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Cover of Crash

Crash

J. G. Ballard (1973)

SubgenreMagical Realism
Age groupAdult 18+
Content ratingX
Pages (Quick Read (<250))
Setting
CSM age18+
Goodreads3.64

Content levels

ViolenceStrong
Sexual contentExplicit
LanguageStrong

Positive tags

Not yet tagged

Protagonist archetypes

AntiheroTortured Protagonist

Synopsis

The definitive cult, post-modern novel – a shocking blend of violence, transgression and eroticism. When our narrator smashes his car into another and watches a man die in front of him, his sense of sexual possibilities in the world around him becomes detached. As he begins an affair with the dead man's wife, he finds himself drawn with increasing intensity to the mangled impacts of car crashes. Then he encounters Robert Vaughan, a former TV scientist turned nightmare angel of the expressway, who has gathered around him a collection of alienated crash victims and experiments with a series of erotic atrocities, each more sinister than the last. But Vaughan craves the ultimate crash - a head-on collision of blood, semen, engine coolant and iconic celebrity. First published in 1973 'Crash' remains one of the most shocking novels of the second half of the twentieth century and was made into an equally controversial film by David Cronenburg.

Tags

Transgressive FictionExperimental LiteratureCult ClassicPsychological Horror