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Controller
"Controller is both fierce and fearless. It is a compelling, unblinking journey into the dark." Stephen May
How far would you go to satisfy your desires? Sex and punishment, art and exploitation, Controller is the debut novella from one of the UK’s finest young writers.
A young traveller finds herself in Northern Spain, working as an artist’s model. As her relationship with the artist deepens and darkens, her experience of the city, those around her and the nature of art and desire change.
Shortlisted for Route’s Next Great Yorkshire Novelist Competition in 2011 and nominated for the Sabotage Reviews Best Novella 2012.
Sally Ashton grew up in Yorkshire and from the age of fifteen has been invoved with the Writing Squad (An Arts Council initiative for young, Northern writers). She studied Creative Writing at the University of Warwick and last year finished a Master’s in Translation and Interpreting in London. In between her degrees she travelled extensively and spent time working in France, Canada, Spain and Austria. She is currently back in Spain, working as a translator. In her spare time she loves playing sport, reading and drinking a lot of coffee.
Controller was shortlisted for the Route Next Great Author Award and shortlisted for best novella in the Sabotage Review Awards 2013.
How far would you go to satisfy your desires? Sex and punishment, art and exploitation, Controller is the debut novella from one of the UK’s finest young writers.
A young traveller finds herself in Northern Spain, working as an artist’s model. As her relationship with the artist deepens and darkens, her experience of the city, those around her and the nature of art and desire change.
Shortlisted for Route’s Next Great Yorkshire Novelist Competition in 2011 and nominated for the Sabotage Reviews Best Novella 2012.
Sally Ashton grew up in Yorkshire and from the age of fifteen has been invoved with the Writing Squad (An Arts Council initiative for young, Northern writers). She studied Creative Writing at the University of Warwick and last year finished a Master’s in Translation and Interpreting in London. In between her degrees she travelled extensively and spent time working in France, Canada, Spain and Austria. She is currently back in Spain, working as a translator. In her spare time she loves playing sport, reading and drinking a lot of coffee.
Controller was shortlisted for the Route Next Great Author Award and shortlisted for best novella in the Sabotage Review Awards 2013.
72 pages, Kindle Edition
First published October 2, 2012
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
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March 16, 2024I'm not going to rate this because I didn't finish it. I was so on board with this 30% into it. The prose is sparse and the main character, Laura, is weird but interesting. A young woman who left home is now modeling for an art class.
Around 40% the story leans into body horror; the detailed descriptions are very detailed and graphic--uncomfortable. 50% I had to tap out. The MC finds some photographs in a drawer and then describes them in explicit detail and I wish I hadn't read what I read. Fucking sick.
TW for grotesque subject matter, unsexy sex stuff, and horrible disgusting shit with the corpses of children. Ugh. No. Bye.
Around 40% the story leans into body horror; the detailed descriptions are very detailed and graphic--uncomfortable. 50% I had to tap out. The MC finds some photographs in a drawer and then describes them in explicit detail and I wish I hadn't read what I read. Fucking sick.
TW for grotesque subject matter, unsexy sex stuff, and horrible disgusting shit with the corpses of children. Ugh. No. Bye.
November 3, 2017
Disturbing and Weird
The free form is distracting. The content is violent and awful. There is no point or real plot. A disturbing read, not a good one. I'm not into this kind of thing, but I had to read something from Dead Ink for a class.
The free form is distracting. The content is violent and awful. There is no point or real plot. A disturbing read, not a good one. I'm not into this kind of thing, but I had to read something from Dead Ink for a class.
May 18, 2020
A short read at ~90 pages, but one that took me a while to get through. It's incredibly dark and dense, with pages and pages focused on minute movements and senses. The prose is often stilting and sparse, and it sometimes took a lot of concentration on my part to follow what was happening. It's consistently beautiful, though:
The book doesn't beat around the bush when it comes to the darker subject matter. Some of the scenes (the photos and the virus) were very, very gruesome and disturbing, and I struggled to get through portions of it.
I appreciated Ashton's note at the start - that Controller is an exploration of the Male Gaze, and was not intended to be interpreted as erotica. I'm stealing this directly from the testimonials on the back, but it really is a striking dive into the relationship between artist and model.
Her deft, quick hands. The lid of the milk, pour thick, opaque stream, pan, pan handle, metal, click of lighting, flame blue.
The book doesn't beat around the bush when it comes to the darker subject matter. Some of the scenes (the photos and the virus) were very, very gruesome and disturbing, and I struggled to get through portions of it.
I appreciated Ashton's note at the start - that Controller is an exploration of the Male Gaze, and was not intended to be interpreted as erotica. I'm stealing this directly from the testimonials on the back, but it really is a striking dive into the relationship between artist and model.
March 18, 2024
I don’t know what I just read. Honestly, I don’t. Mainly because the writing was so sparse and fragmented, it was all I could focus on. That’s it. That’s the whole review.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews