Consumed

A Novel

By: David Cronenberg

Narrated by: William Hurt

“An eye-opening dazzler” (Stephen King) about a pair of globetrotting, gore-obsessed journalists whose entanglement in a French philosopher’s death becomes a surreal journey into global conspiracy from legendary filmmaker David Cronenberg.

Stylish and camera-obsessed, Naomi and Nathan thrive on the yellow journalism of the social-media age. Naomi finds herself drawn to the headlines surrounding a famous couple, Célestine and Aristide, Marxist philosophers and sexual libertines. Célestine has been found dead, and Aristide has disappeared. Police suspect him of killing her and consuming parts of her body. Yet Naomi sets off to find him, and as she delves deeper into the couple’s lives, she discovers the news story may only skim the surface of the disturbing acts they performed together.

Journalist Nathan, meanwhile, is in Budapest photographing the controversial work of an unlicensed surgeon named Zoltán Molnár, once sought by Interpol for organ trafficking. After sleeping with one of Molnár’s patients, Nathan contracts a rare STD called Roiphe’s and travels to Toronto, determined to meet the man who discovered the syndrome. Dr. Barry Roiphe, Nathan learns, now studies his own adult daughter, whose bizarre behavior masks a devastating secret.

These parallel narratives become entwined in a gripping, dreamlike plot that involves geopolitics, 3-D printing, North Korea, the Cannes Film Festival, cancer, and, in an incredible number of varieties, sex. Consumed is an exuberant, provocative debut novel from one of the world’s leading film directors, a writer of “fierce sculptural intensity” (Jonathan Lethem, The New York Times Book Review) who makes it “impossible to look away” (Publishers Weekly).

great for David Cronenberg lovers<br />

if you're seen Crash, existanZ, Video drome, the fly....
you're gonna love this
a mix of all of those and much more

Uneven narrator

Very slow and suddenly too fast narration, with weird intonations. I would have appreciated the book more with it wasn't for the narrator.

A good work from Cronenburg

The story stayed interesting and the suporting characters are all delightfully weird. I ate it up.

Pretty "Fly" for a White Guy

Any additional comments?

Readers familiar with the movies of Cronenberg will find many similar themes in Consumed. Themes of medical fetishism, insects, sci-fi gadgetry, global conspiracy and often grotesque, one-way transformation abound. While the themes may be familiar, the novel's direction was not and that is part of what I found captivating about this book.

The storyline is both modern and international. Modern tech, like tablets and digital photography are featured heavily in the plot and help give the story a contemporary feel. As we follow two photo journalist who are pursuing their own news stories in separate parts of the world, it is their cameras and computers that are indispensable intermediaries to each other.

I have only listened to one other narration by William Hurt. I forget which of Hemingway's stories it was but it was a disappointing listen, in part because Hurt sounded tired and nonchalant the whole time. I found Hurt's performance in Consumed to be nearly flawless. All of his accents were good and all of his characters were believable. I enjoyed hearing him take a sentence and prolong syllables or add an emphasis in a less then obvious way so as to provide nuance and destroy verbal monotony. Yet the overall feel of Hurt's narration is always calm even when things are tense.

If you've enjoyed the movies that spanned Cronenberg's career, then Consumed is a no-brainer.

Like listening to a dementia patient

Would you say that listening to this book was time well-spent? Why or why not?

Ive tried to like this book for hours and thought i would finish it just to honor Cronenberg, and perhaps one day i will. But for now, I gotta move on. Hurt wounds like he can't remember what he was just saying and, while its certainly interesting to hear him be peculiar, its also highly dismissible. As for the story, ehhhh......there only seem to be a few parts that stray from the "how bizarre can this interaction get?" trope, leaving the dialogue flat, the sex boring and repetitive, and the storyline seeming only to be a vehicle for more opportunities for bizarre interactions.

What was your reaction to the ending? (No spoilers please!)

Ill let you know when i get there, so close but it seems so far away.

Who would you have cast as narrator instead of William Hurt?

um, yes, although he is the most interesting part of the book.

Did Consumed inspire you to do anything?

shop