Choke

Rating:
Summary: Brilliant isn't the right word...
Review: but it's the first one that comes to mind.

I've read all of Chuck Palahnuik's novels, and I eagerly awaited _Choke_. I wasn't disappointed. _Choke_ is the story of Victor Mancini, a sex addict who stages chokings in order to milk his saviors of enough cash to pay his mother's medical bills. But is Victor himself a savior? All of Palahnuik's novels deal with the fact that our current society has sunk so far into absurdity that we need some sort of savior to shake us up and see what we're doing to ourselves, but the question remains -- does anyone have what it takes to be that savior?

I can't help comparing this novel to _Survivor_, which is still my favorite Palahnuik novel, and, as an earlier reviewer mentions, the best way to review any Palahnuik novel is to compare it to his other novels. _Survivor_ has a bit more of an edge to it than _Choke_ does. Still, any Palahnuik novel is definitely worth reading, because there are no bad Palahnuik novels.

Rating:
Summary: "Welcome to Hell"
Review: I wish I could say I was cool enough to have known about Chuck Palahniuk before others had discovered him, but I had actually never heard of his first published novel, Fight Club, until I had seen director David Fincher's brilliant film version of it. A few days later, I bought the novel, read it and then quickly bought his second and third books, Survivor and Invisible Monsters, devouring them one after the other. I was enraptured by Palahniuk's world of anarchists making explosives from human fat, transsexuals feeding estrogen to unsuspecting chauvinists, suicide cultists, and fashion models without faces wreaking vengeance on old boyfriends. I became an instant fan.

In his new novel, Choke, Palahniuk introduces us to Vincent Mancini, a twentysomething whiling his life away in a shitty, low-wage job at a colonial amusement park. His mother is wasting away from Alzheimer's in an expensive elder-care facility, and to make enough money to help her, he goes into restaurants, stuffs food into his mouth and pretends to be choking. When someone comes to the rescue, a plea for financial aid soon follows. Feeling an obligation to look after the person he's saved, the "hero" eagerly complies.

Faced with his mom's painful end, Vincent goes into meltdown. He becomes obsessed with death and sex, diagnosing people's minor ailments as symptoms of potentially excruciating death, cruising addiction sections of bookstores and going to Sexual Compulsives Anonymous (SCA) 12-step meetings to pick up women. Not that he doesn't realize just how much of a lost soul he is. Written in the form of a brutal self-inventory-Step Four of the 12 Steps to Recovery pioneered by Alcoholics Anonymous-Vincent warns us off at the beginning:

"If you're going to read this, don't bother. After a couple of pages, you won't want to be here. So forget it. Go away. Get out while you're still in one piece. Save yourself."

A chapter later, he's humping a girl on the floor of a 12-step meeting bathroom while giving us a philosophical introduction to the world of sexual compulsivity. The bit is both funny and hot enough that we're inclined to agree when he says, "I think that I shall never see a poem as lovely as a hot-gushing, butt-cramping, gut-hosing orgasm."

But there's despair here amid the debauchery. Vincent's mindless fucking around is a symptom of a deep ennui laced with a soured spirituality. In Fight Club, the relationship with God is always seen in the context of the absent father: If I never know the warmth and trust a good father delivers, then how can I love and trust a faceless, seemingly absent Father in heaven? Daddy's missing in Choke, too-Vincent has never known his father. When he's tossing off a line like "Parenthood is the opiate of the masses," he's not just flipping the bird at people who've found some measure of happiness in breeding; he's also mourn.ing his own loss of family.

Sadly, the origins of the fiction in Choke are rooted in Palahniuk's real-life tragedy. His father-a chronic womanizer-was murdered by a girlfriend's ex-husband who stalked and shot the couple to death. Trying to reach some parity with that loss, Palahniuk attended 12-step programs for sexual compulsives, hoping to get a line on how his father's mind worked.

He's gotten the details right, based on my attendance of SCA meetings with a onetime girlfriend. (Yes, you get laid a lot with a compulsive girlfriend, but there's little joy in it. Sooner or later, infidelity and sexually transmitted diseases rear their ugly heads.) He's nailed the 12-step minutiae dead-on: the circle of blandly normal faces; the small green church meeting rooms; the coffee and cigarette smoke; the horrific, matter-of-fact recitation of stories that sound like urban legends; the trembling raised hand; the eyes that look only at the floor; the weeping and self-loathing; the fact that you'll never ever look at people without wondering what secrets they're harboring.

I don't mean this to sound like the book is a downer because it isn't. The particular strength of each of Palahniuk's books is that no matter how colorfully degraded the characters, his tight, economical writing never bores. It's also never preachy, delivering the bitter pills of his sharp observations with wry humor and a steely-eyed but generous humanity.

For Palahniuk and his readers, the unexamined life isn't worth reading about. His characters have to reach the lowest depths before they can reclaim their lives, and, like a 21st-century Virgil, he's there to take our hand and give us a guided tour of hell. Palahniuk's interest is in redemption, not nihilism, despite the objections of uncomprehending critics.

But social criticism isn't enough unless you're prepared to follow through and actually change things. That's a tough truth to take to heart, and I suspect many will simply gloss over that aspect of the book, preferring to focus on the sexual activity and snarky asides simply because it's easier. Palahniuk warns us that we can only tear down the world-and one another-so much before we run out of things to level.

It's a sober lesson, but once you've learned it, you're fucked. You can't go back; you can only move forward and try to improve things or stay where you are, frozen in panic.

Rating:
Summary: Why don't they make us read THIS in school?
Review: I go to high school, and in English class they make us read boring novels about fake people who would have died hundreds of years ago, as if relating their stories to everyday life will help us at all once we leave the God forsaken classroom. And they call these "classics."

But it's stories like Chuck Palahniuk's CHOKE that can truly be interpreted and applied to today's culture. Depressing, humorous, and deep in philosophy. While I found Survivor to be more memorable than Choke, Choke is still leaps and bounds ahead of any other non-Palahniuk novel I've ever read.

Choke is more of a story than a bible, but it has a very fullfilling ending that leaves you in a pensive mood. Get this book if you've enjoyed other Palahniuk works, but if you're trying this author out for the first time, go with Fight Club or Survivor.

And remember, Don't Read Ahead!

Rating:
Summary: Sick book...I love it!
Review: What else can I say other than it's a sick, vulgar, jive, and hilarious book. Not many books can fuse all four qualities. I'm so proud to be Generation X.

Rating:
Summary: Typical Palahniuk = Excellent Book
Review: I sat down and read this book in a day. I haven't read "Invisible Monsters" yet. I read "Survivor", because I liked "Fight Club". I read "Fight Club" because I liked the movie. I've enjoyed everything that Mr. Palahniuk has written for two main reasons, (i) I am part of the generation that he seeks to capture, caught in a culture that seems at times pointless and absurd, and (ii) you never know what to expect from his plot.

Another reviewer mentioned how tough it is to review one of Mr. Palahniuk's books - I couldn't agree more. While I really enjoyed this book, part of that enjoyment came from its unpredictability, an element all to easily given away in a review. I won't do that. I do think that the only way to evaluate one of Mr. Palahniuk's books is by comparing it to his other books, and of the two I've read, this is the second best. Nothing to do with its quality, just that I think "Fight Club" was really good, and I'm also probably biased there by the quality of the movie. Victor, the lead character in "Choke" is as compelling as was Jack in "Fight Club", and is much more enjoyable than was Tender Branson of "Survivor."

This book is a much more personal plot, driven around Victor's search, than it is a plot about changing the world. One almost wonders if Victor takes his name from Viktor Frankl, author of "Man's Search for Meaning" (a great book). Victor spends the whole book searching for an answer to his mother's illness, an understanding of who he is, and a sense of purpose in the middle of a confusing world.

If you've read Palahniuk's works and enjoyed them, then I can't imagine how you wouldn't enjoy "Choke." All of his style and wit are on display, creating a very enjoyable book. If you haven't read anything by Palahniuk, this isn't a bad book with which to start, no concerns over having seen the movie ("Fightclub") or outrageous, all-encompassing plots ("Survivor"). I very much enjoyed this book, and couldn't endorse it any more heavily than I am.

Rating:
Summary: HMMMMMMMmmmmmmmmm..............................
Review: Heres where I place Choke in the Palahniuk universe: Not as good as Fight Club or Survivor but a lot better than Invisible Monsters (really did not like IM for some reason). Choke started out well and was going well right up to the last few chapters--Palahniuk was going for something really really big and right when you find out the truth--he yanks everything away, his build up just fizzles away into a no-ending. Now the book is decent on its own, but after FC and Survivor, I felt like I had Palahnuik Blue-Balls. It leads up into nothing. Ah well it was a worthy try, a decent 3 1/2 stars--I may re-read it again to make sure I didn't miss anything, but if your a Palahnuik Newbie, stick with FC or Survivor (if you read Survivor keep your head up for the secret ending). Everyone take care and be safe.

Rating:
Summary: the best of both worlds
Review: victor mancini uses an almost stand-up comedy routine to endear himself to the reader so that he can purge himself of the burdens he bears within his soul. but how serious are these burdens? are they really self-destructive thoughts and feelings or is this a man who is taking his actions much too seriously? his mother is a mess from day one and probably before. he has no career. he has a strong mind but lacks self-confidence. mr. palahniuk uses humor to keep the energy flowing and allow the reader to see a light at the end of the tunnel on some issues that can be dicey to confront. this is the first book of mr. palahniuk's that i have read but will certainly not be the last.

Rating:
Summary: Your latest trick
Review: Blame "Fight Club". The movie and the book. Blame "Survivor" (the book, not the TV show). You see. Chuck Palahniuk has set himself up. He only has himself to blame. You go write two blazing, incendiary novels, people have expectations. Every novel has to be blazing and incendiary. More than that: each successive novel has to be more blazing and more incendiary than the one that preceded it. The conclusion I reached - ooh, about midway through "Choke" - was that, whilst making for a better read than (the unholy mess that was) "Invisible Monsters", "Choke" is not quite as good as "Survivor". Or rather, "Choke" is only as good as "Survivor" and - now that he has a back catalogue, as it were - it is time to raise the bar somewhat.

Which isn't really very fair, I know. Because "Choke" is a great book. A messy (but in a good way), diffuse look at what is rapidly coming to be a Palahniuk type (itself another problem: the narrators of his novels, be they men or women, are all the same voice): the post-outsider. Because Palahniuk's narrators are not just your average outsiders. They are former Cult members like "Survivor"'s Tender Branson, or models without a jaw like whatever the name of the character in "Invisible Monsters" was. Victor Mancini (the star of this particular fable) has a mother who used to be a sort of outlaw and is now dying from Alzheimers. To raise the money to keep her in a care home, he chokes on food each night in restaurants, safe in the knowledge that whoever saves him will inevitably feel beholden to him, for making them a hero. They send money. He pays bills. Victor is also a sex addict. He attends regular meetings (are you thinking "Fight Club"? me too) of sex addicts (except where they go to follow a twelve step programme, Victor goes to take notes). What else, what else? Well, he works in a theme park that seeks to recreate the educational aspects of 1734. Everybody who works there is on some kind of unprescripted medication. He has a sort of a romance going with his mother's doctor. His friend Denny collects rocks. Just your average collection of fruit loops and start-of-the-century madmen then.

And of course it is all hugely enjoyable. A kind of romp. A Palahniuk romp. It's just that we've had Palahniuk romps now. It's time for a new trick. Because if, as every Tom, Jick and Harry contend, he is the new Don DeLillo, the new Bret Easton Ellis, the new whatever, it is time he set himself a challenge, it is time he sent himself a bomb wrapped in brown paper through the post, it is time he gave us Palahniuk's "Underworld" or "Glamarama" or whatever.

Rating:
Summary: Ehh...
Review: Well... Choke provides some very interesting and funny moments; some profound others twisted. Where Chuck gets his material I dont want to know, wait maybe i do. The reason I didn't give this book higher marks is because it seems alittle less refined then Fight Club. It doesn't really break any new ground but it definitely is entertaining. Its got a bit of vonnegute's surreal weirdness mixed with Irving Welsh's brutality/ harsh reality. Maybe a little overly stylized... but its not as good/bad as people say.

Rating:
Summary: Choking never felt so good
Review: Thinking of spoiled cat food to keep from ejaculating is one of the funniest things I've ever read. Meet Chuck Palahniuk. His world is sick, twisted, demented, and you'll love every minute of it. This book had me laughing out loud several times. Victor Mancini reminds me of Patrick Bateman from American Psycho without of course murdering the women he sure as hell degrades them. Anyway, this is a good read, the end.