Books of the week
CONSENT LEO BENEDICTUS FABER, $33
The psychopathic stalker is a relatively recent invention in literature. One of the first and best was Patricia Highsmith’s Ripley with his absolute amoral sexual fluidity. In 1962, John Fowles’ The Collector revealed a socially inadequate young man who kidnapped his victim in the hope she would grow to love him
More recently, Bret Easton Ellis published American Psycho featuring Patrick Bateman, the ultimate “yuppie” serial killer, whose human victims were the exact equivalent to the book’s obsessively listed luxury products.
Consent by Leo Bendictus is a variation on the theme. The narrator, a man who is never named, discovers that he is wealthy through a bequest of “11 million” from an aunt. It gives him total independence, but it is a freedom he uses to indulge in compulsive stalking.
On seeing an attractive woman in a public place, he follows her. Even more fanatically, he tracks her in her private life and workplace, assembling detailed files over days, weeks, and even months.
First there was Laura, a hairdresser and would-be actor. Then scores of women later, there is Frances, an attractive young management consultant…
Benedictus is a cunning writer. Consent does not initially lay all its cards on the table. A reader can only take what is given and create the links. It is a disturbing and frequently tense process.
Frances’ job is put on the line by an anonymous email which accuses her of wanting to poach her customers for when she hands in her notice, of arrogance, giving kickbacks, inflating her hours, and financial fraud. There is no evidence but the email itself. However, Frances is suspended until an investigation is complete.
But who wrote the email? Was it the man who obsessively follows her or has she personal enemies in the office? Slowly the foundations of her life begin to erode and it is all witnessed by her stalker who, seeing her cry in a cafe, cannot help but offer a moment of human consolation.
Consent is a tricky book. The reader makes deductions only to have them undercut. Benedictus presents us with Frances’ story, but is it really her story, or simply her stalker’s imagination of her story? While the reader considers these things, incidents pile up.
A drunken night of sex with a near stranger plays out into something completely different. An employee of Frances’ company dies in mysterious circumstances. Is it an accident or murder? Is she even safe from observation in her own bedroom?
Consent is a carefully crafted and completely chilling novel where all the possibilities are open – until they suddenly snap closed.