This latest book by the author of Fight Club and Haunted is the fictional oral biography of one, Buster "Rant" Casey, the "superspreader" of a new epidemic. As told by family, friends, and acquaintances, Rant Casey is the illiterate James Dean of a small town called Middleton. Feared by adults, idolized and envied by his peers, Rant eventually leaves his roots behind and moves to the city where he becomes a champion of the nighttime activity of "Party Crashing," a regularly scheduled event in which the participants speed their cars around the town with the express purpose of crashing into one another. "What 'Typhoid Mary' Mallon was to typhoid, what Gaeton Dugas was to AIDS, and Liu Jianlun was to SARS, Buster Casey would become to rabies." Dealing with themes such as time travel, night/day segregation, and "peak boosting" (an activity in which the user experiences a movie by plugging into a port in the back of his neck), Rant is the literary equivalent of riding blindfolded on a runaway horse, because you have no idea where Palahniuk will take you next. This book was very well-written and well-researched. If it hasn't been established before, Palahniuk ensures his status as our generation's Charles Dickens with this novel. The only possible drawbacks to this book are that it can be hard to follow due to the oral biography format along with the volume of information being presented (you really have to pay attention, and may have to go back and re-read parts), and some scenes are quite graphic. Palahniuk is the author of the widely-acclaimed book and movie Fight Club, as well as the novel Choke, the story of a sex-addicted con man who may be the direct descendant of Jesus Christ, which is scheduled to be released in theaters in 2008.
