If you haven’t heard about The Passage by Justin Cronin yet — chances are you will. Very, very soon.
Cronin’s new novel hits stores today — but the buzz has been building for months — even years now. In fact, Fox 2000 is already working on a movie adaptation of the novel (they bought the film rights based only on the first 400 pages of the book — which clocks in at a total of 780+ pages). The novel is a modern twist on the vampire legend, and there is no sparkling anywhere in sight.
Instead, the novel takes a modern, apocalyptic approach to the myth — and if the buzz is any indication, we’re going to be hearing a lot about The Passage for years to come. It’s already garnered a ton of support from the likes of Stephen King, Jennifer Egan and others.
Here is the official synopsis:
“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. He 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—towards 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, masterful prose, and depth of human insight mark it as a crucial and transcendent work of modern fiction.
For the comments: Will you be reading The Passage?
Novel Novice 
I will! I just got an email from my local bookseller telling me that this was going to be a hot new read and that I’d hear about it. Then, your email came. Sounds like he was right!
It is in my TBR stack!
I haven’t decided if I’m going to be reading this or not but it sounds interesting and I’ve heard tons of good things about it.
Even though I’m only half-way through, I know that this book is going to be one of my most favorite reads. If you haven’t bought it yet, go. Right now. Sure, you look at it and think, “wow, another vampire story”. Believe me, it’s so much more. The Passage is a fantastic new twist on an old classic and I would suggest it to almost anyone.