Product Description

She's a catwalk model who has everything: a boyfriend, a career, a loyal best friend. But when a sudden motor 'accident' leaves her disfigured and incapable of speech, she goes from being the beautiful centre of attention to being an invisible monster, so hideous that no one will acknowledge she exists.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #5081 in Books
• Published on: 2000-11-02
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 304 pages

Review
A macabre fantasy, in which a deformed model is guided by a drag queen down the yellow brick road of her past to the Emerald City of her future - all dreamed up by cult novelist Palahniuk (Survivor, 1998) in one of his more baroque moods. There is a certain point in all bedroom farces and comedies of errors when you give up trying to figure out who's who and just go along for the ride. That might be the wisest strategy here. Our narrator is one Shannon McFarland (although she doesn't actually introduce herself until the very end), and she's a real mess, quite literally: she was injured in a mysterious shooting and has lost her entire jaw and most of her face. Oddly (or perhaps not so oddly?), Shannon's brother Shane was also disfigured in a suspicious accident when he dumped a load of trash into the fire and a can of hair spray exploded in his face. Shane eventually turned gay and was thrown out of the house by his parents, who later learned that he had died of AIDS. Shannon grew up, became a supermodel, and got herself engaged to Manus, a vice-squad detective who ditches Shannon after her accident and takes up with Evie Cotrell, a rich Texas bimbo who used to be Shannon's roommate and may have been a man early in her career. But never mind Erie; the one to watch is drag diva Brandy Alexander, who meets Shannon in the hospital and soon becomes her only friend. Brandy takes Shannon on the road, and - along with Brandy's boyfriend Alfa Romeo, who in reality may be Manus - the two steal drugs from expensive homes by calling realtors and posing as potential buyers. Eventually, Shannon discovers that Brandy is not who she appears to be, but by then we're ready for anything. Too clever by half a Chinese box of a novel fascinating in its intricacies but pretty hard to get a grip on whole. (Kirkus Reviews)

Booklist
‘This is a wild ride of a novel’

New York Newsday
‘Palahniuk is one of the freshest, most intriguing voices to appear in a long time.'

Customer Reviews

Amazing! So intense it will stop you from sleeping!
As someone who has recently completed a BA in English Literature it shocks (and worries) me that I can barley even begin articulate just how incredible this book is. Recommend to me by a friend, I was at first sceptical because of the book's basic premise i.e. - the story of a disfigured fashion model, which sounded slightly vacuous and shallow to me. I was extremely wrong! This is a great meaty read, almost overflowing with substance. The text is a great example of literary postmodernism and as such presents a fervent and continuous challenging of our societies established notions of gender, of sexuality, and most definitely of narrative and our assumptions about how a story should be told. In this latter respect I found "Invisible Monsters" reminiscent to the works of Jeanette Winterson, particularly "The Powerbook" and "Lighthousekeeping".

A word of warning though, do not read this novel before you go to bed. I did and for two nights running it seriously disrupted my sleep, which is a testament to just how intense Shannon's narrative is. You will be so totally absorbed into the darkness and twisted logic of her world it becomes very difficult to escape yourself!!

The novel does have its lighter moments though with some great laugh-out-loud comedy, particularly coming from Shannon's parents and their zealous and overcompensative crusade for gay-rights.

An intensely dark, disturbing and thought-provoking classic for our times!

i ruined it for myself but its a good book
I decided to read this after reading Diary and fight club.

This book is so intense that I really wound myself up and got really anxious about what would happen. I then actually decided to read the end before I got there just to relieve the tension...which was a stupid idea. Cause the end is really good.

just..
dont do that.

but read the book. Its difficult to get your head around palahniuks writing technique at first with the charachters incoherent and nihilistic thoughts but its still awesome.

see through good
i was so impressed by this book that i will now be reading everything Chuck Palahniuk wrote. He's now one of my favorite writers, along with Christopher Moore and Jackson McCrae.

"Invisible Monsters" is a really twisted work that everyone should read. You WILL be put off by some of the humor and references to sex, but that's part of Palahniuk's deal. I can tell you, even if you don't like some of the sections in this book, the coming together at the end makes up for it.

The basic idea of the book is about a fashion model who has become disfigured. Palahniuk uses fashion-type references throughout and the word "Flash!" to denote the fashion world or the remnants of it. A truly well thought out book from cover to cover. I would also recommend the Christopher Moore book "Practical Demon Keeping" and the McCRae "Katzenjammer" for other equally entertaining reads.