Rating: 
Summary: excellent! read it!
Review: excellent, excellent novel. palahniuk delivers once again. for anyone who's read fight club and survivor (the two best, in my opinion) lullaby extends palahniuk's library of social commentaries. reading some of the other reviews, i think a few people missed the point. some say that he moves to fast through the story, or that he doesn't develop the characters as well as he has in previous novels. THAT'S THE POINT! the point is to be a smooth read without being overbearing. lullaby touches the tip of the iceberg on many different topics. it does this to make you think, and God forbid we do that! it pours the troubles of humanity into your lap and makes you put the peices together. none of that spoon fed drivel that can pass as a novel these days. the point of not developing the characters as efficiently as possible is to allow the reader to relate the characters and opinions to his/her own life and to. the theme of oversaturation by the mass media is classic palahniuk, and is just as enthraling in lullaby as in his other novels. it seems like the other reviewers missed the social parallel of the death penalty debate. once again challenging the opinion of the reader and making you THINK. an excellent, page-turning, hilarious, swift read! i would highly recommend reading lullaby along with fight club and survivor.
Rating:
Summary: Don't be so humble. You're not that great....
Review: Loyal readers of Chuck might find this book interesting, but a bit dry. Although "Lullaby" is unique compared to most novels, it isn't quite as distrubing as some of Chuck's other works. Readers of literary fiction will find it a bit more grim then they prefer. The book is an easy to read, and holds your attention, but doesn't really come together until the last page (and I really mean the last page). It wasn't a waste of my time, but I don't think I would pay for the book until it comes out in paper back.
Rating: 
Summary: It gets good....no really it does!
Review: If you saw the movie fight club or read the book and were looking forward to reading another book by Chuck P. don't! Save yourself the trouble in trying to get through it all.Ok sure it got good but only at the end where things came together in a not so neat way. If I had a nickel for every time I picked up that book read a page and was bored with it I would have a ... load of nickels. His writing could go down in history as being the most pointless filler for a book ever. The characters he uses are dull and personally there none imaginative. The sorta hippy boyfriend and girl friend, the rich widow and the dull widower get mashed together and create no plot. With his go-no-where characters which could bore you to death he strives to sound intelligent using repetative ideas about why people are so horrible. This pointless drable that he puts in could make you sick, which would probably be a good thing, it might take you away from reading it. This book is divided into four sections which are: boring, boring,boring and slightly good. DONT WASTE YOUR TIME!
Rating:
Summary: beautiful
Review: I like this book. Tis a good book. It really makes you think. It is indeed kind of like Fight Club but with an incredibly different aspect. Yay good.
Rating: 
Summary: Stop!
Review: Somebody should have taken Chuck P's pen away after Fight Club... The movie that is... He's a one trick pony with nothing funny or clever left to say. Only for the most obsessed fans. (Although i used to be one and i hate this one) Almost as bad as Choke!
Rating: 
Summary: Interesting but repetitive
Review: "Lullaby" tells the story of Carl Streator, a newspaper reporter investigating SIDS (Sudden Infant Death Syndrome) for an upcoming article. As Carl delves into his investigation, a peculiar pattern begins to emerge: a fairytale book, "Poems and Songs from Around the World," is always nearby when a baby dies from SIDS. Carl eventually discovers that the book contains a "culling song," an ancient African song capable of killing anyone who hears it -- instantly. Armed with the culling song's power, Carl soon becomes an unwitting murderer; even *thinking* the culling song in someone's direction is enough to kill that person. Along the way, Carl meets up with Helen Hoover Boyle, a real estate agent who deals in haunted houses, her Wiccan secretary Mona, and Mona's boyfriend, Oyster. Forming an "anti-nuclear family", they set out on a cross-country road trip to destroy all known copies of the song book, before the "virus" is able to spread any further. Palahniuk's premise is certainly intriguing (albeit difficult to swallow at times), but he stumbles with the execution. The culling song presents the kernel of an interesting idea, but the book feels padded even at a slim 260 pages -- simply put, this is an idea that would have worked much better as a short story. Palahniuk is clumsy in communicating his major themes, taking a heavy-handed approach that simply involves bludgeoning the reader into submission through sheer repetition. But there is an even larger problem here, one beyond the scope of just this book: Palahniuk is becoming repetitive. He has an incredibly unique voice, but it hasn't expanded much since "Fight Club" and "Survivor". While reading "Lullaby", I was suddenly struck by an observation -- all of the characters sound exactly alike -- in this novel *and* in Palahniuk's other novels. Likewise, the themes of nihilism, media saturation, and salvation-through-destruction are used and re-used over and over. I understand that authors have common themes that they revisit, but after a while, it begins to feel more like a rut than a style. Palahniuk needs to show more growth in this area quickly or he runs the risk of being seen as a one-trick pony. Overall, the book is interesting, but it never rises above the level of just "OK". If you've never read Palahniuk before, I'd recommend reading either "Fight Club" or "Survivor" instead of this. Here's hoping that Palahniuk branches out into some new areas with his next novel.
Rating:
Summary: Dark at Times, But Not Your Typical Work of Fiction
Review: What if you could kill someone simply by repeating a few lyrics in your head or outloud? What if you didn't even realize you were killing the people around you? Carl Streator is a newspaper reporter who's been assigned a story on Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. All of the deaths have one common link - an anthology of poems from around the world. The culling song has embedded itself in Carl's brain. Before he knows it, people are dropping all around him. As he tracks down other victims who have lost someone, he comes across a woman named Helen Hoover Boyle, a real estate agent who repeatedly sells houses whose residents don't include people from this world. The two decide to join forces and destroy every book that features the culling song. Some people have different plans for the powerful culling song. And they're willing to use a little manipulation of their own to get it. Chuck Palahniuk has written a novel that's not your ordinary, run of the mill fiction. The characters are very unique, not your typical cast. At times, this tale is pretty dark and if you're the sensitive type, this may not be the book for you. But if you're up for an unusual tale, Palahniuk won't disappoint. And how can you not be intrigued by a book that has a dead bird illustration on the cover?
Rating:
Summary: Compelling reading for Chuck fans
Review: I must admit, I had high hopes coming into the long-awaited Lullaby. Like most of you, I have read Fight Club, Survivor, and Choke(planning on Invisible Monsters) and was eagerly anticipating Lullaby like a virgin on prom night. I think fans of the visionary that is Chuck Palahniuk will enjoy this dark and esoteric, yet amusingly fun novel. Perhaps those less versed in the original, sordid, and cynical prose of Chuck would be better served to commence the Palahniuk journey with the incomparable Fight Club. While Lullaby is anything but pedantic and mundane literature, the character development was a bit lackluster and the storyline perhaps somewhat convoluted and unrealistic. Having said that, I must admit that Lullaby was a compelling, if not bizarre read nonetheless. One annoying anachronistic snafu that I must point out is how author Basil Frankie "lifted off the Internet" some of his material for his book Poems and Rhymes from Around the World - despite having written it 20 years ago. That's about as likely as hell freezing over. This group of eclectic and unendearing characters was by all means the weakest group written by Chuck thus far. I recommend Lullaby for diehard Chuck fans like moi, but not for first-time readers.
Rating:
Summary: sticks and stones
Review: Chuck Palahniuk is brilliant, bottom line. I was a little unsure about this book through the first few chapters. The whole "supernatural thriller" thing isn't exactly an idea that grabs me by the collar of my shirt. After I got introduced to all the characters and the story, however, I found myself hooked. I read the book in two days, and I just couldn't put it down. It works on so many levels, it's fabulous. If you dig Chuck Palahniuk, or just good stories, get this book.
Rating: 
Summary: More Goodness from Mr. Palahniuk
Review: I just finished this book and really liked it. As usual, there were many ingenious themes all wrapping and interconnecting which are so enticing that it keeps you wanting to read more - classic Palahniuk. There were also, as is his style, very sharp and critical insights into the modern condition which he so well, and often subtly, captures. Palahniuk's books are always a joy to read for those willing to take a stark account of the world we live in. I will say the reason I only gave this 4 stars is b/c the first 100 pages of the book, while they do a good job setting up the ending, seem underdeveloped. I think there was room for Palahniuk to delve more into the characters' pasts in these pages, or at least hint at their pasts more. Also, one major theme of this book is about power and it's ability to corrupt. In these initial pages I think this book could have been better is in really detailing the struggle of the main character to resist this corruption. To be fair there is some of this here, but it is after the fact and after the corruption has already begun.
Nevertheless, the book is well worth the read and I would recommenced this to anyone interested in seeing the world like no one else sees it.
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