Stunning, expansive, punk, angry, imaginative, dense, ornate, turbulent, brilliant

The All-Consuming World was a book that I was really anticipating coming out. When Erewhon sent me a copy in the mail I was absolutely overjoyed! Erewhon books is one of my favorite publishers, and Cassandra Khaw has other incredible works out. Honestly, opening this book at first was a bit of a challenge. The world-building is dense but flowery all at once and unique to any similar books that I’ve read before, so I wasn’t able to stay grounded in any kind of assumptions of the world. The group of misfit ex-criminals is full of rage and bitterness so they swear a lot, which is jarringly juxtaposed by the writing style that was both precise in some parts and ornate in others. This book breaks your assumptions and shatters your beliefs in what a book needs to be.

Though the text took a while to start understanding, once I made it halfway through I started to see how clever Khaw’s writing actually is. They confused me to challenge me. The dense world helped me explore my imagination and push the boundaries of my thoughts. The prose is constantly changing and matches each character’s perspective perfectly. The ornate writing trains you to detach from what you know about humanity, technology, life, and consciousness in order to reach the climax that really turns everything on its head once again. All of this makes for a turbulent reading experience, but one that completely paid off for me in the end.

Quick Summary: The All-Consuming World follows a group of angry misfit ex-cons coming back together to relive their last mission that ended in tragedy. Broken and traumatized from the last mission that cost them their friends, the group begrudgingly agrees to go back to the planet that ruined it all in the hope that one of their dead friends isn’t dead after all.

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