City of Culture bid packs a punch, says Fight Club author

Palahniuk, whose 12 novels are all best-sellers in the US, will be appearing at Hull University’s Middleton Hall on Friday, November 15 as part of the Humber Mouth festival.

And the audience may be in for a shock – his readings can be so hard-hitting that listeners have been known to faint, an effect of which he is proud, having a running total of 77 victims so far.

Asked what he thought of Hull’s bid to be culture capital, the writer said: “If they’ve invited me that shows they have got some guts.

“It’s not a tame little festival if they’ve invited me.”

He said the secret of causing people to faint was “good writing”.

Palahniuk, 51, added: “At a large event in Brighton with 
Irvine Welsh there were 18 people who fainted, and outside in the foyer they had the St John Ambulance and it was full of people on stretchers – it was terrific.

“I would much rather that happened than me bore them to sleep.”

His books include Fight Club, made into a film starring Brad Pitt and Edward Norton which acquired a cult following after a slow start at the box office.

He is currently working on a sequel to Fight Club, which he hopes to complete by Christmas, and promises to share some new material with the audience in Hull on what will be his first visit to Yorkshire.

“I never read from the current book, I want to give people something exclusive,” he said.

“I will be reading from an unpublished short story, Zombies, that will come out later in Playboy, and some things people will not have seen or heard.”

The 10-day literature festival starts next Friday and also features writers including Poet Laureate Carol Ann Duffy and Hull MP Alan Johnson, who will be reading from his highly acclaimed biography, This Boy.

Hull is competing against Dundee, Leicester and Swansea Bay 
to be named City of Culture in 2017.

The team delivering Hull’s bid will make their final presentation to judges on November 14, with the winner set to be announced on November 20.

Hull is third favourite with bookmakers William Hill at 11/4.