The Road, by Cormac McCarthy: an excerpt

The gray ash floated from the clouds and sifted over the barren landscape and drifted. Covering ash with ash. Like fertilizer from a malevolent god. The sky burning itself out like a Roman candle. In the distance the ashen corpses.

He rearranged the ashes in the fire and poked at the coals and opened a tin of peaches and ate a few and drank deep from the sweet juice. Humanity. The wistful scraps of civilization. From every memory a floating ember. The fire died. He considered lighting it again and stirred the ashes. The darkness would come and swallow them up. Dark ashen grayness. The boy drew a circumference in the ash.

Bleak, isnt it Papa?

Yes.

Going to get bleaker, isnt it?

Yes.

Will we ever run out of food?

We'll come close, but there's always a house or store or bunker with canned goods that will keep us going. And we will always ration our apostrophes.

But will we ever run out of synonyms for "ashen?"

Try not to think about that, son.

Okay.

Promise?

Okay.

Okay.