Reviews

Consumed by David Cronenberg

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elsbet's review

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adventurous challenging dark mysterious reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.75

grimamethyst's review

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dark mysterious tense slow-paced

2.0

I enjoyed this book, It got a bit weird, but I like weird. It was intriguing because I had no idea of where it was going or what was going to happen. I found a lot of the writing to be quite heavy though and in areas this broke the flow of the story for me. When I picked it up I didn't realise that it was part of a series which frustrated me because it left me with so many questions that I feel I must read the next one. (personally I prefer stand alone books than series).

anokayhuman's review

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dark mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.0

texsawyer's review

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dark tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

hardy har i’m david cronenberg i write books now har har

nicktionary19's review

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2.0

The literary equivalent of being invited over for Netflix & chill - but instead they throw on a porno and start masturbating.

Consumed starts off dull. If I hadn’t just DNF’d a book the day before, I likely would have discarded this. Half the text is just detailing technical aspects of different technology. Especially cameras. Everyone in this book is a photographer somehow. All experts. So tiresome.

In the middle, the storylines begin to merge in interesting but improbable ways and the story begins to take shape - you even find out that Consumed might be a murder mystery and not just a list of camera equipment.

It’s all loaded with pretensions that extend across all characters to the extent I’m fairly certain it’s just the author showing off in a pedantic way. Maybe the title shoulda been #humblebrag.

Then it ends. Almost as though Cronenberg didn’t know how to finish all the threads he’d pulled into this rat’s nest and so just kinda left them dangling in air thick with ominous undertones.

Also there’s enough clumsily handled, unnecessary sex that it resembles some kind of highbrow porn. Like having a lecture on economics between cumshots makes it artistic or something.

chrisvanacker's review

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dark mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

leucocrystal's review

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3.0

Add this one to the "3.5 stars if we had that option" stack, which grows steadily by the month. I get what Cronenberg was going for here, but it comes off, at times, as just a bit too dense, at least for me to parse while still enjoying it. I love so many of the concepts explored in here, though; the extremely abrupt, completely unresolved ending was certainly a surprise. I'll be very curious to see what he might write next.