The Darkest Path

by Jeff Hirsch

Overview

USA TODAY bestselling author Jeff Hirsch once again creates a futuristic world with stunning, dramatic realism.

A civil war rages between the Glorious Path--a militant religion based on the teachings of a former US soldier--and what's left of the US government. Fifteen-year-old Callum Roe and his younger brother, James, were captured and forced to convert six years ago. Cal has been working in the Path's dog kennels, and is very close to becoming one of the Path's deadliest secret agents. Then Cal befriends a stray dog named Bear and kills a commander who wants to train him to be a vicious attack dog. This sends Cal and Bear on the run, and sets in motion a series of incredible events that will test Cal's loyalties and end in a fierce battle that the fate of the entire country rests on.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780545512251
Publisher:	Scholastic, Inc.
Publication date:	09/24/2013
Sold by:	Scholastic, Inc.
Format:	eBook
Pages:	336
File size:	2 MB
Age Range:	12 - 18 Years

About the Author

Jeff Hirsch graduated from the University of California, San Diego, with an MFA in dramatic writing, and is the USA TODAY bestselling author of THE ELEVENTH PLAGUE and MAGISTERIUM. He lives in Beacon, New York, with his wife. Visit him online at www.jeff-hirsch.com.

Read an Excerpt

When I woke up in the examination room, I was handcuffed to the bed. My head swam as I lifted it off the pillow. My right wrist was circled in gray steel and locked to the bed rail. My left arm lay throbbing by my side, the skin swollen taut and scarlet from where Sergeant Rhames had broken my wrist with a baseball bat.The room I was in was small and sharply antiseptic. Footsteps passed quietly outside, their sound mixing with the breathy hush of air conditioning. I've done it, I thought. I'm here.I closed my eyes and thought about James, hoping that my little brother's face would be enough to get me through what came next. I pictured him back in the dorm, straightening our meager possessions into piles around our bunks. It always made me laugh, his hospital corners and tidy bustle. Sometimes I'd leave my bunk unmade just to see the obvious pleasure he took in making the place neat again. The door to my left opened and then shut with a clap. There was someone else in the room with me now. His breathing was raspy and labored. Papers rustled in his hands.“You must have really pissed somebody off.”I didn't move. Didn't speak.“Three lacerations that required stitches, along with ten other minor cuts. Multiple bruises over your chest and arms and face. Damn near cracked your eye socket. Your left wrist is fractured. I think maybe I can put a cast on it, but I can't spare any pain meds. Your friends in the Path are to thank for that.”I opened my eyes and lifted my head a painful inch off the pillow. The doctor was short, probably in his forties, with an awkward belly and thinning brownish-gray hair. He wore a white coat over a khaki T-shirt and camo pants. “Where am I?” “Ah, the dead arise. It's a miracle. What's your name?”“I asked where I was.”“Fine.” He started writing on a clipboard. “You're Path John Doe.”“I'm not Path.” I said, letting my head fall back. “Not anymore.”“Funny, they're not exactly known for their revolving-door policy over there.”My tongue darted out over my cracked lips. “Can I have some water?”“If I can have a name.”“Callum Roe. Cal.”Seconds later a canteen was lowered to my lips. The water slid ice-cold down my throat. I drank until I gasped and the doctor pulled it away from me. “It's okay,” he said. “Take it easy. You're in the infirmary at Camp Victory. I'm Dr. Franks. One of our patrols found you out in the desert and brought you here.”“I need to see your base commander.” “Oh, sure,” Franks said with a nervous chuckle. “He asks that I bring all supposedly ex-Path soldiers right over to his office. You know, I keep my sidearm in my desk -– maybe you'd like to take that with you.”“I'm not joking.”“Why do you think you need to see the commander?”I swallowed hard and stared beyond him to the water-stained ceiling. Could I really do this? Would he even listen? I thought of James again, moving through our barracks, setting everything in its place. “Because if you don't let me see him, everyone here is going to die.”

Editorial Reviews

12/01/2013
Gr 7 Up—Callum Roe, 15, and his younger brother, James, were whisked away from their parents in Ithaca, New York, six years ago, by followers of the Glorious Path. More than a religious sect, armies of Path believers have systematically taken over large portions of the United States. Citizens offered "the Choice" of joining are given jobs or trained as soldiers for the cause, and those who refuse often disappear without a trace. James is content with his Path life working as an officer's valet in Arizona, but Cal is considered rebellious and relegated to cleaning out dog kennels. Challenged when trying to save a stray dog named Bear from certain maltreatment, he kills the kennel boss and goes on the lam with Bear. Intending to journey back to New York, Cal heads north to evade capture and encounters a full-fledged war between the Path and the Feds, encountering roadblocks, air assaults, and soldiers at every turn. In Wyoming, Cal meets Natalie and other teens resisting the Path, and they are nearly killed in a skirmish. Nat's father is a casualty and, while they convalesce in a rich kid's hideaway, Cal sees Nat's transformation from a mere rebel to a martyr willing to die to avenge her father's death. Her plan results in a page-turning climax fraught with danger and emotion. The dystopian story is action-packed all the way.—Vicki Reutter, State University of New York at Cortland

School Library Journal

10/14/2013
Hirsch returns to the post-apocalyptic well of his first two books, The Eleventh Plague and Magisterium, in this bleak and somewhat familiar novel. The archetype at play is a military-religious one: a man named Nathan Hill has founded his own church and taken over several southern and western states. The former U.S. has been mired in a civil war ever since, and Callum Roe and his brother, James, were two early converts to the cause, captured when they were kids and forced into service. After bonding with a stray dog, Cal kills a superior officer to save the dog's life and becomes a fugitive. His journey out of occupied Utah and attempts to subvert the cause he once fought for intermix with his meeting an attractive girl named Nat and joining the U.S. forces. The novel hits its stride during well-choreographed action sequences and in occasional scenes featuring Hill, a demagogue who rarely comes across as the evil force he embodies, showing empathy when talking to Callum even as he perpetrates horrific acts of war and terror. Ages 12–up. Agent: Sara Crowe: Harvey Klinger. (Oct.)

Publishers Weekly

Praise for THE ELEVENTH PLAGUE:

"A gripping survival drama." --USA TODAY

"Sure to be a hit among fans of dystopias." --BOOKLIST

"An impressive story with strong characters." --PUBLISHERS WEEKLY

From the Publisher

Narrator Dan Bittner puts the listener right into the middle of the action with his reading of this dystopian adventure. For six years, Cal and his brother, James, have been part of The Glorious Path, a militant religious regime that took over the West after civil war broke out in the United States. But now all Cal can think about is returning home to New York. Bittner’s somber tone matches the dark themes of the story—war, violence, and the choices that must be made to find a path. His intense delivery works well to portray Cal’s emotional stress and feverish activity in fighting both for and against the Path. E.N. © AudioFile 2014, Portland, Maine

APRIL 2014 - AudioFile

Narrator Dan Bittner puts the listener right into the middle of the action with his reading of this dystopian adventure. For six years, Cal and his brother, James, have been part of The Glorious Path, a militant religious regime that took over the West after civil war broke out in the United States. But now all Cal can think about is returning home to New York. Bittner’s somber tone matches the dark themes of the story—war, violence, and the choices that must be made to find a path. His intense delivery works well to portray Cal’s emotional stress and feverish activity in fighting both for and against the Path. E.N. © AudioFile 2014, Portland, Maine

APRIL 2014 - AudioFile

2013-09-01
Fifteen-year-old Callum Roe is caught up in the second American Civil War. It's 2026, and the United States is once again fragmented. Federal forces are at war with the Army of the Glorious Path, which includes most of the former Confederacy plus additional states, including the southwest, Alaska and Washington. The Path--a militant and religiously fundamentalist organization--in which women are robed and veiled "companions" ministering to the men--is dedicated to being "a light in the darkness and the rod that falls upon the backs of the defiant." Cal, captured by the Path six years previously, is set to move up from novice to citizen when Capt. Monroe reneges on a deal, and Cal instead becomes Pvt. Callum Roe in the army. When he kills a man to protect a dog, he becomes a runner, off the Path, intending to journey across the war-torn country from Arizona to his former home in New York. Cal's first-person point of view offers the immediacy of his personal experience in this action-packed drama, but unfortunately, it isn't up to offering the fuller social and political history of the war that many readers would find interesting. An intriguing vision of a possible future rooted in current politics and wrapped in an exciting tale of war. (maps) (Fiction. 12-18)

Kirkus Reviews