Reviewed by Robin

“Diary” by Chuck Palahniuk

Summary

“Diary” is, as the title says, a book in the style of a diary. This ‘diary’ is written by an omniscient author. He tells the story from the point of view of various characters but mainly from the one of Misty Mary Wilmot (Kleinman). She’s a hotel maid at the Waytansea Hotel on Waytansea Island. Her husband has just attempted to commit suicide and now lies in a coma. The book is written like a diary, this means the chapters are divided into dates and the action is mixed with flashbacks, which should explain the situation in which Misty finds herself.

Misty Mary Kleinman was an art student when she met Peter Wilmot. Peter was a strange guy and wasn’t liked very much by other students, but Misty fell in love with him. This was the beginning of the end for Misty.

Misty begins the diary right after Peter’s suicide attempt. At that time she is 41 years old. She lives in the house of her mother-in-law with her daughter Tabbie. Misty’s situation isn’t very agreeable: She doesn’t get much money and takes pain killers and drinks alcohol all the time. She wants to get out of her depression and to start painting again. She gets help from a friend called Angel Delaporte. He helps her to restart painting and get out of her depression. He also analyses Peter’s handwriting to discover what kind of person he is.

One day Misty trips at work and falls. She breaks her leg so she can’t go on working. The injury is so serious that she can only lie in bed with a catheter. Misty doesn’t do anything else but paint. From now on she paints with her eyes closed. She’s in her room at the Waytansea Hotel the whole time and doesn’t know what’s going on around her. Sometimes she gets visits from her mother-in-law but also from a certain Detective Stilton. He tries to throw light on Peter’s attempted suicide.

After Misty has finished her last picture – she has painted 100 pictures during her days out of work – her mother-in-law organizes an art exhibition of Misty’s pictures at the hotel. It’s an opportunity for Misty to earn some money and get back into a normal life. At the opening of the exhibition someone sets fire to the place and the whole hotel burns down. Misty and Tabbi can take refuge, but Misty’s mother- and father-in-law die. Misty inherits all their money and also gets money from the insurance of the hotel. She and Tabbi can start a new life now.

Characters

Main characters

Misty Marie Wilmot (Kleinman): She’s the protagonist of the story and it’s also her who writes the ‘Diary’. She’s the daughter of a chaotic hippie mother. Her family background isn’t very sophisticated; she repeatedly describes herself as “a white-trash-girl”. As a little child she dreams of a perfect life in a perfect house with the perfect husband and family. She often paints her wishes while she’s an art student at the local art school. At art school she also makes the acquaintance of “grown-up rich-boy” Peter Wilmot. Misty is a sensitive woman and a kind of an innocent little girl till she gets to know Peter. From that time on, her life slowly but surely goes to hell: she gets pregnant although she doesn’t want to (Peter exchanged her birth control pills with cinnamon candies), she stops painting, she becomes isolated from other people and she can’t follow her plans because of Tabbi. Like this, she becomes the white trash girl that she is now.

Peter Wilmot: Peter is Misty’s husband and after an attempted suicide he lies in a coma during the whole story. He was also an art student at the same school Misty went to. He’s a strange guy who likes to pierce his whole body with precious brooches. He’s a complex person and often seems to be a psychopath because of his strange statements. After art school Peter works as a self-employed refurbisher of rich people’s holiday homes, with the peculiar habit of sealing off one of the rooms after scrawling threats and obscenities on its walls like: “Step on this Island and you will die.”, or “…your blood is our gold…” or “…we will kill every one of God’s children to save our own…” Misty has the suspicion that Peter is associated with the OAF (The Ocean Alliance for Freedom), an obscure liberation movement.

Angel Delaporte: He’s a friend of Misty’s and supports her so that she can restart painting and that she can handle her life again. Angel pushes her to go on painting and he even buys a picture from Misty. He also accompanies Misty to the refurbished houses where Peter has tagged his graffiti, his slogans, on the walls. He can interpret handwriting, so he tries to discover what kind of man Peter was behind the surface.

Grace Wilmot: She’s Peter’s mother and Misty’s mother-in-law. Her relation to Misty is not very deep but they manage to get on with each other. Grace is a kind of support for Misty.

“Tabbi” Wilmot: She’s Misty’s and Peter’s daughter. She’s thirteen years old and has the same hair colour as her father. She almost spends more time with her grandmother than with her mother. Tabbi was an unplanned child and Misty doesn’t make a secret of it.

Secondary characters

Clark Stilton Detective: He’s a detective at the Hate Crimes Task Force in Seaview County.

Dr. Touchet: He treats Misty during the period she is injured.

Criticism

For me, the novel sometimes was very hard to read. It’s written in colloquial English because it’s a diary. Nevertheless it was a challenge for me to understand everything because the vocabulary was often too large for my standard. Also the structure of the novel is sometimes confusing. It’s like a huge puzzle: You have to put together every little detail you are given in the story in order to get a coherent picture, and this is very demanding, because the action is full of flashbacks and strange insertions. At the beginning for example, Palahniuk describes the muscles working in the human face in a whole chapter. I can’t make out any sense in this; I don’t think this is important for the story.

I think Chuck Palahniuk is a very special author. His style of writing and also the plot are very abstract as we know also from other books of his, such as ‘Fight Club’. This abstract thinking makes the story quite difficult to understand but it also makes it very interesting and provoking. The style of writing is very direct, sometimes too direct. I had to laugh a few times because of the fecal expressions and descriptions. On the one hand the story seems to be very realistic (Misty wants to start painting again) an on the other hand it’s quite fantastic (for example when Palahniuk describes the muscles in the human face).

A few times I had problems to make out to whom the narrator is speaking. The level of narrating is different. The story is told from Misty’s point of view but it’s not Misty herself who tells the story. There are also parts in which the narrator refers directly to Peter like: “…dear sweet Peter…” This was confusing for me, because Misty isn’t saying that directly, it’s said by another person or rather by something else that embodies Misty, it could be her subconscious.

The story itself is heavy stuff. It’s very touching when you see the way Misty suffers. Palahniuk is very direct in his style of writing that makes the story realistic and also intensifies the whole situation. He also describes the feeling of the characters and their environment in great detail.

Theme

The main theme of the story is Misty’s way through her depression and the final breaking out of it with the help of curative painting. Misty suffered more or less unconsciously under her husband Peter. Thus she fell into a depression. She began to drink and to swallow painkillers all day long. Her dream of a perfect life didn’t work out. All those factors caused Misty to lose her inspiration and creativity. With the help of Angel Delaporte and the compulsive painting she found her way back to life and recovered her strength.

Clipping

I could have chosen any other passage of the text because every page is the same for me. For me, the manner Palahniuk narrates the plot is one of the most interesting things in the story. It’s very difficult to make out a real plot in the story so I have chosen a passage in which you can see how the relationship between Misty and Peter could have been. The passage is on page 191 out of 261 pages, so it is almost in the middle of the book. It’s a flashback situation in which Misty talks about Peter. In the real time of the plot, Misty lies in bed with an injured leg:

August 15

Just for the record, one problem with art school is it makes you so much less of a romantic. All that garbage about painters and garrets, it disappears under the load you have to learn about chemistry, about geometry and anatomy. What they teach you explains the world. Your education leaves everything so neat and tidy.

So resolved and sensible.

Her whole time dating Peter Wilmot, Misty knew it wasn’t him she loved. Women just look for the best physical specimen to father their children. A healthy woman is wired to seek out the triangle of smooth muscle inside Peter’s open collar because humans evolved hairless in order to sweat and stay cool while outrunning some hot and exhausted form of furry animal protein.

Men with less body hair are also less likely to harbor lice, fleas and mites.

Before their dates, Peter would take a painting of hers. It would be framed and matted. And Peter would press two long strips of extrastrong double-sided mounting tape onto the back of the frame. Carful of the sticky tape, he’d tuck the painting up inside the hem of his baggy sweater.

Any woman would love how Peter ran his hands through her hair. It’s simple science. Physical touch mimics early parent-child grooming practices. It stimulates your release of growth hormone and ornithine decarboxylase enzymes. Inversely, Peter’s fingers rubbing baby rats with a paintbrush.

After you know about biology, you don’t have to be used by it.

On their dates, Peter and Misty, they’d go to art museums and galleries. Just the two of them, walking and talking, Peter looking a little square in front, a little pregnant with her painting.

There is nothing special in the world. Nothing magic. Just physics.

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