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nohoneyjustb 's review for:
Haunted
by Chuck Palahniuk
It's so hard to talk about this book without ruining anything, but I'm gonna do my best. Was it gross? Yeah, kind of, but nothing that made me wanna scream and shout and cry and throw up like so many reviews would lead you to believe. It's an interesting kind of horror and gore he's used. Is it effective? Absolutely. But not in the way you would have yourself believe. And that's what blows my mind the most about this book
Now, I knew going into this book that it would be completely different from anything I've ever read before, but I still didn't expect to come out of this story feeling the way I felt. It took me MONTHS to get through this book; partly because a previous book had put in a slump that I just could NOT shake, mostly because every story, every chapter, every poem and character in this story will unsettle you in one way or another. Never in a book have I seen such an accurate yet horrifying portrayal of humanity. I've never before felt such simultaneous disgust and sympathy for a group of fictional (based on non-fiction, terrifyingly enough) characters. Chuck Palahniuk is no stranger to the strange and twisted, the darkness in morality that blurs the lines between right and wrong, but there's just something so different and special about this novel. I'll admit, with every new chapter I started I got more and more frustrated, more and more detached from the story. A few chapters in particular shook me so hard I literally couldn't process the story until I put it down and gave myself a few days to think about what happened. I couldn't hide my contempt for the choices he made with his story telling and I didn't think I would be able to forgive him for making me feel so uncomfortable and invaded and unsafe in the world... Until I got to the end. Do I feel comfortable? No. Do I feel any less gross for reading it? Definitely not. But now I understand that that was his whole point all along.
Now, I knew going into this book that it would be completely different from anything I've ever read before, but I still didn't expect to come out of this story feeling the way I felt. It took me MONTHS to get through this book; partly because a previous book had put in a slump that I just could NOT shake, mostly because every story, every chapter, every poem and character in this story will unsettle you in one way or another. Never in a book have I seen such an accurate yet horrifying portrayal of humanity. I've never before felt such simultaneous disgust and sympathy for a group of fictional (based on non-fiction, terrifyingly enough) characters. Chuck Palahniuk is no stranger to the strange and twisted, the darkness in morality that blurs the lines between right and wrong, but there's just something so different and special about this novel. I'll admit, with every new chapter I started I got more and more frustrated, more and more detached from the story. A few chapters in particular shook me so hard I literally couldn't process the story until I put it down and gave myself a few days to think about what happened. I couldn't hide my contempt for the choices he made with his story telling and I didn't think I would be able to forgive him for making me feel so uncomfortable and invaded and unsafe in the world... Until I got to the end. Do I feel comfortable? No. Do I feel any less gross for reading it? Definitely not. But now I understand that that was his whole point all along.