About the Book
The exhilarating debut novel by iconic filmmaker David Cronenberg: the story of two journalists whose entanglement in a French philosopher's death becomes a surreal journey into global conspiracy. Stylish and camera-obsessed, Naomi and Nathan thrive on the yellow journalism of the social-media age. They are lovers and competitors--nomadic freelancers in pursuit of sensation and depravity, encountering each other only in airport hotels and browser windows.
Naomi finds herself drawn to the headlines surrounding Célestine and Aristide Arosteguy, Marxist philosophers and sexual libertines. Célestine has been found dead and mutilated in her Paris apartment. Aristide has disappeared. Police suspect him of killing her and consuming parts of her body. With the help of an eccentric graduate student named Hervé Blomqvist, Naomi sets off in pursuit of Aristide. As she delves deeper into Célestine and Aristide's lives, disturbing details emerge about their sex life--which included trysts with Hervé and others. Can Naomi trust Hervé to help her?
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. Nathan then 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.
About the Author :
David Cronenberg is a Canadian filmmaker whose career has spanned more than four decades. Born in Toronto, Canada, Cronenberg was inducted onto Canada's Walk of Fame in 1999. In 2002, he was made an Officer of the Order of Canada, and in 2006 he was awarded the Cannes Film Festival's lifetime achievement award, the Carrosse d'Or; he is also an Officer in France's Order of Arts and Letters (1990), and a Chevalier in its Legion of Honor (2009). Cronenberg's many feature films include Stereo, Crimes of the Future, The Dead Zone, The Fly, Naked Lunch, M. Butterfly, Crash, A History of Violence, A Dangerous Method, and Cosmopolis (an adaptation of Don DeLillo's 2003 novel). His most recent film, A Map to the Stars, starring Julianne Moore, Joan Cusack, and Robert Pattinson, opened at the New York Film Festival in Fall 2014.
Review :
"Cronenberg's approach to narrative is sturdy and direct... His originality is in what he's driven to show you, the fierce sculptural intensity of his details and his willingness to linger."--Jonathan Lethem "New York Times Book Review "
"Consumed is an eye-opening dazzler. Not for the fainthearted, but for those of us who relish a trip into the shadowy depths, a must-read. Cronenberg's novel is as troubling, sinister, and as enthralling as his films."--Stephen King
"An astonishing, seamless continuation of what I call his peerless novelistic film oeuvres. With Consumed, he has become the definitive heir, not just of Kafka and Borges, but of Cronenberg himself."--Bruce Wagner
"Classic Cronenberg! Who else can tell such a frightening, thrilling, shocking story about the nexus of the spirit and the flesh? Consumed will, well, consume you."--J. J. Abrams
"Coming from David Cronenberg, the originality, wit, preoccupation with technology, and uncompromising carnality of Consumed should come as no surprise. He will probably be accused of every sin that can be invented to compensate for human fear of mind and body. This fiercely original book, with the scope and poetic exactitude of Nabokov's best work, has the power to unsettle, disarm, and finally make the reader absolutely complicit."--Viggo Mortensen
