Justin Cronin's final book of his Passage Trilogy, The City of Mirrors, is a post-apocalyptic masterpiece. It beautifully encapsulates the previous three books and provides a satisfying resolution to the drama. The events of the book follow the main characters' various storylines. After giving birth to the stillborn product of her rape, Alicia devotes two years to emotional healing and physical training for her showdown with Zero. She tracks him down eventually, but is unable to kill him. Instead she listens to his life story -- how he became Subject Zero -- and decides to stay with him for the meantime, although it's not like she has much choice. Michael hears a legend of a safe zone in the Atlantic somewhere and decides to bank upon the validity of the rumor. He spends more than a decade raising funding, designing, and outfitting a huge shipping freighter in order to save the remaining humans and take them to the safe haven.
After retiring Peter lives in Kervile with his nephew. He reluctantly agrees to become involved with politics again, even becoming president. Under his militaristic, aggressive leadership the people prepare to defend against one final invasion by the virals. He also brings Amy back to complete her mission of killing Zero. In a grand showdown Zero, Alicia, and Michael all are killed. The humans take Michael's ship to a remote island where they propagate until centuries later the human population once more spans the globe. These new pioneers in North America run into Amy once again who has been living there completely alone all these years after Peter's death.
As complex as the plot proves, Cronin's story is a classic. He's presenting readers with a sacrifice story like that of Jesus Christ. Each of the main characters embark on unique journey's of which the goal is the survival of the species. Based upon their unique abilities, they each contribute to this final goal in an essential way. Amy typifies the Christ figure because she sacrifices herself when she's bitten, then she returns to human form by a miracle, she defeats Zero and his ilk once and for all, and she descends into purgatory when she outlives all of her companions who haven't gone to the safe haven. After a lifetime devoted to the salvation of humanity, she continues to live for centuries, awaiting the possible resurrection of the humans.
