The characters are all a bit psychotic and hard to understand, but fascinating despite of that or maybe because of that. The Narrator with his dark thoughts, his will to die, his will to see things destroyed. Tyler, with his hate for consummerism and his petty tricks (such as inserting a single porn frame into a normal movie or his various messing with people’s food). As for Marla, she is a likable enough character, only she seems to me like she’s looking for something, missing something, needing something she doesn’t have and doesn’t even know what it is.

The book itself was, well, fascinating. It started out harmless enough, cryptic enough, mixing random sentences in a way I liked but I found hard to follow. I would probably have picked up the action a bit difficult if I hadn’t already seen the movie and known what to expect. However it kept getting more and more interesting, more and more fascinating, until an ending I totally love. (as a trivia bit, according to imdb, the author of the book liked the ending of the movie more than the one in the book; I think the exact opposite :) ).

To tell the truth I find it very interesting how much I liked the book and was captivated by it even though I can hardly agree with the characters’ thoughts and reasons and I don’t approve of the majority of their actions in any way. It’s a book I never thought I would like and nevertheless I do. I definitely recommend it.

Some quotes:

Long story short, now Marla’s out to ruin another part of my life. Ever since college, I make friends. They get married. I lose friends.
Fine.
Neat, I say.
Tyler asks, is this a problem for me?
I am Joe’s Clenching Bowels.
No, I say, it’s fine.
Put a gun to my head and paint the wall with my brains.
Just great, I say. Really.

———-

Tyler asked what I was really fighting.
What Tyler says about being the crap and the slaves of history, that’s how I felt. I wanted to destroy everything beautiful I’d never have. Burn the Amazon rain forests. Pump chlorofluorocarbons straight up to gobble the ozone. Open the dump valves on supertankers and uncap offshore oil wells. I wanted to kill all the fish I couldn’t afford to eat, and smother the French beaches I’d never see.
I wanted the whole world to hit bottom.
Pounding that kid, I really wanted to put a bullet between the eyes every endangered panda that wouldn’t screw to save its species and every whale or dolphin that gave up and ran itself aground.

———-

If you can wake up in a different place. If you can wake up in a different time. Why can’t you wake up as a different person?

———-

On a long enough time line, everyone’s survival rate drops to zero.

———-

I’ve met God across his long walnut desk with his diplomas hanging on the wall behind him, and God asks me, “Why?”
Why did I cause so much pain?
Didn’t I realize that each of us is a sacred, unique snowflake of special unique specialness?
Can’t I see how we’re all manifestations of love?
I look at God behind his desk, taking notes on a pad, but God’s got this all wrong.
We are not special.
We are not crap or trash, either.
We just are.

For another quote, a very serious spoiler, select the next few white lines (I totally wouldn’t recommend it if you haven’t seen the movie or read the book):

Oh, this is bullshit. This is a dream. Tyler is a projection. He’s a disassociative personality disorder. A psychogenic fugue state. Tyler Durden is my hallucination.
“Fuck that shit,” Tyler says. “Maybe you’re my schizophrenic hallucination.”
I was here first.
Tyler says, “Yeah, yeah, yeah, well let’s just see who’s here last.”

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