New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice
Named a Best Book of 2025 (So Far) by Vulture
A Most Anticipated Book from The New York Times Book Review, The Los Angeles Times, The Boston Globe, NPR, The Guardian, Goodreads, LitHub, BookRiot, New Scientist, Barnes & Noble, Publishers Weekly, Library Journal, Book Culture, Washington Review of Books, Reactor Magazine, Gizmodo, Tertulia, Paste Magazine, and Orange County Register
“This is an amazing work of fiction. I absolutely loved it. At the heart you’ll find a blood-drenched story of pursuit and two brave and resourceful children. But there’s so much more. I immersed myself. Have never read anything like it.”
—Stephen King
“Sing, goddess, of Mark Z. Danielewski’s reimagining of the American western. . . . Tom's Crossing sifts gold from a slurry of genre conventions—Stetsons, palominos, Smith & Wesson rifles—marrying Homeric hymns with more recent account of land grabs and oligarchs. Set in Utah in 1982 and rendered in a tangy vernacular . . . [the story] follows a pair of truculent ponies and the teenagers determined to save them from an abattoir—a simple plot that opens onto a metaphysical odyssey, an epic about epics. . . . [Danielewski] has always reveled in bridging genre and high-gloss literature; here he blends police procedural, the horror of Stephen King and the postmodern density of David Foster Wallace. It's Danielewski’s infinite West. . . . This is peak maximalist fiction: a mash-up of famous, forgotten and half-forgotten volumes, a library of an author’s mind. . . . The novel is also funny, à la Charles Portis, sprinkling droll comedy among its gorgeous surfaces. . . . Danielewski’s love of life in all its guises brightens his novel; he hoists us onto the saddle to see it up close.”
—Hamilton Cain, The New York Times Book Review
"A thrilling masterpiece. . . . [An] adventure story, and a tremendous one at that. . . .The coupling of homeyness and erudition in the book’s prose sounds doubly affected at first, as if a tipsy James Joyce were doing improvisatory karaoke to a Marty Robbins gunfighter ballad. . . . And yet Danielewski, who did grow up in Utah, invites you to soak in this mode for long enough that it simply becomes a voice you know, in the way you might that of a stranger recounting his woes at an airport bar—friendly and yet slightly alien, of your world but still somehow other. . . . Danielewski so convincingly captures the rangy physicality of his story, often with a bemused wit. . . . Its great length is crucial to its drama and charm. . . . [echoing] the genuinely epic scale of Kalin and Landry’s quest, the way their journey wears them down but also reshapes their senses of self. . . . Call me a sap, but I kept crying through much of what followed. Less because there’s tragedy here, though there’s plenty, than because of all the love that persists in spite of it. It’s the love that keeps you going, the love that promises tomorrows after this relentless procession of four very long todays. The love, too, that gives you your heart in the way that only fictions can. I loved this book. I imagine that almost everyone who reads it through will try to heave a copy into your hands. Let me be the first. Pick it up, and be patient with its loping rhythms until you find your own. Gallop or trot real slow."
—Jacob Brogan, The Washington Post
"An authentic western epic. . . . A maximalist canvas of intricate, intimate detail. [Tom's Crossing] fills the contemporary western vacuum left behind by Cormac McCarthy, but it’s informed by every era of the Great American Novel, from Melville and Faulkner to Pynchon and, looking further afield, Roberto Bolano’s 2666. . . . An unexpectedly earnest trove of story within story within story within..."
—Neil McRobert, Vulture
"A page-turning western thrill ride featuring hardy chases, death-defying climbs and violent shootouts. . . . With all the literary allusions, sweeping mythology and formal audacity that [Danielewski's work] usually entails."
—Calum Marsh, The New York Times
"[A] celebration of mountainous immensity. . . . The prose is highly oral. . . . Think a more sophisticated Huckleberry Finn with numerous references to Greek myth and literature. . . . [Tom's Crossing] is plot-driven—and in a way author-driven—with readers forced by its narrative conventions to ride out the whole suspenseful journey. . . . An anomaly, a non-comped work."
—Tom LeClair, The Los Angeles Times
"An epic of the American West. . . . A work of new mythology. . . . Danielewski often shifts his tone and language instantaneously between a Louis L'Amour novel and a piece of holy text. . . . [He] takes our own places, both mountains and mythos, and builds new worlds from it."
—Matthew Minicucci, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
"Danielewski is a writer of enormous power and vision. He has invented a gripping story with mythic undertones. . . . Sublime and thrilling."
—Marcel Theroux, The Guardian
"A sweeping epic set in the rugged Utah wilderness. . . . Danielewski’s prose is lush and dialect-inflected, simultaneously ornate, and folksy, reminiscent of early Cormac McCarthy. The characters are exquisitely drawn, memorable, and fully human. Mythic in ambition, the narrative is propulsive yet immersive, given to rumination and asides, adding intimacy and emotional resonance. A most resplendent journey well worth the effort."
—Bill Kelly, Booklist, starred review
"Epic. . . . The beauty of this elaborate novel goes beyond the page-turning plot. . . . Fans of Danielewski’s House of Leaves will clamor for his first major stand-alone novel in 25 years.”
—Joyce Sparrow, Library Journal, starred review
“With echoes of The Iliad and a body count to rival Blood Meridian, morphing from Western to horror to police procedural and back again, Danielewski’s yarn is carefully plotted and imaginatively written. . . . A daring foray into a genre that’s seen little recent experimentation.”
—Kirkus Reviews
"Exciting. . . . Adventurous readers will enjoy this wild ride."
—Publishers Weekly
