(no subject)

The first time I ever encountered any of Chuck Palahniuk's work was when I first read the short story 'Guts'.

I forget how I found it --bad_sex, probably, and I was far too young for it at the time. Sweet fifteen -maybe sixteen- and drawn into the trainwreck of the story, forced to read through each disgusting detail, even while knowing desperately that I really, really didn't want to do so. I've always been piss-poor at keeping myself from reading, and so I've all manner of faint echos still in my mind, of deeply disturbing things I never wanted to imagine.

It's good though. The opening line, the closing line, the whole thing is really quite good. It's effective. It's supposed to make you squirm, it's supposed to break your heart and set your mind on edge. He's a good writer. Deeply disturbing, but good.

And then, at the end of my senior year, my farewell from Mrs. Johnston was books, like she gave every student who ever worked on her lit mag. "The paranoid's pocket guide to mental disorders you can just feel coming on", George Carlin's "Napalm and Silly Putty" and Chuck Palahniuk's "Haunted".

Several months later, I decided to read Haunted. I was at college, I was bored, I had only just seen Fight Club in the prior few months, and had decided he was a good writer. And oh yes, he was. I hesitate to say that I enjoyed the book, but I certainly devoured it.

My copy was lent and lost, but I've recently had the good fortune to pick up a second copy at a good price. In these past few days, I've reread it.

( Spoilers within, because I never did get around to writing the original report, and there are large amounts of it that ought to be talked about. )

~Sor
MOOP!