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The Beginning of The End
(Unwritten Speculated Prologue) Here marks several years before the beginning of the book, when the world came to an end. -
The Book Begins
(Page 3) Here marks the beginning of the novel, when the man wakes up and looks at his son on page three. The characters are introduced as "the man" and "the boy", and are portrayed as two of the few who survived the apocalypse who still live at this time. -
The Gas Station
(Page 7) While searching an abandoned gas station for supplies to aid in their fight for survival, the man discovers an old, broken phone. He picks up the phone and dials what he remembers to be his father's home phone number. This act is a crucial point in developing the man's character this early in the book, showing that he is an emotional man, clearly attached to his family. This also shows that the man has hope that he and his son aren't the only two still alive in these barren wastes. -
The Duo Discovers A Forgotten Home
(Page 25) The man and the boy come across the man's old home. This is an emotional moment for the father, and introduces the concept of the boy's fear of entering buildings such as the house. -
Swimming In The Waterfall
(Page 38) The man and the boy wash in the waterfall. The man washes the boy's hair, and they camp here for a while. This environment introduces the idea that there are only certain places that they can safely camp, the waterfall not being one of them because the sound produced by the waterfall would prevent them from hearing any possible threats approaching them. -
Finding The Corpses In The Trailer
(Page 47) While searching an abandoned trailer for supplies, the man stumbled upon a group of corpses lying forgotten in the dark. The man quickly looks away and leaves. This event is significant because it is the first moment in which a "disturbing" moment is thoroughly described in the novel. -
Standoff With The Raider
(Page 62) The man and the boy encounter a group of post apocalyptic raiders, a group of savage people willing to do anything and hurt anyone to survive. The man and the boy hide, but are discovered by a lone raider, separated from the group. When the raider grabs the boy, the man puts him down with a shot to the head. This event signifies that the man will do anything to protect his son. -
Truths Of A Cruel World
(Page 71) The man returns to the sport where he has killed the singled out raider without the boy to discover that nothing remains in the spot save blood and a small amount of mutilated body parts. This event indirecty introduces the topic of cannibalism to the reader, suggesting that the other raiders of the group found the corpse of the dead raider, and proceeded to consume the flesh of the dead raider for survival. -
Moving Past The Orchard
(Page 90) The man and the boy come across a large field, an orchard, during their journey. It was very apparently the former site of a battle between a number of people. Seeing the decrepit, disembodied heads and the rotted skulls of the wasteland's fallen victims stirred in the man, leading the man to put his arm around the boy before they left. This description of the field was incredibly vivid and detailed, one of the scenes from the book that depicted simply pure horror. -
Waking Up In Hell
(Page 92) The man and the boy awake from their slumber to find a massive band of raiders trudging on down the road. Men with guns, dozens of women, most of them pregnant, and slaves and prisoners of battles pulling wagons and carts filled with spoils of war. The man and the boy lie unnoticed and wait for them to pass. This scene shows the reader the very essence of the type of people the man and the boy have been trying to avoid, as well as it shows just how much of a threat other people can be. -
American Appetites
(Page 110) The man and the boy come across a seemingly abandoned house. After searching most of it for supplies, they discover a door leading down to a basement with a lock on it. The man cuts the lock, and persuades the boy to follow him down. Reluctantly, he follows, and in the basement he duo discovers a large group of unclothed humans, some of which are missing limbs, who are being held captive by savage cannibals. This event furthers the boy's fear of being indoors a significant amount. -
Climbing The Ladder
(Page 118) When the man ventures off to explore an abandoned barn while the boy sleeps, he comes across a ladder in the barn. He climbs the ladder to the second floor of the barn to see if there is anything of use up there. The action of climbing the ladder, something that people today wouldn't consider difficult, took the man much effort. "...he was so weak he wasnt sure he was going to make it to the top," (118). This action helps show the severity of the physical state that the man is in. -
A Light Shining In Darkness
(Page 137) The man and the boy discover a safe haven, complete with a hidden entrance, a great supply of fresh food and water, and the opportunity to provide a warm place to sleep for the couple. This event was a very key event in the story. Among other things, it provided the duo with a great number of supplies to continue their journey with, and instilled a great amount of hope in both the boy and the man. -
Dreaming
(Page 153) The man is woken up by an image created in a dream. "He'd been visited in a dream by creatures of a kind he'd never seen before. They did not speak. He thought that they'd been crouching by the side of his cot as he slept and then had skulked away on his awakening." This dream helped the man understand that the boy was indeed an alien to this world. The man and the boy have always known different worlds from different lifetimes. -
Ely The Wanderer
(Page 165) The man and the boy come across a wandering old man whom of which calls himself "Ely". The boy wants to help Ely and begs his father to let him feed the old man. The man agrees, and the boy feeds Ely. The man and Ely converse with each other, introducing important topics such as religion, which then translates into labeling the boy as the "Christ Figure" character archetype. -
Abandoned Train
(Page 179) The man and the boy come across a train that seemed to have once been used as transportation by other apocalypse survivors to move South. It had long since been abandoned by the time the duo found it. This event is significant because it puts emphasis on how little old world technology still exists in this time period. -
Arrival At The Beach
(Page 215) The boy and the man finally reach the South. They arrive at the beach and discover, to their dismay, that it is not everything they had expected. This situation impacts the theme of 'hope' heavily by making the duo lose hope in all they they look forward to, granted there is anything left to look forward to. "He looked at the boy. He could see the disappointment in his face. I'm sorry it's not blue, he said. That's okay, said the boy," (McCarthy 215). -
Exploring The Boat
(Page 223) The man leaves the boy on the beach to watch the two's possessions while the man swims out into the ocean to closer examine an abandoned boat floating out in the distance. The man salvages the flare gun and the first aid kit from the boat's supplies, two items that become very important later in the story. -
The Signal
(Page 245) The man and the boy recovered the flare gun from the abandoned boat and then proceeded to fire it off over the ocean later. When they fire the flare gun, it is a special moment for the man and the boy. It instills hope into their hearts once again, as miniscule as that hope may be. -
The Thief
(Page 253) The man and the boy awake from their sleep on the beach to discover that their cart is missing. The man uses his superior survival skills to track down the thief that had stolen all of the couple's supplies. The man's old world nature takes over when he confronts the thief. The vindictive acts performed by the man here show the man's true nature and make the reader doubt the reliability of the man's claim of being one of the "good guys". -
Arrow To The Knee
(Page 263) The man and the boy travel through a dangerous area, surrounded by buildings and structures that could easily house potetnital threats. As they continue through the streets, the man and the boy are attacked by a survivor in a window whom of which is armed with a bow and makeshift arrows. The man is shot in the leg with one of the makeshift arrows and begins to bleed furiously. The man survives the shot at first, but this event directly foreshadows the beginning of the man's death. -
The End Of The Cycle
(Page 281) The man finally passes away in his sleep, huddled up next to the boy. The novel comes to a close, and the boy realizes that he'll have to go on without his father. He vows to be strong, and he talks to his father in his mind as his father would have wanted him to. -
Recruitment
(Page 281) The boy, after staying with the remains of his father for three days, walks to the road and stops. He is soon visited by a wanderer, whom proceeds to ask where the boy's father is. "Where's the man you were with? He died. Was that your father? Yes. He was my papa," (McCarthy 282). The boy continues to talk to the wanderer and eventually agrees to travel with the wanderer and his party. This event marks the end of the book, and the end of the story of the man and the boy.
