A father and his son walk alone through burned America. Nothing moves in the ravaged, nuclear landscape save the ash on the wind. It is cold enough to crack stones, and when the snow falls it is grey. The sky is dark. Their destination is the coast, although they don't know what, if anything, awaits them there. They have nothing; just a pistol to defend themselves against the lawless bands that stalk the road, the clothes they are wearing, a cart of scavenged food - and each other. "The Road" is the profoundly moving story of a journey. It boldly imagines a future in which no hope remains, but in which the father and his son, 'each other's world entire', are sustained by love. Awesome in the totality of its vision, it is an unflinching meditation on the worst and the best that we are capable of: ultimate destructiveness, desperate tenacity, and the tenderness that keeps two people alive in the face of total devastation.
Cormac McCarthy (Rhode Island, 1933) és un dels autors canònics de la literatura americana contemporània i un candidat constant al Premi Nobel. Tota la seva obra en català ha estat publicada per Edicions 62, on destaquen Tots aquells cavalls (Edicions 62, 2001), novel·la amb la qual va guanyar el National Book Award i el National Book Critics Circle Award, No és país per a vells (Edicions 62, 2008), que va ser adaptada al cinema pels germans Coen, i La carretera (Edicions 62, 2007), que va merèixer el Premi Pulitzer l'any 2007. Amb la traducció al català de Meridià de sang el setembre de 2009 es posa a l'abast dels lectors la que es considera la seva obra mestra.