On the utopian island of Prospera, Proctor Bennett leads a rewarding life as a ferryman. Tasked with guiding those ready to "retire" onward to a mysterious island called the Nursery when their embedded monitors fall below 10%, Proctor believes in the Prosperan way: live, retire, and be born anew, with a restored body and a mind wiped of all previous memories. By this process, Prospera has order. And life is good.
That is, until Proctor receives the call to retire is own estranged father. Riddled with unease as he accompanies his father to the ferry, Proctor soon realizes something is very wrong. His father leaves him with a disoriented, unsettling message: "Orianos, it's all Orianos." But what does it mean?
From that moment on, Proctor finds himself propelled into a ceaseless pursuit for the truth. Life on Prospera may not be all that it seems; the same goes for its neighboring island called the Annex. All around, unrest is growing, mysterious "echoes" are pinging into Prospera's utopian paradise, and Proctor can no longer turn away. But at what cost will the truth come? It may not just be his future as the ferryman that hangs in the balance.
An epic behemoth of the most impressive proportions, "The Ferryman" will have to come up against something quite special to be dethroned as my top book of 2023. Here, Justin Cronin weaves an almost impossibly-creative, compelling, deeply-emotional story into the kind of page-turner that will cause you to sacrifice an entire night's sleep.
To dive into the plot much more would be to rob readers of what is truly a once-in-a-generation reading experience, but prepare for the floor to drop out from beneath you during this--and not just once, but several times. The sheer magnitude of Cronin's plot and how it seamlessly weaves together is remarkable; this is a sci-fi masterpiece.
Rating: 5 Stars
Publication Details: Out 5/2/2023, Random House Publishing
*Huge thank you to NetGalley & the publisher for providing my review copy!*
