A dark, nihilistic tale, Cormac McCarthy's second novel Outer Dark sees brother and sister wander separately through a countryside scourged by three terrifying and elusive strangers.
In an unspecified place in Appalachia, sometime around the beginning of the twentieth century, a woman named Rinthy bears her brother's child.
The brother, Culla, abandons the baby in the woods, and tells Rinthy that the he has died by natural causes. When she sees his grave empty, she sets forth alone to find her son.
Wracked by sin, Culla too leaves for the countryside. He will be haunted by The Trio, punishers and murderers, as the novel moves towards its eerie, apocalyptic resolution.
'A profound parable that ultimately speaks to any society in any time' – Time
Praise for Cormac McCarthy:
'McCarthy worked close to some religious impulse, his books were terrifying and absolute' – Anne Enright, author of The Green Road and The Wren, The Wren
'His prose takes on an almost biblical quality, hallucinatory in its effect and evangelical in its power' – Stephen King, author of The Shining and the Dark Tower series
'[I]n presenting the darker human impulses in his rich prose, [McCarthy] showed readers the necessity of facing up to existence' – Annie Proulx, author of Brokeback Mountain