Review: The Invention of Sound by Chuck Palahniuk

Mitzi has a very unique talent that’s invaluable to the film industry. The secret to taking a film to the next level lies in the details, and this is where Mitzi comes in – she’s responsible for the sound effects in a film – from a head being smashed in, to a stab wound – she knows just how to mimic the right sound to leave the audience traumatized and wanting more. But what the producers who furiously bid millions of dollars for her sound clips don’t know is that Mitzi has a special talent for getting her work to be so realistic. It’s murder.

Each hair-raising soundbite that Mitzi releases into the world started off as a recording of a real murder, and Mitzi has a collection of hundreds of clips, some of which were made by her father, before she got into the profession.

So when Foster Gates hears what he thinks is a clip of his long-missing daughter screaming in a film, he tracks Mitzi down to question her, and doesn’t like what he learns.

Chuck Palahniuk has a vastly underrated talent – he makes the macabre fascinating. As he delves into a possible underbelly of a well-known industry like Hollywood, he sows seeds of doubt and derision, and it’s glorious. Few writers have the skill to make a seemingly implausible storyline so convincing and engaging, and yet Palahniuk does it every time he writes a new book.

That’s not necessarily to say he’s glorifying the seediness of the world, but in making readers uncomfortable, he’s starting important conversations and raising an important point; there’s no escaping the ugliness of the world. Reading a Palahniuk novel often feels like a bad trip – situations and events are turned on their heads, and a quiet unease permeates the storyline, but that’s exactly what makes his work so appealing. Simply put, he’s a pioneer, and the world he’s creating is a dark mirror or truth.

The Invention of Sound by Chuck Palahniuk is published by Corsair Books, an imprint of the Little, Brown Book Group, and is available in South Africa from Jonathan Ball Publishers.