carnage gives way to sunrise on a nation, and ultimately a world, forever altered. All that remains for the stunned survivors is the long fight ahead and a future ruled by fear—of darkness, of death, of a fate far worse.

As civilization swiftly crumbles into a primal landscape of predators and prey, two people flee in search of sanctuary. FBI agent Brad Wolgast is a good man haunted by what he’s done in the line of duty. Six-year-old orphan Amy Harper Bellafonte is a refugee from the doomed scientific project that has triggered apocalypse. Wolgast is determined to protect her from the horror set loose by her captors, but for Amy, escaping the bloody fallout is only the beginning of a much longer odyssey—spanning miles and decades—toward the time and place where she must finish what should never have begun.

With The Passage, award-winning author Justin Cronin has written both a relentlessly suspenseful adventure and an epic chronicle of human endurance in the face of unprecedented catastrophe and unimaginable danger. Its inventive storytelling, masterly prose, and depth of human insight mark it as a crucial and transcendent work of modern fiction.

Special Features:

• Full-color wrap-around artwork by François Vaillancourt
• Twelve black and white interior illustrations by François Vaillancourt
• Offset printed on an acid-free archival quality paper stock
• A fine binding featuring a unique material
• Hot foil stamping on the front cover and spine
• Smyth-sewn to create a more durable binding
• Twine head and tail bands
• High-quality endpapers
• Sewn-in satin ribbon page marker
• Custom-made slipcase stamped with hot foil and featuring a unique die-cut window
• Limited to 750 copies signed by Justin Cronin and François Vaillancourt

Reviews and Praise:

“A blockbuster.”
— The New York Times Book Review

“Mythic storytelling.”
— San Francisco Chronicle

“Magnificent . . . Cronin has taken his literary gifts, and he has weaponized them. . . . The Passage can stand proudly next to Stephen King’s apocalyptic masterpiece The Stand, but a closer match would be Cormac McCarthy’s The Road: a story about human beings trying to generate new hope in a world from which all hope has long since been burnt.”
— Time

“The type of big, engrossing read that will have you leaving the lights on late into the night.”
— The Dallas Morning News

“Addictive.”
— Men’s Journal

“Cronin’s unguessable plot and appealing characters will seize your heart and mind.”
— Parade

About the Author:

Justin Cronin is the New York Times bestselling author of The Ferryman, The Passage, The Twelve, The City of Mirrors, The Summer Guest, and Mary and O’Neil. His work has been published in more than forty-five languages and has sold more than three million copies worldwide. A writer in residence at Rice University, he divides his time between Houston, Texas, and Cape Cod, Massachusetts.