About a week ago I made my way to a book store after realising it had been some time since I had bothered to read anything that wasn’t on some kind of screen. Not knowing what I wanted or what was available that I would be keen on reading, I fell back on a consistently good author named Chuck. His last name is Palahniuk, and I don’t intend on having to mention that surname anymore, due to the difficulty in spelling the damn thing. Lo and behold I was told that his latest book was indeed available. But it wasn’t the book I was looking for. Nor was it the droid. I was keen on getting Snuff, but instead, was shown a book called Pygmy. After a quick scan of the back cover, I bought it. It’s not really all that hard deciding to purchase something you know – or at least are certain of – is going to be good. The adventure of this operative had begun.

Ok. Firstly, how in the name of wide wide world of sports can this book be summarised without either spoiling it or worse, ruining the concept with some feeble attempt at explanation? I am really not sure, so bear with me as I try my best to do neither. The way Chuck has written this book is both difficult and very rewarding. The story follows a diminutive young man named Pygmy, who has been accepted as a foreign exchange student with an American dream nuclear family in an un-named small-town in the heartland. He is not just there to study. He is planning something big.

Delivered via ‘despatches’ which detail Pygmy’s experiences both past and present, Chuck has managed to fire vicious barbs at American culture using the disjointed voice of his protagonist. It is hard to read the book and not put on a voice; broken English the kind you can stereotype with someone of Asian decent. At the start of each shift reading the book, it takes some time to get into the groove of being able to read it fluently. As usual, Chuck repeats things. In an interview with the author here, he explains his use of repetition, and in this case, the use of quotes from various dictators:

The quotes are nonfiction elements, and by including a nonfiction element, you lend a greater reality to an incredible fictional story, like the rules in Fight Club. They lend gravity to the scene and they signal the scene is being summarized and ended in Pygmy’s mind.

The family Pygmy lives with is never named. In fact names are rarely used, except for those of his fellow exchange students – or operatives, as he puts it. The Cedar family, with which he is living, includes ‘cow father’, ‘chicken mother’, ‘pig dog brother’ and the most interesting member, ‘cat sister’. It can be said that Pygmy is not just there to learn, he is planning something. The other foreigners, or operatives, all share the one goal – the same plan. It has to be said the way that Pygmy views those around him, the community and society as a whole can be quite negative and often scathing. But it is hidden under a veil of single-mindedness, brainwashed into him at a young age, so almost sounds innocent.

The great part of this novel is how Chuck has managed to get across this sense of desire of Pygmy to fulfill his obligations to the plan with a gradual softening of his hatred of America. Seeing Americans through his eyes, as I said before, lets some serious shit be said and done. But it is all done with this constant wonder and suspense as to what the ‘plan’ is. The book builds upon a foundation that gradually reveals itself and the final act is sheer brilliance. I couldn’t put it down once I was on the home straight and the feeling of contentment and satisfaction at the end is great. I can easily recommend this book to all who enjoy Chuck’s twisted, acerbic and surreal take on the world.

This is a first for me here at the site. Its not often I ever feel the need to offer a review or even open up on an opinion about a book. Sure, I read, but not as much as I used to, and its something I am trying to remedy. So it is with a mild level of trepidation that I turn the Morgs-Opinion-A-Tor towards Rant, the latest novel by the bent, brilliant and bizarre Chuck Palahniuk. His latest novel is quite unique – much like his previous tomes, of which I am yet to read Invisible Monsters and his two non-fictions. As somewhat of a sign of things to come, it was the second of his books that I read, Survivor, that truly grabbed my attention, with its radical disregard of the most basic, fundamental and ‘normal’ practice. What practice you ask? Well, put it this way. When I say to you the book starts at the end and works backwards, I am not kidding. The chapters, pages and story all spin, backwards, a wonderfully detailed web of a story that its not until you get to page ‘1′ that you reach the true finale. This blew me away, and add the fact I loved Fight Club the movie and the book even more so, the man seemed to be able to do know wrong. And Rant continues his solid run of hits.

Taken straight from the back cover to avoid confusion: Rant takes the form of an oral history of one Buster ‘Rant’ Casey, in which an assortment of friends, enemies, admirers, detractors and relations have their say on this evil character who may or may not be the most efficient serial killer of our time.

Ok firstly, the idea of an oral history, is, well, the chapters are made up of pretty much what people said about Rant on various issues and events. Spread out almost like a court transcript, the novel, with great attention to detail, sets to construct a complex and quite engaging plot with many intertwining stories. The novel plays out almost as if you are holding something of a case file. You know the ones, the ones they have in the movies and on TV, where it tells you what so and so said about someone, full of conflicting reports and often written in a way to lure the reader into what becomes the grasp that Rant has on his world. It is a testament to Palahniuk’s command of the written story that all these different characters are given a scope of input rarely seen on such a level.

To delve into this book with such a little amount of information would be courageous. So this kid Rant, he is, as in most of Palahniuk’s work, an incredibly unique character. He lives in a rural world, he lives a simple life and his parents are simple folk, despite their bizarre life stories. I shouldn’t delve to deeply into the stories of them all, as it would ruin half the fun of putting all the pieces of the puzzle together yourself. But there is something that needs to be said about Rant – he is gifted. Although the gift may not be obviously something to nurture at first, it is this gift that seems to offer him a distance from the real world, that can only come when being burdened in such a way.

As a child he chased the stings, the barbs and teeth of animals we are told to avoid. He does so, he says, to feel alive. Truly alive in a world where everything is artificial, created on computers, mass-produced for immediate consumption. It are these oddball characters that Palahniuk creates to examine, criticize and mourn the failings/successes of society. His world’s are real, his characters only partially unreal. The novel is full of twisted humour, obscene situations and dark insights into what makes the world we live in such a whirlwind of wonder, be it good, bad or something in between.

I highly recommend it and reckon it should be available at all good book stores (and bad ones too probably).

//This would make an insanely good movie!