Snuff

Hello, I have always been a Chuck Palahniuk lover and I'm probably one of the great few who read "Fight Club" before I saw the movie. If your a prude don't read this book. I'm not even done with it yet; I got it in the mail yesterday and I'm already half through. I love all his books and this is just one more. If you ever get the chance to meet him do it and DEFINITLEY stay for his reading-you never know what will come out of his mouth next.

Palahniuk is such an excellent writer, and there's so much to his work that's genius, but why is he trapped in doing the exact same thing everytime? And I'm the sucker who keeps buying the books, expecting that he'll finally break out of his self-created box.

But I keep being wrong. And so I get stuck reading "Diary," and then "Haunted," "Rant," and now "Snuff." To its credit, "Haunted was slightly better than the other three, and "Lullaby" was OK as well. But "Snuff," in my opinion, is his worst one. It's predictable, it's redundant, it's just trying to shock for the sake of shock.

What happened to his story-telling? What happened to the magic of books like "Fight Club" and "Invisible Monsters" and "Choke"? I don't care about any of the characters, or about anything that happens in the book. I read ahead to pick up the next obscene morsel of a mind feigning how demented it is because being demented sells books. For some reason people are drawn to things that shock, that no one else wants to talk about or mention or describe. But at some point, it all just becomes the mundane.

Ironically, Palahniuk is crossing the line into the mundane with every attempt to be sacreligious. That is, unless he hasn't already been there for the last few years.

I love Palahniuk books. But I can say, Haunted had some good short stories to it, as did Stranger than fiction. Both had perfect stories in them, complete, start to finish, work that would bring a smile to Amy Hampel's face. But this book, (Rant, not a big fan) was fantastic. Personally I don't like this multiview point stuff that books and movies are taking, but this book is nothing short of fantastic. The people are so clearly done, the story is hilarious. It's nothing life changing, but I don't think it's suppose to be. It's a great book to have, and you'll find yourself reading parts of it to friends who don't care to hear it.

If like myself YOU raced through 'Rant', hated 'Haunted' didn't like 'Diary' and were lulled to sleep by 'Lullaby' then you'll be glad to know that Chuck Palahniuk's best work didn't stop after 'Choke' in 2001. Here in his 9th novelistic effort he turns the porn industry on it's head and satirically skewers it in the way that only he can. With a story about a 600-man strong gangbang of a washed up porn star you'd probably be thinking "low grade porn", but you'd be wrong. What you get here is anything but titillating. In fact like most of his work you see only the seamiest, nastiest and most extreme sides of a very dirty industry. This is a quick and breezy read that has a lot in common with a bad accident at the side of the road. You know you shouldn't and don't really want to look, but you just can't help yourself.... As always with Palahniuk though the laughs come at you out of nowhere like a left hook.

... it might not be in the top 10 of his works. Better than "Haunted" but not near as good as "Rant." I have read every Chuck novel and will read everyone he puts out. Fight Club, Choke, and Survivor and my favorites. If you haven't read those novels yet, then read them first. If you still need more Chuck after those, then give this one a try.