Crash

Avant-garde satire of the very highest literary order. I absolutely hated this book... and I love it. Perhaps that's exactly what Ballard was going for, or perhaps writing this book was simply a very personal therapy session, facing and exorcising Ballard's demons head-on, following the deaths of his loved ones in car crashes.

CRASH consists of about 90% sexualized car collision imagery and 10% functional necessities for framing the former into a story. For me, this book is an over-the-top satirical master-stroke that unapologetically highlights the often disgusting and perverse side of capitalist commercialism - sex, money, violence and exploitation. It critiques mankind's use of sex to sell automobiles and mankind's perverse obsession with speed and violence, rubbernecking as we pass accidents on the freeway.

This book was difficult to read because of the content, yet the writing is so incredibly beautiful that I had to retrieve it, and continue on each time that I'd cast against my wall for being disgusted. It's a relentless onslaught on the psyche, almost completely devoid of expletives, Ballard utilizes only scientific and formal terms throughout for genitalia, body fluids, etc., yet this somehow makes everything feel even more graphic and intense.

By no means a 'cozy read'. It's like taking your medicine - tastes horrible going down, but afterward, you're glad you did it.