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Feb 17, 2012

Meg ♥ rated it:

Damned is another book I loved from Chuck Palahniuk. Each chapter starts: “Are you there, Satan? It’s me, Madison,” by a girl so emotionally needy she craves attention from the devil himself.

Madison is thirteen, and very smart. She's the daughter of a narcissistic actress, and a billionaire father. They adopt orphans to look good to the public, and ship Madison to her Swiss boarding school during the holidays to do other things. Madison dies, and is sent to Hell. More...

7 comments like (36 people liked it)

Oct 27, 2011

Jacob rated it:

Look out, Chuck Palahniuk fans! It's a Chuck Palahniuk book! Chuck Palahniuk's Damned, the newest Chuck Palahniuk book (by Chuck Palahniuk!) is classic Chuck Palahniuk, a wonderful addition to Chuck Palahniuk's collection of Chuck Palahniuk books, and a must-read for Chuck Palahniuk fans who love Chuck Palahniuk and his Chuck Palahniuk books!

Meet Madison, Chuck Palahniuk's newest creation, a dead thirteen-year-old girl trapped in Hell after overdosing on marijuana (or did she? C More...

109 comments like (70 people liked it)

Oct 27, 2011

Bradley rated it:

I enjoyed this book, but it would have been much better if it had a plot arc going on. Sometimes it's nice when authors work off an outline or just known what's going to happen next in the story rather than seeming like they're making up every little thing as they go along. Sure, there's an inciting incident and a journey with no particular destination for no particular reason than to just wander around Hell and check out the sites. And then the journey comes to an abrupt halt for no reason that More...

14 comments like (14 people liked it)

Jan 29, 2012

Kemper rated it:

If a thirteen year old dead girl in Hell stops a rampaging Godzilla-sized demon by sexually pleasuring it, would you consider that necrophilia, bestiality or kiddie porn?

I’m not sure either, but these are the kind of questions that can come up when you read a Chuck Palahniuk novel.

Madison is the very smart but overweight daughter of a rich and famous Hollywood power couple that finds herself dead and in Hell after experimenting with marijuana. Turns out that all the wh More...

10 comments like (29 people liked it)

Nov 07, 2011

Emily rated it:

I wanted to finish the book before I did a full review on it, but some things just cannot wait..and this is one of them.

I really try to like Palahniuk. His earlier stuff..brilliant. But lately, especially in the case of Damned , all I'm reading is shock value nonsense. You know, I get it. You are a very intelligent man, Mr. Palahniuk. You know a lot and you have very opinionated views on the world. How bout writing an essay on why you think the Hollywood celebrity crowd is wasting the More...

2 comments like (3 people liked it)

Feb 21, 2012

Sarah rated it:

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here

1 comment like

Feb 19, 2012

Meg - A Bookish Affair rated it:

I like Chuck Palahniuk's writing in general. It's funny. It's off-kilter. It's unique. I loved Fight Club and Survivor so much that he's been elevated in my book so that every time he has a new book coming out, it ends up on my TBR list so adding Damned was no question. While I finished the book, I'm a little sad about the time I spent on reading the book.

The storyline sounds funny. In practice, it's not so funny. On top of that, throughout the book, I felt like Palahn More...

0 comments like

Feb 13, 2012

Michelle rated it:

For more book reviews, go to www.insearchoftheendofthesidewalk.com

Dear Chuck, are you there? It’s me, Michelle. I’ve just finished your newest publication. I want to tell you that I enjoyed the sarcasm and wit of your novel, but worry that you are relying on gratuitous sexual images to draw in more readers. Your writing can stand on its own without that. Stick with your eccentric characters- it is your strong suit as a writer.

Chuck Palahniuk continues to push boun More...

0 comments like

Feb 01, 2012

Kimberly Laura rated it:

I had to read this one, I really did.

After being in teh audience for a Chuckie P. radio interview (Live Wire look it up and Go!) I decided to delve back into his world.

Mainly because it seemed that somehow he had found the perfect voice and perfect world for his special brand of seeing.

Damned i shte story of a 13 year old girl's 'life' in Hell after dying from what she remembers as a 'marijuana overdose.'

All in all this Madeline Spencer appears to More...

0 comments like

Jan 13, 2012

Tony rated it:

I read some reviews on this book before I started it and there were some bad ones. People were upset and were claiming that Chuck is losing it. Claiming Fight Club and his older books blew this one out of the water. The problem here is that although Palahniuk has more or less the same style of writing for every book he is able to bring you into them no matter what the plot is. I disregarded those reviews because since he is one of my top 3 favorite authors he can do no wrong..well.. sometimes he More...

0 comments like (2 people liked it)

Jan 10, 2012

EinsteinShrugged rated it:

Oh Mister Chuck. I loved you so much. You spent a long time on my list of "I'll read anything they write" authors. I kept you on there after realizing I had to skip parts in Haunted to make it good. I was willing to forgive you almost anything for those glimpses of amazing writing. Rant almost did you in but you were redeemed in Snuff. We won't talk about Tell-All ... after all, everyone has an off day. And, to be fair, you did manage to pull Damned back from the brink halfway t More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Jan 08, 2012

Spanish-inquisition rated it:

In my opinion, this is some of Chuck’s finest writing thus far and unlike many of his previous works, it ends on a hopeful note.
Make no bones about it, Damned is a weird book that goes well beyond the realm of absurd and straight into freak show. It is satire at its most extreme. You’ve got to be okay with that or you won’t make it very far in Damned.
I liked the way the character grew and changed and how things were explained in the end. It wasn’t a huge reveal that blew me a More...

0 comments like

Jan 07, 2012

Kathryn rated it:

Let's see, how to describe this book. Okay, on one end of the scale you've got "The Lovely Bones": a charming, hopeful young girl is torn from her loving family by a horrific murder and goes to Heaven, where she lives in an idyllic paradise, watching over her loved ones from afar. Then on the other end of the scale you've got "Damned", where Maddie, a jaded, overweight smart-alec with a set of pretentious movie-star environmental hypocrites for parents, gets killed almost (pr More...

0 comments like

Jan 07, 2012

Laurance rated it:

"Oh Satan, just imagine: Me with bangs!"

I went into reading this book knowing that it was written by Chuck during the time his mother died of cancer, and after seeing many interviews referring to the book I decided to finally go pick it up. It isn't a masterpiece by far, but it is a very fun read from front to back. You'll more or less learn many things from 13 year old Maddie about Hell that you never knew, on top of how to take over it. Also, from seeing all the interview More...

1 comment like (2 people liked it)

Jan 05, 2012

Rebecca rated it:

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here

0 comments like

Dec 19, 2011

Jim rated it:

Authors always (or should) have reasons for every word they write and especially how their story is constructed and told. But when readers don't get what the writer is going for, whose fault is that?

I'll theorize that it's a sliding scale, from 90-10 to 10-90 — sometimes it's 90 percent the author's problem and 10 percent the reader's problem, and sometimes vice versa, or anywhere in between.

I began thinking about this while reading "Damned," the new novel by Chu More...

0 comments like

Nov 29, 2011

Constance rated it:

I really enjoyed this work however I do not feel like its Palahniuk’s best nor will it ever be his claim to fame. After all, it is hard to follow novels like Fight Club and Survivor.

Admittedly the idea behind the novel is original. Damned is narrated by Madison, an overweight thirteen-year-old girl who finds herself in hell after being suffocated by a string of Hello Kitty Condoms. If the previous sentence did not intrigue you enough to read on I urge you to do so.

Madison is More...

0 comments like

Nov 27, 2011

Matt rated it:

i want to give this somewhere between 3 and 4 . . it was a really easy read, for some reason . . and quick . . and for me very enjoyable . . when the narrator has a readable/likable voice as this one had (for me), it can lead to this kind of reading experience . . like you're just listening to someone talk to you . . very natural . . however, the book never really--i dunno--*went* anywhere . . there were some cool thematic musings, i guess . . the plot is pretty much just a set up--or should b More...

0 comments like

Nov 24, 2011

Brian rated it:

In the last few years, Palahniuk's books have felt like a 7th generation copy of a copy of a copy of a book he wrote in the early 2000s. I've continued to read Chuck in hopes of seeing again the genius behind his first works, but alas, "Damned" is such an execrable send-up I am hoping that this is nothing more than a contractual obligation book and at some point we get to see the return of a very talented writer, rather than wonder when his muse left him.

"Survivor" More...

1 comment like (5 people liked it)

Nov 14, 2011

Marina rated it:

I am a Chuck Palahniuk fan. I excitedly recommend my friends, "Fight Club" and "Invisible Monsters" as I'm a huge fan of them both. I even liked "Snuff".

I was really, really excited for this book. I loved the premise and I was eager to read what Chuck would do with it. I thought it had great potential, and it hooked me in from the beginning.

I can't really decide at which point I started to dislike it. I was a little more than halfway through More...

1 comment like (3 people liked it)

Nov 13, 2011

Shane rated it:

Dear potential reader of this novel, its me, Shane. Damned is a book with extremely powerful and disgusting subject matter, told with the insecurity and droll attitude only a prepubescent girl can give. It has truly graphic sections and succeeds in making the reader uncomfortable from time to time. Madison Spencer reports all of these events to the reader (who originally was meant to be Satan) while also giving them a fairly circuitous answer of how she found herself in Hell.

The book, More...

0 comments like

Nov 09, 2011

Melissa rated it:

This book is the most bizarre book I have ever read. I love Chuck, but in this case I believe he has turned into the love child of Clive Barker and Tom Robbins. And it is really a psychotic car wreck I can not turn my eyes away from. I was memorized by how disgusting and comical and utterly gross this book was. I even dreamt about it. A spoiled rich 'tween girl from Hollywood parents is accidentally killed by a botched sex game and lives out eternity in hell. And hell is pretty frickin' weird. H More...

0 comments like

Nov 05, 2011

Angela rated it:

This is the third Chuck Palahniuk I've ever read. The other two, Snuff, and whatever the full title of Rant was, were read so many years ago, I barely remember the writing. So this review may be odd compared to the others. (It's not a well-liked book, is it? Hmm.)

I really liked this book. A thirteen year old girl ends up in Hell? I'm sold. I was anxious to read it since first reading the blurb. The actual book didn't disappoint, at all. I am very eager for the next two, because it ende More...

0 comments like (2 people liked it)

Oct 31, 2011

Tim rated it:

Madison Spencer is the chubby, precocious daughter of a pair of wildly narcissistic movie stars condemned to Hell for "overdosing on marijuana." In this wicked satire of Christian mythology, adult greed and teen drama, Madison finds out that Hell is often like the infamous teenage movie The Breakfast Club, as she joins forces with teen stereotypes: the jock, the stoner, the diva, in order to make her way through the afterlife. Starting every chapter with a snarky jab at the teen fictio More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Oct 29, 2011

Caris rated it:

Earlier this year, I submitted a story for an upcoming anthology called Amazing Stories of the Flying Spaghetti Monster. I don’t do this often, as I’m not so good with short fiction (it takes me a while to get a good handle on the story). But because of the subject matter, I decided to give it a shot. I love the FSM mythos. It’s funny and clever. My story was guaranteed to be accepted, I knew, because it was funny, original, clever, and better than anything else anyone could write. Ever. More...

15 comments like (21 people liked it)

Oct 27, 2011

Nathan rated it:

Chuck Palahniuk's new novel is a cookie-cutter re-hash of the same stories he's written before - at least for the first two-thirds of the story. Bizarre narrator / weird setting in which to tell the story - check. Satire of the extreme materialism of our society - check. Repetitive form statements throughout the novel by the narrator - check. As with the random etiquette statements noted throughout Survivor, here it is proof of the narrator's extensive vocabulary and repeat elements of parents' More...

0 comments like (2 people liked it)

Oct 24, 2011

Tara rated it:

From my review:
"DAMNED pays twisted homage to Judy Blume’s 1970 YA classic by beginning each chapter with the deceased 13-year old anti-heroine (sent to Hell for smoking marijuana, which seems a bit excessive) asking “Are you there Satan? It’s me, Megan”. She and her Breakfast Club crew of teenage misfits journey through hell searching for… well, to be honest, I’m not completely sure. Because I barely made it through the first 100 pages. Palahniuk’s vision of hell isn’t fire and bri More...

0 comments like

Oct 24, 2011

Sean rated it:

Madison is the only biological daughter of a successful businessman and an award winning actress. When we first meet Madison, she's riding along in a car with her mother, as she flips through houses that they own all around the world, using a laptop. She spies on the maids, fiddles with the temperatures, and locks doors. Madison watches as her mother changes the lighting in a house in Europe. Her parents continuously adopt children from third world countries to stay relevant, so More...

1 comment like (1 person liked it)

Oct 21, 2011

Robyn rated it:

I once again find myself Lamenting Good Reads' lack of half stars. This should be a 3 1/2.

I must admit, I walked into this book with a fair bit of trepidation, having felt rather lukewarm to everything that came after Haunted and been fully enraged by Pygmy. Reading this book was going to be, I thought, the book fan's equivalent of identifying the corpse. "Yep, that's good old Chuck P. I used to love him... Pity what happened, though." And I would assert that my beloved auth More...

0 comments like (4 people liked it)

Oct 04, 2011

David rated it:

Well, I can now sit back and wait for the 2011 Palahniuk wars to commence. I've already heard the distant rumblings of such and now, based on what I've read, I know that the full slaughter will soon break. Mind you, I don't think that Palahniuk's newest work is bad. I actually enjoyed it quite a bit. It won't rank up there with some of his books that I regard as imperative in order to not have lived a wasted life, but it was a fun read. There are some good characters, good description, and More...

0 comments like (8 people liked it)