This was, I think, a really brave departure for Chucky Baby. This is the first of his books that doesn’t have that trademark voice. It was incredibly hard to read at first, but, eventually, the words started coming together and making sense. I was a little disappointed and even a bit angry when I started. I don’t read his books for variation. I love his work, even if it always sounds like it's from the point of view of the same character. That character is awesome. However, this book was pretty damned good. Far better than Snuff was.“Terrorists” posing as foreign exchange students looking to annihilate the United States? Yep, that’s it in a nutshell. I liked the perspective: Pygmy and his cohorts view the US as a country of terrorists. They should. The US was responsible for killing their families. It’s funny how little we consider this viewpoint. It really deserves more analysis. In the past few years, how many individuals have our fearless leaders made enemies of through acts of war? Is Pygmy a figment of Chucky’s imagination? Or is he just a taste of what’s to come?I enjoyed Pygmy’s thoughts, especially his views of love and his hatred for Devil Tony, the pastor at his exchange family’s church. He really was a joy to know. And the bit with the forced sodomy…that’s just good writing. ( )

Chuck, you're getting humane in middle age! What are we fans going to do with you?!? Not his best book, but I thoroughly liked it. ( )

(Reprinted from the Chicago Center for Literature and Photography [cclapcenter.com]. I am the original author of this essay, as well as the owner of CCLaP; it is not being reprinted here illegally.)

I hope this doesn't come across as sour grapes, but the older I get, the more I realize that there's a legitimate danger that comes with a young artist having a big hit early in their career -- and that's that the public then forever compares each new project of theirs to that big hit, most of the rest suffering in comparison and usually called derivative and worse, because to be frank this is what most artists in general do, is endlessly repeat themes and motifs over the course of their entire career. Usually we don't notice, because most artists slowly get better with each new project, keeping their early work deservedly obscure and their later masterpieces simply better treatments of the same subjects; but when it comes to someone like, say, transgressive gay author Chuck Palahniuk, this endless reshuffling of elements becomes particularly noticeable, because of him first clearly laying these elements out in his massively popular early hit Fight Club (made into an even more massively popular movie by David Fincher), and literally not getting an ounce either better or worse at it in the 15 years and 11 novels since. I've reviewed two of his past books here before, 2007's Rant and 2008's Snuff, while just recently finishing up his latest, the post-Bush terrorism comedy Pygmy; and just like the others, I felt that though it was a decent book on its own, it unfortunately also feels many times like a laundry list of quirky Palahniukian touches, to be checked off a master list like a version of car bingo designed by David Lynch. Impossibly ludicrous storyline based on a cartoonishly named plan to take over the world? Check! Gay men who can only relate romantically through the filter of violent, forced sex? Check! Insanely over-the-top random unbelievable events thrown in every 30 pages just to keep everyone on their toes? Check! Main character with a pathological disgust for the human body? Check! Said main character repeating nonsense catchphrases every five minutes or so? Check!

It doesn't necessarily make the individual books themselves that bad, but it certainly diminishes their collective impact in an incremental way, and makes you roll your eyes just a little more the bigger a veteran you are of Palahniuk's work, a main reason why so many authors with big hits early in their careers end up sorta petering out by the ends of them, attracting a regularly shrinking audience who with each new release look back yet a little more nostalgically on that early bestseller that seemed so fresh and daring at the time. I'll keep reading Palahniuk's newest releases for sure, mostly because they're short and punchy and only come along once a year or so, but I've long since given up on the idea of being startled by one in the same I was by Fight Club. That's a bit of a shame, but also very typical, and shouldn't come as much of a surprise from an artist who has proven by his own actions to have only a handful of truly brilliant original ideas.

Out of 10: 7.9 ( )

i enjoyed the story, but it was hard to read. i don't think i got used to the style till 3/4 of the way through. regardless it was funny and entertaining, i’d gladly read it again (if only to go over passages i had trouble understanding). Palahniuk’s still one of my favourite authors. ( )

As a rabid Palahniuk fan, I was tickled to get this book and start it. As I read the first page, my first response was WTF Chuck?!? Another gimmicky style? The book is written as if it is a first person account of a person whose primary language isn't English, but the account is written in English. For example, flowers are called "plant genitals."

I almost quit the book, but I kept on, and I finally adapted to the writing style. The story is about Pygmy and his comrades, who were taken from their parents at a very young age and made into weapons of "the state." We never find out which country--Palahniuk does this on purpose--the country who wants to destroy the USA is a composition of what could be many other countries. Anyway, Pygmy and his comrades all enter the USA as foreign exchange students, with their goal to inflict "Operation Havoc."

I really did enjoy the story, even as distracted as I was by the writing. I really wish Ole Chuck would just weave us a few good novels without the gimmicks. He's a great writer, has a huge base and doesn't need to "play." Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe his gimmicks are forever sealing his fate as one of the greatest contemporary writers of our time. ( )