Make Something Up

Make Something Up: Stories You Can't Unread is a collection of short stories published on May 26, 2015 and written by Chuck Palahniuk.[1][2][3]

Make Something Up: Stories You Can't Unread
First edition
AuthorChuck Palahniuk
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
GenreShort story collection
PublisherDoubleday[1]
Pages256[1]

Make Something Up ranked No. 8 on the ALA’s list of the Top Ten Challenged Books of 2016, due to profanity, sexual explicitness, and being “disgusting and all around offensive.”[4]

Reception
  • Sandra Newman in The Guardian has many reservations: 'In Palahniuk, we have a writer at the height of his powers, but who refuses to use those powers for good, and sometimes refuses to use them at all; who would rather soak his powers in urine, then eat them and vomit them into your lap. It’s a performance that can be exhilarating when graceful, but simply painful when it is not. He is an enfant terrible in desperate need of adult supervision, and one wishes Palahniuk’s editors would convince him not to publish his flimsiest tantrums. I would love to read his next “Knock-Knock”, but not at the risk of reading his next “Torcher”.'[5]
  • Mark Diston in the The Register writes that 'overall this collection is amusing, insightful and wickedly funny. Chuck Palahniuk is a different writer set free from the constrictions of writing a “straight” novel. The same problems that made Beautiful You such a flawed work are still apparent in this collection, but Make Something Up is a much more relaxed, playful and better book.'[6]

Stories
  • Knock Knock (Dec 2010 of Playboy[7]) - The father has always told off-colour jokes, but he now suffers from terminal prostate cancer. His son recalls to him many of his jokes but as death approaches his father no longer laughs.
  • Eleanor - Written with many malapropisms, Randy hates trees and moves from Oregon to California with his pit bull called Eleanor. He marries a realtor called Gazelle then at Christmas Eleanor chews a nativity figure of Baby Jesus and Gazelle then buys a large Christmas tree...
  • How Monkey Got Married, Bought a House and Found Happiness in Orlando - Akin to an Aesop folktale where Monkey works successfully in sales in Llewelyn Food Marketers Inc. and is determined to advance her career in Orlando. Her boss is given cheese to sell; but the customer finds that it smells bad and cannot be persuade to eat it. Monkey makes herself eat it and finds it delicious but still there are no takers...
  • Zombies (Nov 2013 of Playboy[8]) - In a high school the latest craze is to apply a cardiac defibrillator's electrodes to students temples resulting in them scrambling their brains. At the airport Trevor applies the defibrillator and his Uncle grabs him and people in turn connect saying "if you hurt yourself, you hurt me, as CNN reports the growing story...
  • Loser - A quiz game (based on The Price Is Right) concerns a Zeta Delta in the TV studio crowd rush week. The fraternity group take LSD in the form of Hello Kitty stickers and one of the fraternity makes it to the final round of the contest but then loses with an unfeasible value a million of a trillion dollars.
  • Red Sultan's Big Boy - Her father buys his 13-year-old daughter Lisa an Arabian stallion to replace her horse which died the previous week. But the stallion has a sordid past and appears in a bestiality video in which a mans died later of a ruptured colon. Lisa and her friends have seen the video but her parents have told her father to get rid of the horse.
  • Romance (Aug 2011 of Playboy[9]) - The overweight narrator has had two girlfriends, the first slimmed but discovers she had terminal cancer. He does not believe he will ever meet anyone, then at Lollapalooza he falls in love with Britney who seems out of his league. Despite his misgivings with his friends who think she is retarded, alcoholic, drug-addict, and a nymphomaniac) he marries her and has twins with her.
  • Cannibal (May 2013 of Playboy[10]) - He performs cunnilingus on Marcia Sanders in High School and she has missed her period, he sucks out the small fetus and blood, hence his nickname..
  • Why Coyote Never had Money for Parking - Another Aesop folktale an employee at Llewelyn Food, Coyote has a wife and child. At midnight Coyotes puts his baby in his car to send her to sleep at 5 mph round the town, where Coyote sees Flamingo. Coyote loves his wife but secretly uses Flamingo on the streets. His wife tells him that their neighbours say that Flamingo is a transvestite.
  • Phoenix - Ted's daughter April is blind as a result of toxoplasmosis triggered by their cat called Belinda Carlisle. But he was unaware that the cat used the crushed granite of the fireplace as a litter tray. Ted's wife Rachel used hairspray for months to stop the cat losing hair, switched on the fireplace which set on fire the hair-sprayed cat which ran around the house setting it on fire.
  • The Facts of Life - Troy explains about sex to his six-year-old son the act occurring in a drive-in movie involving spontaneous combustion of hand sanitiser spread on their genitals.
  • Cold Calling - Bill (who lives in Walla Walla, Washington) tries to sell potential customers the Wonder Wet Wipe, a floor mop; but the callers keep side-tracking him and racially abuse him while he tries to keep to the sales script.
  • The Toad Prince - Ethan reveals his modification of his penis to Mona, as it grows and manifests into a moving creature...
  • Smoke - A man has a fear that language has become a separate entity.
  • Torcher - Rainbow Bright is an organizer in a 'Burning Man' type festival following a sand storm. The following morning a murder is discovered and Rainbow tries to keep things under control...
  • Liturgy - The remains of a placenta has been found by various dogs in various places, the poker-faced homeowners board have investigated but cannot find those responsible...
  • Why Aardvark Never Landed on the Moon - Rooster, Aardvark and Rabbit were the top of the 5th grade, but they are constantly bullied and so decide to form the Flunk Club; they stopped working, sniffed glue and were no longer bullied. Rooster found Aardvark and Rabbit were going to the library and museum and told them that they must fail and take even more glue...
  • Fetch - Hank finds a throws a tennis ball for a dog in a cemetery, but the ball then lands on a grave and with a life of its own. The ball leads him to a collection of gold coins, and then beats him up, telling Hank to return the coins to the widow who's husband is in the grave.
  • Expedition - Set in Hamburg before the events of Fight Club, Felix M is frequents the depravity of the city, writing a book revealing its dark side. Felix is told about a 'monstrous child' and is led into a maze of dark tunnels where he meets his father and also Tyler Durden...
  • Mister Elegant (Dec 2006 of Vice[11]) - A Male stripper suffers from a strange medical condition which causes him to have an 'accident' whilst dancing and meets some people with strange deformaties.
  • Tunnel of Love - a massage therapist provides euthanasia to dying clients...
  • Inclinations - Kevin pretends to his parents that he is gay and is sent as an inmate to a conversion centre which has unlimited access to sexually available women. Every boy on his floor, pretends to be gay to extort money from their conservative parents. In the centre they are shown 'Betsey' the corpse of a teenage girl to show them 'the erotic mysteries of the female body', and Kevin tries to escape...
  • How a Jew Saved Christmas - A Secret Santa goes wrong when Miley receives unwelcome presents. Clara sent them to Miley but cries when the presents are not appreciated...

References
  1. "Make Something Up". Kirkus.
  2. Newman, Sandra (June 11, 2015). "Make Something Up review – Chuck Palahniuk at the height of his powers". The Guardian.
  3. Cowles, Gregory (June 5, 2015). "Inside the List". The New York Times.
  4. Spotlight on Censorship: Make Something Up
  5. Make Something Up review – Chuck Palahniuk at the height of his powers Retrieved 18 Sep 2020.
  6. Fight Club's Chuck Palahniuk is back on form Retrieved 18 Sep 2020.
  7. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18777492-knock-knock
  8. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18853743-zombie
  9. https://www.amazon.com/Playboy-Magazine-Goddess-Reveals-Cranston/dp/B00MLBXDQY
  10. https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/17856443-cannibal
  11. [https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/15783331-mister-elegant


This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.