Thought Train to Pusan

I don’t know why I keep trying to read books by Chuck Palahniuk. That is not to say that he’s not a good writer, it’s just that his very distinct style and way of telling a story is not for me. I’ve given him a go with a couple of other novels, but I think I’ve just come to realize that while I can see why others might like his work, I just can’t seem to enjoy it. And that’s okay. Though I will say that out of the three books I’ve read by Chuck Palahniuk to date, this one was not my least favourite, so that’s a good thing! Damned is about a thirteen year-old girl who has just died and is now in Hell. The story of how she died and what her life was like is told through almost a series of journal-entry type chapters addressed to Satan. Her accounts of Hell are vivid and include a lot of grotesque filth and imagery, as well as descriptions on how the whole operation is set up to run as she comes to learn more and more. Madison is intelligent and snarky, but defin...

Chuck Palahniuk has some pretty interesting and insightful ideas about humans and the world we live in, but they are also pretty grotesque. “Maybe he should lighten up a little?” I think to myself. But then again, there is a demented humor to some of the biting things he writes and shows, which makes me wonder if the perversions experienced in this book aren’t strictly limited to these specific and wildly outlandish situations. Because I mean… they aren’t the crazy situations just heighten them or make them seem all the more dramatic. Invisible Monsters is a story told by a young woman who is identified by various names throughout the novel. In the opening scene, we see a house burning down on the wedding day of a woman named Evie Cottrell, who has apparently just shot a friend of the narrator named Brandy Alexander. Brandy asks the narrator to tell her her story as she lies dying in the narrator’s arms, and from there the tale of the narrator (as well as Brandy) unfolds in a n...