Invisible Monsters: A Novel

Palahniuk's books are like dangerously wild individuals from the same family. They all have their own quirks and twitches, but you can see the resemblance. Many reviewers of Palahniuk (especially those here) try to judge his writing in comparative terms. ("not as good as Fight Club" or "better than Choke") Palahniuk is, unfortunately, a victim of his own skill, because although his texts are...more

Palahniuk's books are like dangerously wild individuals from the same family. They all have their own quirks and twitches, but you can see the resemblance. Many reviewers of Palahniuk (especially those here) try to judge his writing in comparative terms. ("not as good as Fight Club" or "better than Choke") Palahniuk is, unfortunately, a victim of his own skill, because although his texts are certainly their own stories, they do have remarkably similar tones (e.g. he sprinkles his text with odd/unusual facts as a backdrop for the odd/unusual action). As a result, they polarize the audience quite well. Like one book, and you're likely to enjoy them all. That having been said, let me add my own opinion to the mix: this book is Chuck's best to date (note: I haven't read Diary). All of his books are, to some extent, about identity crises. In this case, it is the identity crisis of ex-model Shannon, whose jaw is blown off in an unusual auto accident. She goes on a soul-quest of sorts with transgendered queen Brandy, and a few other people with similarly odd problems. What follows is a tangled, twisted, and tantalizing tale of drugs, sex, love, loss, and hope. This time, the style of the book is tailored after movie-esqe terms (like "flash forward" and "jump cut"), giving the text a cinematic quality that works well with the subject matter (it also, for you literature fans, makes for a far more subtle metaphor than you'd expect). The flashbacks and the dialogue and the incidents with Shannon's parents and modeling peers are all as well-crafted as an insightful and hilariously filmed movie scene. Some of the reviewers here complain about the "soap opera" quality of the book, to which I say, "go read the funny pages." There are, true, melodramatic moments, but they are well-honed, well-placed, and, by God, necessary. The story's many threads tie together neatly and superbly by the film's violent and firey conclusion, and true to Chuck's form (with the exception of Choke), not a word of the book is extraneous or unnecessary. Other people complain that the novel doesn't answer the question it poses, nor does it rise above the subject matter it scorns. Although I will concede that these statements are half-true, they are simply part of Palahniuk's form, and for his audience, part of his charm. If you want someone to deliver polite and pat answers, then read, I don't know, Danielle Steel. Besides, Palahniuk does offer solutions--he just makes you search for them, makes you assemble them on your own. Neither does he treat his subject matter with wishy-washy ambivalence, but with unflinching honesty and realism (although reading this book, you may find it hard to compare it to any kind of reality with which you're familiar). His spare, brutal, and beautiful writing clarifies the brutal and beautiful nature of his story. So, if you want bite-sized literature with a sweet moral center, go somewhere else. This book is candy, sure, but it's the kind that gets all over you.   hide

*brief synopsis & SPOILERS in this review* I've been reading the book for the past couple of weeks, slow reader that I am, and am glad to say I have (finally) finished reading the thing. Spoilers ahead. Our story starts with a gruesome scene: The narrator, watching her hysterical best friend shoot someone with a rifle. She seems eerily unperturbed by these events and starts to narrate her...more

*brief synopsis & SPOILERS in this review* I've been reading the book for the past couple of weeks, slow reader that I am, and am glad to say I have (finally) finished reading the thing. Spoilers ahead. Our story starts with a gruesome scene: The narrator, watching her hysterical best friend shoot someone with a rifle. She seems eerily unperturbed by these events and starts to narrate her story. The narrator is Shannon McFarland, an attractive model who has it all: Her career, her model best friend, a police detective boyfriend. Her flashbacks are in a non-chronological order, jumping to her teen years at home to her modelling career to her time travelling with Brandy Alexander, Queen Supreme. As the story progresses, we find that the turning point in her life happened when her jaw was blown off by a gun ("Birds ate my face," was what she wanted to tell anyone who asked.). She meets Brandy at a hospital, and is immediately taken by her beauty. They drag along Shannon's boyfriend and go around the country with a myriad of made up names, stealing female hormones pills and other drugs from rich women and selling them. Nothing in her life is what it seems: The beautiful Brandy Alexander is a transgender who has had surgery to look exactly like her, her handsome boyfriend is a bisexual who is two-timing her and her best friend, etc etc. The thing about Invisible Monsters is that it is very reminiscent of Fight Club. In both books, the narrator is one who is starting on a journey of self-discovery (or self-destruction, depending on how you look at it-- maybe it's the same thing). They are both spectators to the actions of a wild, non-comformist radical (Tyler in Fight Club, Brandy in Invisible Monsters), and are swept up uncontrollably by them. The thing about Palahniuk is that he likes his plot twists; they are always unpredictable and always dramatic. In Fight Club it turns out that Tyler Durden is actually the narrator's alter ego, and in Invisible Monsters Brandy Alexander is actually long-lost-presumed-to-be-dead brother who had undergone a sex change operation and plastic surgery to look exactly like Shannon. What was fantastic about the book was Palahniuk's writing. The storyline jumps to and fro, and builds up oh-so-slowly. You can't see what relevance this has to do with that, until the big picture is unveiled. Then you look back at the whole story and go, oh. It manages to be dark and negative without being pessimistic, and how we are all always so caught up in our own existences that we can't help but lose our selves. In all his books, he teaches (I say 'teaches' because I have learnt) us that self-improvement is not what we should want. What you need to do is fuck up so badly that you can't save yourself. Don't do what you want. Do what you're afraid to want. Do what scares you. Blast away everything that reassures you that life will be ok. It won't. Learn to deal. Chaos is the way nature is the way humans are. Stop trying to organize and place everything in order. Bomb your comfort zone. I say it isn't pessimistic, because his books are not about how negative life is. It's about how sad our lives are: the life we strive for but never attain. Always looking to improve it on the outside, by buying more, being more beautiful, getting more attention. No. It isn't pessimistic because it embraces chaos. It embraces self-destruction. It's more of self-dismantling, so that you can be built up again. We are all products of society, parts of something that we don't even try to comprehend. We want what society wants (Kant's duty ethics?), we desire what society dictates we desire. We are incapable of original thought, because every thought we conceive has been thought of before by a million other people. And that's OK. It's not our fault, and it's not a bad thing. But we'll be stuck in this self-centered cycle where everything we want is materialistic, and everything we get is meaningless. We are all self-composting. The only thing I didn't really enjoy was the ending, which ended on a positive note. It spoiled dark tone of the book that was constant since the beginning of the book. Still, on the whole it wasn't a disappointing book. It mixes equal parts of disgustingness, cynicism and radicalness that sucks you in like a whirlpool. In conclusion... READ THIS BOOK! ::chucks book at EVERYONE::   hide

PALAHNIUK ME SORPRENDE DE NUEVO, EL GIRO AL ÚLTIMO MINUTO. CUANDO CREÍAS QUE SABÍAS QUE LA HISTORIA TENÍA UN SENTIDO TE VIENE EL GOLPE BAJO SORPRESIVO CON UNA LIBERTAD DE LENGUAJE Y CON PERSONAJES QUE BUSCAN LA AUTODESTRUCCIÓN PARA ENCONTRAR LA LIBERTAD Y ASÍ MISMOS.

I've enjoyed Palahniuk's other books, but because Invisible Monsters was never released in hardback, it was the last one that I read (aside from Haunted) and boy does it suck out loud. Invisible Monsters isn't a novel. It's some kind of awful venereal disease. If you look at the history behind this book, you'll find that Invisible Monsters was the first novel that Palahniuk wrote (before Fight...more

I've enjoyed Palahniuk's other books, but because Invisible Monsters was never released in hardback, it was the last one that I read (aside from Haunted) and boy does it suck out loud. Invisible Monsters isn't a novel. It's some kind of awful venereal disease. If you look at the history behind this book, you'll find that Invisible Monsters was the first novel that Palahniuk wrote (before Fight Club) but it was rejected from every publisher he sent it to. Then Fight Club made it big and this novel was released onto an unfortunate public when it should have been pulped and sent back to hell. So, what exactly is wrong with this book? Cliche characters, a complete and total disconnect preventing anything that could possibly resemble empathy, forced tired edginess (ooh, transsexuals, how dangerous), the same stupid twist happens over and over and over again; the whole book is just a total mess. Do yourself a favor and skip this one, if you like Palahniuk then go for Fight Club, Survivor or even Lullaby.   hide