Blood Meridian

Blood Meridian follows a nameless fourteen-year-old runaway known only as the Kid as he drifts westward across the violent borderlands of the United States and Mexico in the mid-19th century. After encountering brutality and hardship on his own, he joins a ruthless gang of scalp hunters led by John Joel Glanton, who are contracted to collect Native American scalps for bounty. Throughout the novel, the Kid crosses paths with the terrifying and enigmatic Judge Holden, a towering, almost mythical figure who embodies war, philosophy, and cruelty, and whose presence looms over the narrative’s exploration of human violence and the darkness at the heart of Manifest Destiny.