One of The Atlantic’s “Great American Novels of the Past 100 Years,” now with a new foreword by Marlon James Widely considered one of the finest novels by a living writer,
Blood Meridian is an epic tale of the violence and corruption that attended America’s westward expansion, brilliantly subverting the conventions of the Western novel and the mythology of the “Wild West.” Its wounded hero, the Kid, a fourteen-year-old Tennessean, must confront the extraordinary brutality of the Glanton gang, a murderous cadre on an official mission to scalp Indians. Seeming to preside over this nightmarish world is the diabolical Judge Holden, one of the most unforgettable characters in American fiction.
Based on historical events that took place on the Texas-Mexico border in the 1850s,
Blood Meridian represents a genius vision of the historical West, one whose stature has only grown in the years since its publication.
An epic novel of the violence and depravity that attended America's westward expansion, Blood Meridian brilliantly subverts the conventions of the Western novel and the mythology of the "wild west." Based on historical events that took place on the Texas-Mexico border in the 1850s, it traces the fortunes of the Kid, a fourteen-year-old Tennesseean who stumbles into the nightmarish world where Indians are being murdered and the market for their scalps is thriving.
Publisher's Note: The 25th Anniversary Edition has been reset, causing the text to reflow. Page references based on earlier editions will no longer apply, so Vintage Books has compiled the following chart as a conversion aid. Download the chart by copying and pasting the following link into your browser:
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"A classic American novel of regeneration through violence. McCarthy can only be compared to our greatest writers, with Melville and Faulkner, and this is his masterpiece."
—Michael Herr
"McCarthy is a writer to be read, to be admired, and quite honestly—envied."
—Ralph Ellison
"McCarthy is a born narrator, and his writing has, line by line, the stab of actuality. He is here to stay."
—Robert Penn Warren
