Recommended by marilyndale:
"Haunted by Chuck Palahniuk is a novel made up of stories: twenty-three of them, to be precise. Twenty-three of the most horrifying, hilarious, mind-blowing, stomach-churning tales you'll ever encounter -- sometimes all at once. They are told by people who have answered an ad headlining 'Writers' Retreat: Abandon Your Life for Three Months,' and who are led to believe that here they will leave behind all the distractions of 'real life' that are keeping them from creating the masterpiece that is in them. But 'here' turns out to be a cavernous and ornate old theater where they are utterly isolated from the outside world -- and where heat and power and, most important, food are in increasingly short supply. And the most desperate the circumstances become, the more extreme the stories they tell -- and the more devious their machinations become to make themselves the hero of the inevitable play/movie/nonfiction blockbuster that will surely be made from their plight."

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Product Description

Haunted is a novel made up of twenty-three horrifying, hilarious, and stomach-churning stories. They’re told by people who have answered an ad for a writer’s retreat and unwittingly joined a “Survivor”-like scenario where the host withholds heat, power, and food. As the storytellers grow more desperate, their tales become more extreme, and they ruthlessly plot to make themselves the hero of the reality show that will surely be made from their plight. This is one of the most disturbing and outrageous books you’ll ever read, one that could only come from the mind of Chuck Palahniuk.

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Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #3963 in Books
• Published on: 2006-04-11
• Released on: 2006-04-11
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 432 pages

Review
“Reading a Palahniuk novel is like getting zipped inside a boxer’s heavy bag while the author goes to work on you, pounding you until there is nothing left but a big bag of bones and blood and pain.”
—The Miami Herald

“To Palahniuk’s credit, there is something here to appall almost every sensibility. The author has a singular knack for coming up with inventive new ways to shock and degrade.”
—The New York Post

“Frequently entertaining [and] often appalling. . . . There are paragraphs here—entire pages, in fact—that are as disgusting as anything I’ve ever read. Truly vivid and harrowing (and often quite funny).”
—Minneapolis Star Tribune

“Summer reading for people who like their lit doused in bodily fluids.. . . Haunted has an anarchic sensibility that hurdles over the top.”—Time Out New York

“Chuck Palahniuk is one of the most intriguing writers of our time. [Haunted ] is a blend of stories that are among the most horrifying, stomach-churning and mind-blowing tales ever encountered.” —Tucson Citizen

“Chuck Palahniuk’s rightful place is among literary giants. He combines the masculinity of Ernest Hemingway, the satirical bent of Juvenal and the attitude of Lenny Bruce.” —Greensboro News & Record

“To Palahniuk’s credit, there is something here to appall almost every sensibility. The author has a singular knack for coming up with inventive new ways to shock and degrade.” —New York Post

“Funny, always on the edge of reality and bloodied by the profound horror of narcissism.” —Playboy

“Place this bet in your time capsule: Chuck Palahniuk’s novels will be required reading in American literature classes 100 years from now.” —The Fort Myers News-Press

“Palahniuk is as unique and colorful as ever.” —The Onion

“Searing and honest. ...His nasty detail and unimaginably horrible scenarios will give some people nightmares. This creepy ?ction masterpiece could be the de?nitive novel of our time for its genre.” —The Cincinnati News Record

“Chuck Palahniuk appears to be going around the bend. ...A satire of reality television–an effective one–but also an homage to horror stories and a meditation on pop culture.” —The Seattle Times

“The most original work of ?ction this year.” —The Guardian (London)

“Chuck Palahniuk is up to his old tricks. ...His prose is, as always, gorgeous.” —Entertainment Weekly

“One part Canterbury Tales, one part Lord of the Flies, and 100 percent classic Palahniuk. ...[His] grisliest book yet.” —Broward—Palm Beach New Times

About the Author
Chuck Palahniuk’s six novels are the bestselling Diary, Choke, Lullaby, Fight Club--which was made into a film by director David Fincher--Survivor, and Invisible Monsters. He is also the author of a profile of Portland, Fugitives and Refugees, and the nonfiction collection Stranger Than Fiction. He lives in the Pacific Northwest.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Guinea Pigs


This was supposed to be a writers' retreat. It was supposed to be safe.
An isolated writers' colony, where we could work,
run by an old, old, dying man named Whittier,
until it wasn't.
And we were supposed to write poetry. Pretty poetry.
This crowd of us, his gifted students,
locked away from the ordinary world for three months.


And we called each other the "Matchmaker." And the "Missing Link."
Or "Mother Nature." Silly labels. Free-association names.
The same way--when you were little--you invented names for the plants and
animals in your world. You called peonies--sticky with nectar and crawling with
ants--the "ant flower." You called collies: Lassie Dogs.
But even now, the same way you still call someone "that man with one leg."
Or, "you know, the black girl . . ."


We called each other:
The "Earl of Slander."
Or "Sister Vigilante."
The names we earned, based on our stories. The names we gave each other,
based on our life instead of our family:
"Lady Baglady."
"Agent Tattletale."
Names based on our sins instead of our jobs:
"Saint Gut-Free."
And the "Duke of Vandals."
Based on our faults and crimes. The opposite of superhero names.


Silly names for real people. As if you cut open a rag doll and found inside:
Real intestines, real lungs, a beating heart, blood. A lot of hot, sticky blood.
And we were supposed to write short stories. Funny short stories.
Too many of us, locked away from the world for one whole
spring, summer, winter, autumn--one whole season of that year.


It doesn't matter who we were as people, not to old Mr. Whittier.
But he didn't say this at first.
To Mr. Whittier, we were lab animals. An experiment.


But we didn't know.
No, this was only a writers' retreat until it was too late for us to be anything,
except his victims.

1.

When the bus pulls to the corner where Comrade Snarky had agreed to wait, she stands there in an army-surplus flak jacket--dark olive-green--and baggy camouflage pants, the cuffs rolled up to show infantry boots. A suitcase on either side of her. With a black beret pulled down tight on her head, she could be anyone.

"The rule was . . . ," Saint Gut-Free says into the microphone that hangs above his steering wheel.

And Comrade Snarky says, "Fine." She leans down to unbuckle a luggage tag off one suitcase. Comrade Snarky tucks the luggage tag in her olive-green pocket, then lifts the second suitcase and steps up into the bus. With one suitcase still on the curb, abandoned, orphaned, alone, Comrade Snarky sits down and says, "Okay."

She says, "Drive."

We were all leaving notes, that morning. Before dawn. Sneaking out on tiptoe with our suitcase down dark stairs, then along dark streets with only garbage trucks for company. We never did see the sun come up.

Sitting next to Comrade Snarky, the Earl of Slander was writing something in a pocket notepad, his eyes flicking between her and his pen.

And, leaning over sideways to look, Comrade Snarky says, "My eyes are green, not brown, and my hair is naturally this color auburn." She watches as he writes green, then says, "And I have a little red rose tattooed on my butt cheek." Her eyes settle on the silver tape recorder peeking out of his shirt pocket, the little-mesh microphone of it, and she says, "Don't write dyed hair. Women either lift or tint the color of their hair."

Near them sits Mr. Whittier, where his spotted, trembling hands can grip the folded chrome frame of his wheelchair. Beside him sits Mrs. Clark, her breasts so big they almost rest in her lap.

Eyeing them, Comrade Snarky leans into the gray flannel sleeve of the Earl of Slander. She says, "Purely ornamental, I assume. And of no nutritive value . . ."

That was the day we missed our last sunrise.

At the next dark street corner, where Sister Vigilante stands waiting, she holds up her thick black wristwatch, saying, "We agreed on four-thirty-five." She taps the watch face with her other hand, saying, "It is now four-thirty-nine . . ."

Sister Vigilante, she brought a fake-leather case with a strap handle, a flap that closed with a snap to protect the Bible inside. A purse handmade to lug around the Word of God.

All over the city, we waited for the bus. At street corners or bus-stop benches, until Saint Gut-Free drove up. Mr. Whittier sitting near the front with Mrs. Clark. The Earl of Slander. Comrade Snarky and Sister Vigilante.

Saint Gut-Free pulls the lever to fold open the door, and standing on the curb is little Miss Sneezy. The sleeves of her sweater lumpy with dirty tissues stuffed inside. She lifts her suitcase and it rattles loud as popcorn in a microwave oven. With every step up the stairs into the bus, the suitcase rattles loud as far-off machine-gun fire, and Miss Sneezy looks at us and says, "My pills." She gives the suitcase a loud shake and says, "A whole three months' supply . . ."

That's why the rule about only so much luggage. So we would all fit.

The only rule was one bag per person, but Mr. Whittier didn't say how big or what kind.

When Lady Baglady climbed on board, she wore a diamond ring the size of a popcorn kernel, her hand holding a leash, the leash dragging a leather suitcase on little wheels.

Waving her fingers to make her ring sparkle, Lady Baglady says, "It's my late husband, cremated and made into a three-carat diamond . . ."

At that, Comrade Snarky leans over the notepad where the Earl of Slander is writing, and she says, "Facelift is one word."

A few blocks later, after a couple traffic lights and around some corners waits Chef Assassin, carrying a molded aluminum suitcase with, inside, all his white elastic underpants and T-shirts and socks folded down to squares tight as origami. Plus a matched set of chef's knives. Under that, his aluminum suitcase is solid-packed with banded stacks of money, all of it hundred-dollar bills. All of it so heavy he used both hands to lift it into the bus.

Down another street, under a bridge and around the far side of a park, the bus pulled to the curb where no one seemed to wait. There the man we called the "Missing Link" stepped out of the bushes near the curb. Balled in his arms, he carried a black garbage bag, torn and leaking plaid flannel shirts.

Looking at the Missing Link, but talking sideways to the Earl of Slander, Comrade Snarky said, "His beard looks like something Hemingway might've shot . . ."

The dreaming world, they'd think we were crazy. Those people still in bed, they'd be asleep another hour, then washing their faces, under their arms, and between their legs, before going to the same work they did every day. Living that same life, every day.

Those people would cry to find us gone, but they would cry, too, if we were boarding a ship to start a new life across some ocean. Emigrating. Pioneers.

This morning, we were astronauts. Explorers. Awake while they slept.

These people would cry, but then they would go back to waiting tables, painting houses, programming computers.

At our next stop, Saint Gut-Free swung open the doors, and a cat ran up the steps and down the aisle between the seats of the bus. Behind the cat came Director Denial, saying, "His name is Cora." The cat's name was Cora Reynolds. "I didn't name him," said Director Denial, the tweed blazer and skirt she wore frosted with cat hair. One lapel swollen out from her chest.

"A shoulder holster," says Comrade Snarky, leaning close to tell the tape recorder in the Earl of Slander's shirt pocket.
All of this--whispering in the dark, leaving notes, keeping secret--it was our adventure.

If you were planning to be stranded on a desert island for three months, what would you bring along?

Let's say all your food and water would be provided, or so you think.

Let's say you can only bring along one suitcase because there will be a lot of you, and the bus taking you all to the desert island is only so big.

What would you pack in your suitcase?

Saint Gut-Free brought boxes of pork-rind snacks and dried cheese puffs, his fingers and chin orange with the salt dust. One bony hand gripping the steering wheel, he tilted each box to pour the snacks into his thin face.

Sister Vigilante brought a shopping bag of clothes with a satchel bag set in the top.

Leaning over her own huge breasts, holding them like a child in her arms, Mrs. Clark asked, did Sister Vigilante bring along a human head?

And Sister Vigilante opened the satchel far enough to show the three holes of a black bowling ball, saying, "My hobby . . ."

Comrade Snarky looks from the Earl of Slander scribbling into his notepad, then looks at Sister Vigilante's braided-tight black hair, not one strand pulling loose from its pins.

"That," Comrade Snarky says, "is tinted hair."

At our next stop, Agent Tattletale stood with a video camera held to one eye, filming the bus as it pulled to the curb. He brought a stack of business cards he passed out to prove he was a private detective. With his video camera held as a mask covering half his face, he filmed us, walking down the aisle to an empty seat at the back, blinding everyone with his spotlight.

A city block later, the Matchmaker climbed on board, tracking horse shit on his cowboy boots. A straw cowboy hat in his hands and a duffel bag hung over one shoulder, he sat and peeled back his window and spit brown tobacco juice down the brushed-steel side of the bus.

This is what we brought along for three months outsi...

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Customer Reviews

Upchuck, strikes again
Chuck Palahniuk is most known as the author of Fight Club, the book that became the movie with Brad Pitt and Ed Norton; and overnight Palahniuk had a cult following. Erie, scary, and terrifying; if I had to use three words to describe this book, that would be it. Robert A. Heinlien the classic Science Fiction author once quipped "One man's theology is another man's belly laugh." Of this book I would state, "One man's perversion is another man's pleasure." This book will hit both, depending on who you are and your sensibilities.

This book is a collection of short stories, written by characters who are on a writer's retreat. They all responded to an ad to "give up three months of your life and create the masterpiece you have always said you would". Each of the 18 respondents had an idea of where they would be going - to a large country estate, a camp in the woods; yet the reality is they get locked into an old ornate theatre house. They have food, shelter, and facilities, yet all doors are locked, all windows bricked over and no way out.

From there the book becomes a cross between Fear Factor, Survivor and your most feared horror story. We see the depths to which people will descend to achieve fame and riches. Palahniuk, during the current book tour, was reading the first story called `Guts' and to date there have been 63 people who have passed out with many people being injured falling into book cases in book stores. This book will at times, turn your stomach, but will give you an understanding of the darkest side of human nature.
Readers beware! This book is like the fight club movie on super steroids.

Entertaining, but not for everyone
I know I'm in the minority, but I was never really much of a fan of the movie Fight Club. For that reason, I'd never been all that inclined to read Chuck Palahniuk, the author whose novel inspired the film. Nonetheless, reading the general description of his book Haunted was enough to pique my interest, so I picked up a copy. What I got was a book that was imperfect but reasonably entertaining.

Haunted follows a group of individuals who've joined a rather mysterious writer's workshop. For three months, they will in complete isolation from the outside world, a condition similar to what Lord Byron, Mary Shelley and others faced in the nineteenth century; that isolated group produced works like Frankenstein; who knows what this group will produce.

Unfortunately, all these characters are apparently insane and start to destroy their environment. As a result, they're trapped in a place with very limited food or other resources. As they cope with their increasingly desperate circumstances, they tell stories about themselves. These tales form the bulk of the book, and give insights into these very warped people.

Much of Haunted's stories - as well as the framing narrative - is pretty disturbing; one story is literally gut-wrenching (you'll know it when you read it). If you are expecting realistic behavior, however, this is not the book for you; all the characters and situations are absurd, but it generally works well in the context Palahniuk has designed. It is, however, the biggest problem with the story: the characters act in a way that appears so irrational that it is hard to identify with (let alone like) anyone involved.

There are several obvious inspirations for this book, from classic literature such as The Canterbury Tales and The Decameron to more modern entertainments such as Survivor or Big Brother, but Palahniuk leaves his own imprint on the concepts. This is not a book for everyone, but if you enjoy off-beat literature which can easily shock, you should enjoy this book.

Disgusting for some, Divine truth for others.
When handed this book for chiristmas, I was told two things. One was that almost every person who my friend had given this book to had put it down and afterwards called him derogatory names.

The other was that if one could looks past all the filth, all the disgusting gross out factors, one would find a highly deffinative piece of work about the human psyche.

I personally found the book to be much of the second, finishing it in a mere week. The plot details (a writers retreat story stringing together many short stories) can be found in other reviews. However here I state, many push aside parts of the narrative (be it the spoltlight projections, the main narrative, or even more rarely the short stories themselves). However the smart reader quickly picks up the fact that they're all there to reinforce the truth of the novel, the idea of "man as a machine that feeds off of pain and drama." By far the most haunting of the short stories is "The Nightmare Box", even though it is by far one of the least graphic and perverse pieces in the novel.

For those that finish this book, and take more out of it then freak factor, I say to you, I hope the nightmare box known as "Haunted" changes your view of the world as much as it has changed mine.