SOURCE: "Travels with a She-Wolf," in The New York Times Book Review, Vol. CXLIII, No. 49, 725, June 12, 1994, pp. 1, 38-40.

In the following review, Hass praises The Crossing as an "American original." This in-depth discussion of the novel focuses on description and craftsmanship, and Hass briefly examines McCarthy's play, The Stonemason, with respect to craft.

How does a writer like Cormac McCarthy—if there is any writer like Cormac McCarthy—follow up on the immense critical and popular success of his novel All the Pretty Horses, which won a National Book Award for 1992 and accumulated extraordinary praise? Mr. McCarthy got compared to William Faulkner—he has often been compared to Faulkner—Mark Twain, Herman Melville and Shakespeare. The answer provided by The Crossing, the second novel in his projected Border Trilogy, is that he writes an even better book.

The Crossing is a miracle in prose, an American original. It...