Book Review: Damned by Chuck Palahniuk

Title: Damned

Author: Chuck Palahniuk

256 pages, Published by Doubleday

Chuck’s Info: Website | Twitter | Facebook

Buy The Book: Amazon

Summary:

“Are you there, Satan? It’s me, Madison,” declares the whip-tongued thirteen-year-old narrator of Damned, Chuck Palahniuk’s subversive new work of fiction. The daughter of a narcissistic film star and a billionaire, Madison is abandoned at her Swiss boarding school over Christmas, while her parents are off touting their new projects and adopting more orphans. She dies over the holiday of a mari­juana overdose—and the next thing she knows, she’s in Hell. Madison shares her cell with a motley crew of young sinners that is almost too good to be true: a cheerleader, a jock, a nerd, and a punk rocker, united by fate to form the six-feet-under version of everyone’s favorite detention movie. Madison and her pals trek across the Dandruff Desert and climb the treacherous Mountain of Toenail Clippings to confront Satan in his citadel. All the popcorn balls and wax lips that serve as the currency of Hell won’t buy them off.
This is the afterlife as only Chuck Palahniuk could imagine it: a twisted inferno where The English Patient plays on end­less repeat, roaming demons devour sinners limb by limb, and the damned interrupt your dinner from their sweltering call center to hard-sell you Hell. He makes eternal torment, well, simply divine. (Summary provided by Doubleday.)

My Thoughts:

I am a Chuck Palahniuk devotee. I love him. He can do no wrong in my eyes. I lap up every word he writes like a basset hound presented with a crystal bowl of ice cold water after a week long Sahara trek. So it goes without saying that I loved Damned, Palahniuk’s latest novel.

I was so happy to meet Chuck Palahniuk at BEA.

For Damned, Chuck gives us his version of tween angst and YA. (Though, let me make it clear:  This is not actually YA. It is a very adult, very graphic book.)  The novel is told from the POV of Madison, a newly dead resident of Hell, and she’s got some words of wisdom for the man downstairs. Each chapter starts with “Are you there Satan? It’s me Madison.” I was enthralled as I listened to Madison slowly reveal bits and pieces of the life that landed her in Hell while she regaled Satan with her observations regarding his steaming domain. {I was also happy to see safety pins make an appearance in Palahniuk’s writing again. Hellllo Diary!}

Throughout the novel, Madison references her addiction to hope.   Madison’s wide-eyed resistance to giving up hope entirely even in the face of damnation is refreshing. Yes, a book about a thirteen-year-old suffering the indignities of Hell is somewhat refreshing. Chuck is one of the few authors who can pull something like that off. He can take something bleak or grotesque and make it humorous or charming.

With stylistic shout outs to Judy Blume and John Hughes, Chuck draws readers in with his trademark repetition and gross out visuals. Twelve novels into his career Chuck has managed to keep his prose fresh and exciting. I can’t wait to read the next two books in this trilogy.

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