Check the shelf I put this on. Now you're ready: This book is insane. There's something on practically every page that makes you say, "What the *%$#!?" You'll keep reading anyway, though, and you'll love it. The book's like a really hard-core Swedish massage. It hurts SOOOOO good.
The story is essentially about beauty: who values it, what it means, how it can be good, and how it can be a horror. Not only do the characters suffer FOR beauty, they suffer BECAUSE of beauty, and that's a powerful comment on current American society. Palahniuk shows off masterful writing all the way through, allowing the reader to both like and dislike, agree and disagree with all of the characters. He lays pathos out before his readers and expects us to have the capacity and intelligence to simultaneously exalt and suffer, and that's powerful stuff. If you don't have a firm grip on your sanity, a good sense of humor, and an expansive sense of the ridiculousness that is humanity, don't bother with this book.