Rating: 
Summary: superbly sculptured tale of techological nightmare
Review: When I was reading the pages of "Crash" depictions of automobile and anatomical parts had blended together into a uniform vision which is very close in my mind to oblong chrome structures of Konstantin Brancusi (male parts) and uneven flowerely and desert scenes from Georgia O'Keefe
(female parts).
Execution of those allusions is brilliant...
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Summary: Crash what great sex?
Review: Irate it 9 as a pleasure driven sexual enlightment book for many pleasures. I rate it a 1 as a book for a serious reade
Rating:
Summary: Revel in the language
Review: Crash: a novel not of strange obsessions (that's the pretext), but rather a novel of language. Most notable and most fun about this book is Ballard's application of the pseudo-language of scientific literature to such a perverse and ridiculous obsession. If there's a point, its that scientific or official writing, with its detachment, can reduce the most outrageous subject matter to the dryness of a government pamphlet. This is the same ground Ballard was covering in "Love and Napalm: Export USA" (later retitled "The Atrocity Exhibition"). As to all this bunk about the sexuality of car crashes, the eroticism of technology: I doubt it. For instance, Ballard preferred his own dream-landscape of American culture to the real thing, admitting in an interview (republished in Research) that he'd never even bothered to visit the US and rarely left Shepperton. So it is with Crash. Think of Crash as the story of the holocaust (or the making of "Back to the Future II") written by your friends at the DMV.
So understood, the movie was bound to be a challenge for its maker. I'm not sure it worked.
Rating: 
Summary: An Orgy of Skin and Steel
Review: "Crash," despite its excesses, is a cautionary tale, a tale of crossed boundaries and the infringement of technology into the realm of sexuality and vice-versa. And this violation, central to the novel's success, makes "Crash" an uncomfortable, yet enthralling, read. London, the locus of the novel, is a domain of autoeroticism to the small band of deviants who experiment with the "erotic atrocities" of the car crash. Led by Vaughan, a "nightmare angel of the highways," each member of the clique is on a path of self-discovery, searching the fringes for a new definition of identity, usually culminating in a twisted, disjointed sex act among the remains of the shredded, mangled metal of automobiles. But this avenue of discovery leads to the devaluating of any humanity in sexuality, for bodily fluids soon hold no significance over engine coolant, and the scars of past automobile near-fatalities exuberate more eroticism than the standard sex organs.
Excess? Absolutely. And at times the excess becomes almost unbearable in its monotonous perversity. But this surplus of imagery serves a purpose; it is an apocalyptic vision of a downward road that should be familiar to all, one in which technology and sexuality are allowed to mingle freely. The results are not pretty. They are frightening.
"Crash" is one of those novels that is more important than enjoyable. A must read for anyone interested in and disturbed by the state of the human condition in the face of technology in the late twentieth century.
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Summary: A few reasons why I like CRASH
Review: Crash is first peice of writing that I have read by J.G. Ballard, and hopefully it won't be the last. I found the novel erotic, repulsive, and horrifying; yet at the same time, highly enlighting. This is probably due to the fact that Ballard, in my opinion, has an intoxicating style of writing that finds the deepest darkest place in his reader and stimulates it to surface. I found Ballards characters, emotionally depraved as they are, to be both complex, and compelling. Even more frightening is the fact that the car crash fetish is not just something out of Ballard's own imagination, people with this affliction do exist, and are much like the characters in his novel. It is a satisfying thing to be able to find an original peice of writing that completely undercuts your view of what is normal; and it is in this area that Ballard unquestionably succeeds
Rating: 
Summary: not bad after all...
Review: Long-winded, but quite an interesting read nevertheless..
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Summary: You'll never feel quite the same while driving.
Review: Despite the sad comments of the 'fan of shock' below (one who also apparently doesn't understand the differences between American and British English) _CRASH_ is quite the adventure into the world of the eroticism of the car and sexual violence of the auto accident.
I first encountered Ballard via several of his short stories based around the same sort of imagery (what could be considered studies perhaps) "Why I Want to Fuck Ronald Reagan", "The Crucifixion of Christ As Seen As A Downhill Motor Race" (or something like that), etc.
Rating:
Summary: BRILLIANTLY DISTURBING.
Review: BILLIANTLY CONCEIVED. NEVER HAVE I READ A NOVEL LIKE MR. BALLARDS NOVEL CRASH. A DISTURBING TRIP THROUGH THE DISTURBED MIND OF A GROUP OF CAR CRASH FETISHISTS
Rating:
Summary: The marriage of reason and nightmare...
Review: J.G. Ballard's "Crash" opens with the line "Vaughn died yesterday in his last car crash." This opening is eerily reminiscent of the opening of Camus' "The Stranger." Ballard, however, in his clinical eroticism and unhurried inevitability, take the reader on a journey farther inward than Camus could even have dared to dream. Ballard uses the arrogant belief that we as drivers are in control of tons of careering steel as a metaphor for our relationship with technology, form and architecture as extensions of our bodies. That the ultimate climax or orgasm could come at the moment of death is surely the unconcious thoughts of anyone who ever speeded down a lonely road or passed another car with just inches to spare. Objects are often described as "phallic" or the like, and Ballard explores the shaping of our external world to that of the innermost sexual one. Where they collide is the territory of "Crash." This is a classic, challenging work
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Summary: Something Different
Review: "Crash," by J.G. Ballard was one of the strangest books I have ever read. From the beginning of the story, the reader knows that the story they are about to read is going to be something very different, but very exciting at the same time. This science fiction title focuses on the lives of a few people that are obsessed with the fetish between sex and car crashes. Eventually, all of the characters interact somehow deeply affecting their lives forever. Throughout the novel each character eventually gets more and more interested in the idea of the car crash, and having sex in a car. This novel portrays a vast array of emotions to the reader from caring and tenderness, to violence and darkness. All of these emotions are weaved together very well by Ballard, somehow even fitting tenderness and violence together. I have never really looked at how car crashes and sexuality can be combined, but this book does is in a very good, although very strange way. Overall, a very good book that will keep your attention until the last page. Be prepared for something different, but entertaining.
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