Beautiful You

By: Chuck Palahniuk

Narrated by: Carol Monda

Length: 7 hrs and 42 mins

Publisher's summary

From the author of Fight Club, the classic portrait of the damaged contemporary male psyche, now comes this novel about the apocalyptic marketing possibilities of female pleasure. Beautiful You is Palahniuk's much-anticipated satire of the emerging erotic thriller genre, a mash-up of mommy porn and chick lit à la Sex and the City, and fantasy lit à la Clan of the Cave Bear. Imagine if Ira Levin had a baby with Jean Auel.

Penny Harrigan is a low-level associate in a big Manhattan law firm with an apartment in Queens and no love life at all. So it comes as a great shock when she finds herself invited to dinner by one C. Linus Maxwell, aka "Climax-Well", a software mega-billionaire and lover of the most gorgeous and accomplished women on earth. After dining at Manhattan's most exclusive restaurant, he whisks Penny off to a hotel suite in Paris, where he proceeds, notebook in hand, to bring her to previously undreamed-of heights of orgasmic pleasure for days on end. What's not to like? This: Penny discovers that she is a test subject for the final development of a line of sex toys to be marketed in a nationwide chain of boutiques called Beautiful You. So potent and effective are these devices that women by the millions line up outside the stores on opening day and then lock themselves in their room with them and stop coming out. Except for batteries. Maxwell's plan for erotically enabled world domination must be stopped. But how?

©2014 Chuck Palahniuk (P)2014 Recorded Books

This was fucking great

Really great book with a unique plot. The reading was really nice and it had some beer nice suprise twists

Not my favorite, but still ok.

I LOVE Chuck.. but this one was a little too far out there, even for him!

A book for the ladies

A surprise for sure, I enjoy the books very much and can never go wrong with this author he is always surprises me!

So dirty, so hilarious

Marry me, Chuck? This makes 50 Shades of Grey seem like Green Eggs and Ham!

Wow!

The story was a wild ride. I absolutely loved the reading, writing, and audio!

Spoilers

It ends with a vagina screaming. literally. The vagina screams... and Ron Howard is assumed to become a sex god.

crazy amazing

I didn't even read the story line preview. I saw Chuck write it abs knew it was going to be great. He never disappoints and ALWAYS keeps me wanting more!

great

stunningly weird as always. chuck at his shocking best. the narration is refreshing and spot on, the ending is unexpected to say the least.

Wow

I was not prepared for the subject matter. Started listening on a whim. I found it surprisingly good.

I'll start by saying I love Palahniuk...

What did you like best about Beautiful You? What did you like least?

I liked the idea that I felt was being presented in a very satirical story. I loved the overall theme of excessive self indulgence leading to complacent mediocrity, and the anti-materialism that is so present in most Palahniuk novels. On the other hand, I hated the story line. I hated that there was no development of any character. I hated that the deep connection that is generally created in Palahniuk's writing was entirely absent. I didn't hate or love any character. I was ambivalent about all of them, which ultimately lead to me not caring about how things ended up.

How would you have changed the story to make it more enjoyable?

I understand that there was a very heavy satirical tone to this book, but as someone mentioned before, if you write poorly for long enough, even in a satirical way, bad writing is still eventually just bad writing. I would have loved for the usual beautifully dark and twisted voice of Palahniuk to be present.

Do you think Beautiful You needs a follow-up book? Why or why not?

Please no. One was more than enough.

If this was the first Palahniuk book I had ever read, I would have never picked up another one of his books.

Any additional comments?

I was disappointed. There were moments where I could hear the beloved Fight Club author shining through, and then the rest of the time it felt like someone was shoving a dirty sock in his mouth and this book was the muffled, tortured, and drooling result.