I have read everything Chuck Palahniuk has published. I know where each book is at any given time. Often, I have purchased second copies of some of his books to loan to friends, because I can’t bear to part with my copies, lest they return dog-eared, torn or otherwise destroyed. You see, each of those books - the actual bound sheaf of pages– can immediately transport me back to the place I was when I first read it; a backyard in Dublin, a hotel room in Singapore, on tour in Kununurra. Each of Chuck’s books has challenged me. In fact, the idea of this blog being titled ‘The Rant’ is named, in part, in honour of one of my favourite of Chuck’s books “Rant”.

If you’re not familiar with Chuck, perhaps you’ve seen the movie Fight Club, based on his book, “Fight Club”. If you haven’t seen it, I’m almost certain you’ve at least heard of it. “Fight Club”, starring Brad Pitt and Edward Norton, and directed by David Fincher was the point where Chuck’s twisted worldview became part of the zeitgeist. I had read "Fight Club" prior to seeing the movie, but did so knowing that the film was in production. Since then, only one other of his books have been made into films "Choke" starring Sam Rockwell was a faithful adaptation without being a standout. Several others have ben dragged through pre-production hell for years.

Chuck’s tales of society’s misfits living their lives amongst us, gathering steam, seeming normal, finding out they are not alone, testing the depths of their own depravity, the motivations of the restless and lost; in “Invisible Monsters” it is a disfigured former model with more than just a passing interest in household medicines, in “Choke” a disinterested loner might just be the son of God. In what is perhaps my favourite of Chuck's books, "Lullaby", the protagonsist learns of a 'African culling song' that can be used to kill anyone who hears it, that is published in a book of lullabys. What would an ordinary person do when faced with such power, especially when they encounter the rude and selfish strangers on the street? Each of Chuck's book challenges the reader to enter a world removed from their own with only thier morality as a compass.

I have recently completed “Pygmy” written from the point of view of an exchange student to the USA with a secret terror agenda, who discovers through his thoroughly unwholesome host family that there is something strangely likeable about the propaganda of his new home and it becomes clear that Chuck, through his characters, feels the need to laugh at the ridiculous, the downright ludicrous excess of Western society in order to maintain contact with it. With his novels and short stories, Chuck presents a world obscured by self-interest where the people who come to genuinely connect with others must lose or abandon the ideology that has shaped their past, through carefully orchestrated car “accidents”, Heimlich maneuvers or piloting a 747 into the Australian desert.

I once wrote to Chuck, the way you might write to an actor or musician as a teenager. Chuck wrote back to me as well, as I had learned he is inclined to do from time to time. To this day, the signed copy of Chuck’s book “Diary” , the letter he wrote urging me to keep writing in whatever format I chose, the personalized beads, the practical jokes, a t-shirt, a packet of ‘forget-me-nots’ seeds (nice one, Customs) remain the most startling and thrilling mail I have ever received.

I have just begun reading Chuck’s latest book, “Tell-all” and it bears the hallmarks of his simplistic writing style, the barest of details about our characters who are often nicknamed or otherwise unnamed, and a strange preoccupation with the minutiae of soapmaking, name-dropping celebrities, cleaning methods interspersed throughout the story to the point where they become absurd or the repetition becomes some kind of obsessive-compulsive mantra. Or both. I look forward to finishing it, but then only because I know his next book is due for release early next year.