Swan Song
Robert R. McCammon
864 pages - 1987 - science fiction, dystopia
April 8th, 2025 — April 27th, 2025
Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
I have always been a medium fan of Stephen King—I think he has some fascinating ideas, but sometimes the execution just rubs me the wrong way. There’s usually some element of it that feels a bit forced.
From the beginning of this book, I felt like I was reading all of my favorite parts of Stephen King novels, with none of the negativity along with it. It’s a horrifying concept, and slowly has some more magical or mystical elements introduced, but at its core it’s about finding family and rebuilding from nothing. (I think it also helped that there were some strong female characters, which I have always felt is quite lacking in King’s stories.)
Swan Song is maybe a little more prescient today than most might want to admit. It starts with the beginning of World War III and a descent into nuclear winter. Despite the cold and barren wastelands, though, there is so much heart and beauty sprinkled through the book. I think that’s the point of it.
I could not stop thinking about it since I picked it up for the first time. It took me a while, but mostly because it was so densely packed with action, and because I cared deeply about the characters—Josh, Swan, and Sister are some of the most fascinating and real people I’ve ever read in a book. I love their synchronicity and their setbacks. I knew it was a risk to care about them, given the nature of a dystopia.
I’ll be recommending this book to many people in the coming years. It’s a commitment to be sure, but there’s a reason it’s been a sci-fi cult classic for almost four decades. I hope I get to have plenty of conversations about this sprawling novel for a long time.
Summary (Spoilers!)
The President of the United States decides to launch Defcon Three as nuclear warfare tension between the US and Russia hits an all-time high.
Sister Creep is homeless and desperate in New York City. She hallucinates some visions of death and decay. Joshua Hutchins, professional wrestler known as “Black Frankenstein” and often portrayed as the villain for his hulking size, falls asleep in a hotel room to the news of potential war on the horizon. Nine-year-old Swan and her mother Darleen escape their trailer after Uncle Tommy beats Darleen again and destroys Swan’s garden; the little girl can hear the plants screaming. The Croninger family—Phil, Elise, and little Roland—head to their underground Earth House bunker condo for a 2-week stay and notice some leaks and cracks in the ceiling and walls. A man with a scarlet eye and different faces watches a movie about death over and over again, excited about “it” (nuclear warfare) starting.
Sister Creep almost burns alive when a fireball rockets down the tunnel in which she was sleeping. Colonel Macklin grows more anxious about the cracks in Earth House when they hear transmissions of cities being hit with missiles. Josh meets Swan and Darleen at PawPaw’s grocery when his car breaks down, and they all flee to the basement when missiles start landing around them. A friendly fire missile hits Earth House and destroys the fortress under the collapsing mountain.
The President deals with the beginnings of nuclear fallout from the Airborne Control Center. The plane is hit by a bus that was thrown into the air by a missile; seemingly there are no survivors.
Sister Creep survived the fire and stumbles to the only building still standing, the movie theater where the man with the scarlet eye watches and laughs. He causes fire to engulf the theater while she tries to escape. Josh, Swan, Darleen, and PawPaw are trapped in rubble under the store. Macklin is trapped in a pit with his hand pinned in the wall; he plans to cut off his hand to get up to the other corporals.
Roland Croninger is the only one small enough to get to Macklin, so Warner guides him to amputate and cauterize his hand. Roland finds a sickening joy in it. Sister Creep finds a man from Detroit named Artie, and the two head off to search for food and water. They find the ruins of jewelry stores and a pulsating ring of gemstones and melted glass that seems to respond to Sister’s touch. Josh organizes the resources underground.
Sister and Artie find three people—a former policewoman named Julia, a woman named Beth, and a Hispanic woman cradling a dead baby. Sister remembers driving drunk while bringing her daughter home and getting into an accident. She killed her daughter, leading to her family abandoning her in an asylum. Macklin, Roland, and Warner realize they’re cut off from all supplies but plan on recruiting people to help dig them out.
Sister guides the group through the dark and half-submerged Holland Tunnel to get from Manhattan to New Jersey. Darleen dies and Josh finds a flashlight while he’s trying to bury her.
Sister and the group realize that the ring of glass can seemingly grant wishes; she’s able to communicate with the Hispanic woman just by holding it. While sitting around a fire, they’re found by a former priest, Doyle. Roland searches for food and is accosted by Corporal Schorr; he ends up shooting the officer and cutting him up, which he again finds pleasure in. Josh and Swan see a gopher digging upwards. They realize PawPaw has been dead for hours; his corpse whispers to “protect the child” before bursting into flames.
Sister and Doyle talk, and she has a vision of PawPaw’s place while showing the glass ring to him. Roland and Macklin escape the raid and burning through a tunnel to the surface, shooting and killing his parents in the process; they make it to a dirtwart settlement, a “lower-class” area above Earth House.
Sister goes to find supplies and returns to see that Doyle murdered Beth and Julia; he shifts into the man with the scarlet eye and then a horrific creature that fights her for he glass ring. Grass has started growing where Swan sleeps, and she tells Josh that she can hear the plants; they make it to the surface together and realize there’s nothing left.
Sister and Artie are attacked by wolves while walking and are saved by a man in a ski mask. They decide to follow him. Swan and Josh meet Leona Skelton, a seer who predicted Kennedy’s assassination, and her sick husband Davy.
Sister and Artie go with Paul, the man in the mask, and meet Mona, Kevin, and Steve. They eat wolf stew and listen for voices on the radio once a night, holding out hope. Leona starts reading Swan’s tarot cards, and they’re interrupted by Davy coughing violently, nearly dead. Roland and Macklin capture a woman and threaten her into staying with them so they can take advantage of her, instead of the men in the other camps.
Sister shows Paul the glass object. He tells her he was ready to give up. Swan and Josh help Leona say goodbye to the house and pack for their journey after burying Davy. Josh finds Leona’s neighbor’s farm, but they’ve been killed and “All Hail Lord Alvin” has been written on the walls in their blood; they also find a horse in the field nearby, which Swan calms down. They name it Mule. A little terrier that they call Killer also starts following them around.
Roland and Macklin fight towards a tent outside of the dirtwart settlement, owned by Fat Man Kempka. Josh, Swan, and Leona find a supermarket with electricity, but they are quickly attacked by followers of Lord Alvin.
Macklin goes to the salt lakes to ease his infected hand-stump while Roland is drugged and almost raped by Kempka. Roland kills the man and he, Macklin, and Sheila take power over the camp.
Josh is given five minutes to get from the front of the store to Lord Alvin with his hands tied, while the disciples try to kill him; if he fails, Swan and Leona will be killed too. Josh makes it, and the three escape when Killer bites Alvin. Leona is shot on the way out, but Josh and Swan ride Mule out of Kansas, all of their possessions having been stolen.
Sister convinces Paul to head out in search of safety, but they run out of gas and everyone is attacked by wolves. Roland and Macklin become literal Nazis and start killing everyone with burn scars and keloids growing on their faces, despite the two of them showing them, too. Josh and Swan find an abandoned circus train and the last surviving member of the circus, clown/magician Rusty Weathers.
Someone tells Sister that a man was looking for her who could scare away the wolves, and she decides to go to Kansas. The man with the scarlet eye is biking, wolves close at his heels, and looking for Sister.
Seven years later, Rusty, Josh, and Swan take their caravan to a house where Sylvester and Carla let them in. Swan’s face is nearly completely covered in keloids now, as is Josh’s, but she feels life within an apple tree. Franklin Hayes’s town of Scottsbluff is attacked again by the Army of Excellence. Sister and Paul are almost robbed at a saloon, but they kill the perpetrator and are given some drinks as payment.
Sister’s face is also covered in keloids, and they talk to a man named Hugh Ryan who used to be a doctor. He explains the keloids—Job’s Mask, he calls it—and the horrors of the Army of Excellence; he decides to go with Sister and Paul. The man with the scarlet eye sees a vision of Sister in the bar, seeing through the eyes of flies he sent there; he learns that she’s heading to Mary’s Rest with Hugh.
The Army of Excellence is led by Macklin and Roland, and they are found by Alvin who has beheaded Hayes and becomes a corporal in their army after gifting Macklin a wooden hand with nails in it. The apple tree that Swan touched starts blossoming, and they decide to move on to Mary’s Rest. Hugh gets Paul and Sister lost, and Paul yells at Sister for her insistence in the glass ring’s predictions; they get ambushed by a group of children bandits.
The leader of the bandits, Robin, says Hugh must surgically remove a bullet out of one of their own, Bucky, or they’ll kill them all. Hugh struggles but he uses a spike from the glass ring and it cauterizes the wounds, magically acting as a surgical blade. Rusty is attacked by a bobcat and Killer is killed during their journey.
Robin sees Swan and Josh in the glass ring and tells Sister; Hugh guides her towards Mary’s Rest, staying back to provide more medical care. Josh and a woman in Mary’s Rest, Glory, find a printing press and open up to each other about their past before the bombs.
During her journey, Sister falls asleep on watch and wakes up to Robin scolding her for her ignorance. He says he’s going with her and Paul to help them get to Mary’s Rest. They make it, and Sister is allowed to see Swan after giving Josh the Empress tarot card that she found outside of the supermarket. Swan holds the glass ring and there’s a blinding light; after a scuffle, they realize Swan’s hands are healing.
Macklin calls Sheila in and says he thinks that there are traitors in the AOE. They find two Brothers from the American Allegiance, another army, who tell the AOE that they’re heading to West Virginia to find God on a mountain.
Swan comes down with a very high fever, and when they try to help her, her Job’s Mask cracks apart to reveal newly grown skin and beautiful hair; she is gorgeous. Robin goes to see Swan and she wakes up when he kisses her, her face completely healed and her hair the color of fire. Glory’s son Aaron finds a well with potable water using Swan’s dowsing rods, Crybaby.
Sly, the former apple farmer, arrives in Mary’s Rest with a truck filled to the brim with apples from Swan’s tree. While distributing them, Swan comes face-to-face with the man with the scarlet eye, and she says she forgives him and offers him an apple; he screams and runs away.
Roland meets with The Savior and gives him a warning that they’ll attack in six hours; when he returns, Macklin is panicked, his keloids splitting to reveal a horrific and monstrous face. Sister, too, has a fever and is about to shed her Job’s Mask. Eight in town have done so: seven had beautiful faces, and the eighth had a lizard-like face and murder victims under his floorboards. Swan and Robin fight one night about nothing in particular because they can’t admit their mutual feelings.
Macklin’s new face is that of the Shadow Soldier, a devil on his shoulder he’s had his whole life. The AOE takes a big hit during their siege, and Roland starts defying Macklin’s orders, saying they can’t take another front-on attack. Alvin Mangrim says he can get them onto the roof of the mall in a few days. Josh is attacked by the man with the scarlet eye after he and Glory go on a walk.
Roland defies Macklin and takes power over him. Mangrim builds a siege engine and the attack on the Allegiance begins, with the AOE quickly taking control.
A man named Vulcevic arrives in Mary’s Rest with knickknacks to trade. He is thrilled by the sight of newly-grown corn and in the frenzy his truck is stolen by the man with the scarlet eye who heads north towards the armies with news of Swan’s power. He finds the AOE and tells them to go to Mary’s Rest and meet with Swan. He introduces himself as Friend and shifts his appearance, scaring them, but they know that Swan can feed their armies and help them dominate the world.
Swan starts rallying the town into helping her mount defenses. Robin confesses his love as they dig trenches and build walls. Josh starts burning with fever and he realizes that Swan’s new face is the same as the Empress tarot card with a glass and jewel crown. Paul returns from staking out the AOE and says many died, he’s badly wounded, and that they have many guns and a lot of ammunitions.
The siege starts, and Swan almost surrenders, but Sister says she’s a natural-born leader. During the battle, Paul is further wounded, Robin is shot, and Josh barely rescues Swan when she gets trapped under a dying Mule before they’re all captured and separated. Swan and Sister are taken to meet with Roland and Friend, who notices that the glass ring is gone; Paul uses his last bullet as he’s dying to shoot Alvin Mangrim.
Sister and Swan stand their ground as they’re interrogated by Macklin and Friend. They’re lodged with Sheila, who’s gone a little crazy, but they convince her to help them escape since she can go anywhere in camp. Friend goes to find the glass ring that Sister buried, but he realizes it’s missing after the scuffle, which makes him happy; nobody will have it now.
Josh and Robin listen to Brother Timothy’s rambling while imprisoned with him, and he says he saw Swan and Sister a few days ago in camp. Sheila was able to find the glass ring with help from Sister, and Swan puts on the crown, which engulfs her in an armor of light. Macklin is completely undermined by Friend as they head toward Warwick Mountain to find God.
Roland awakens with a new horrible face, his goggles melted to his flesh and his bones showing through in some bloody sores. Brother Timothy is shot as soon as they find “God” on the mountain; Josh and Robin use a ruse to escape their prison.
“God” is actually the President of the US, who survived the plane crash and now lives in a bunker under a mine. He locks everyone inside with no way to get out, then arms the megaton nuclear warheads to hit the ice caps and “reset” the world.
Friend kills God when he realizes that he’s the only person who knows the codes to stop detonation. Roland shoots Macklin when he starts to rip out wires, trying to stop the detonation. Roland also shoots Sister when she tries to intervene; Macklin kills Roland in retaliation. Swan figures out the code to disarm the nukes.
Josh and Robin are able to open the door from the outside with Swan’s help. They bring Sister above ground, and the sun comes out for the first time in over seven years as they climb up the mountain. She dies right after feeling the sun on her face.
Josh leaves Swan and Robin with some farmers, and goes back to Mary’s Rest to find Glory. Stories of Swan, Robin, and their eventual twin children spread as folklore over the years while the world starts blooming anew.
Masks and Faces
I knew that this book would be devastating, but I seriously underestimated how much impact it would have on me. When I say I have not stopped thinking about it in a few weeks, it’s true. The story itself is twisting, but McCammon’s ability to write suspense is fantastic.
There were so many moments when a reveal was coming, and you could feel the build-up, but you did not know if it would be something good or bad. Even the somewhat more “minor” reveals, such as Josh’s or Sister’s new faces under their Job’s Masks, felt completely consequential and important.
I felt like I got what I hoped for through the book. Of course, it was horrible to watch some of my favorite characters die—Sister’s loss at the end made me tear up quite a few times—but there were so many moments of brevity and light. Despite the nuclear winter, they are still able to play music around a fire and smell apple blossoms and find love.
There were quite a few elements that felt very Stephen King-esque to me—the man with the scarlet eye who could change his face, the bones shifting underneath peoples’ Job’s Masks and revealing either a horrific lizard face or true inner beauty, the innate bloodlust in Roland that’s so great that he forgets his parents’ faces. But it feels like I’m minimizing the story by comparing it to Stephen King. It was so unique and beautiful in its own way.
I think McCammon has been rightfully praised for the last 40 years. Allegedly, a TV show is being produced at this very moment as an adaptation of this story, and I will keep my fingers crossed that it happens and that it turns out very, very good. I think that it’s enough of a cult classic to get the treatment that it deserves.
Total pages read so far, 2025: 5,765
Total books read so far, 2025: 15
Next book: The Glass Hotel by Emily St. John Mandel