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Rant

An Oral Biography of Buster Casey

Chuck Palahniuk

First published 2007 · 448 pages

A chaotic, fragmented fever dream of urban decay, vehicular carnage, and time-bending paradoxes.

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What it feels like

Reading this book feels like riding shotgun in a demolition derby while hallucinating on cough syrup. Told entirely through a chorus of unreliable, conflicting voices, the narrative hurtles forward with a propulsive, chaotic energy that is both deeply unsettling and impossible to look away from. The atmosphere is grimy and surreal, steeped in the grotesque details of bodily fluids, urban decay, and vehicular carnage. The prose is punchy and visceral, mimicking the raw, unpolished cadence of an oral history. It begins as a dark, satirical portrait of a small-town outcast and slowly twists into a mind-bending exploration of time, contagion, and mythmaking. This is a perfect, twisted puzzle for readers who crave transgressive fiction that aggressively pushes boundaries and leaves a lingering, feverish aftertaste.

Mood
  • feverish
  • grimy
  • chaotic
  • surreal
Tone
  • satirical
  • cynical
  • provocative
  • deadpan
  • grotesque
Pace
propulsive
Themes
urban alienation · mythmaking and legacy · the illusion of linear time · contagion and disease · rebellion against conformity
The writing
Fragmented, punchy, and visceral, constructed entirely from a chorus of distinct, colloquial, and highly unreliable voices.
The arc
Begins as a morbidly fascinating character study of a small-town outcast and spirals into a disorienting, existential mind-bender.
Who it's for
Readers who crave transgressive, boundary-pushing fiction and don't mind getting their hands dirty with the grotesque and the paradoxical.
Content notes
  • graphic violence
  • body horror
  • sexual content
  • animal cruelty
  • substance abuse
  • incest

About the book

"Like most people I didn't meet Rant Casey until after he was dead. That's how it works for most celebrities: After they croak, their circle of friends just explodes...."Rant is the mind-bending new novel from Chuck Palahniuk, the literary provocateur responsible for such books as the generation-defining classic Fight Club and the pedal-to-the-metal horrorfest Haunted. It takes the form of an oral history of one Buster "Rant" Casey, who may or may not be the most efficient serial killer of our time."What 'Typhoid Mary' Mallon was to typhoid, what Gaetan Dugas was to AIDS, and Liu Jian-lun was to SARS, Buster Casey would become for rabies."A high school rebel who always wins (and a childhood murderer?), Rant Casey escapes from his small hometown of Middleton for the big city. He becomes the leader of an urban demolition derby called Party Crashing. On appointed nights participants recognize one another by such designated car markings as "Just Married" toothpaste graffiti and then stalk and crash into each other. Rant Casey will die a spectacular highway death, after which his friends gather testimony needed to build an oral history of his short, violent life. Their collected anecdotes explore the possibility that his saliva caused a silent urban plague of rabies and that he found a way to escape the prison house of linear time...."The future you have, tomorrow, won't be the same future you had, yesterday."--Rant CaseyExpect hilarity, horror, and blazing insight into the desperate and surreal contemporary human condition as only Chuck Palahniuk can deliver it. He's the postmillennial Jonathan Swift, the visionary to watch to learn what's --uh-oh--coming next.

Description from Open Library.

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