One thing I will say about Palahniuk is that he manages to write in such a way that you can smell the unwashed bodies, the urine smell from the toilet, the buffet table laden with crisps and sweets and the body odour of the 600 assembled men. Basically, he manages to write in such a way that you feel slightly grimy by the time you finish one of his books.
Don't get me wrong, this is definitely a skill, but I felt that the voices of the 4 characters (72, 137, 600 and sheila) were all a little too similar.
In some ways I was dissapointed in this book - the characters just seemd to be lacking something, and it seemed that the author set out to try and shock more than to tell a story.
On the other hand, I did sit and read the whle thing in one go - although that was not too hard as this is quite a short novel.
I do not think this book will win Palahniuk too many new fans, although I could see teens who ahve not encountered this kind of book before enjoying it, and I think longterm fans will enjoy the book. It is definitely very inkeeping with Palahniuks "style" of writing, but it is not my favourite of his books.
It is trickey, as on the one hand it is a very evocative work, but on the other hand, it was not as good as some of his other things.
As one person pointed out, the cover does feature a pair of breasts, but as with the rest of this book, there is nothing erotic about the image, or in the story itself - in fact if anything, this book is a pretty good antidote to feeling frisky.
If you are a fan I would give this book a try, if you want to buy a young adult something "edgy" it may be worth a go, but if you are new to this author I think you would be better starting off with Fight Club.
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