a hilarious satire involving sex addiction and Alzheimers</br></br>Product Description</br></br>Victor Mancini?? a medical-school dropout?? is an antihero for our deranged times. Needing to pay elder care for his mother?? Victor has devised an ingenious scam: he pretends to choke on pieces of food while d"g in upscale restaurants. He then allows himself to be ??saved?? by fellow patrons who?? feeling responsible for Victor??s life?? go on to send checks to support him. When he??s not pulling this stunt?? Victor cruises sexual addiction recovery workshops for action?? visits his addled mom?? and spends his days working at a colonial theme park. His creator?? Chuck Palahniuk?? is the visionary we need and the satirist we deserve.</br></br>Amazon.com Review</br></br>Victor Mancini is a ruthless con artist. Victor Mancini is a med-school dropout who's taken a job playing an Irish indentured servant in a colonial-era theme park in order to help care for his Alzheimer's-afflicted mother. Victor Mancini is a sex addict. Victor Mancini is a direct descendant of Jesus Christ. All of these statements about the protagonist of <I>Choke</I> are more or less true. Welcome?? once again?? to the world of Chuck Palahniuk. <p>  "es from happiness." So says Mancini's mother only a few pages into the novel. Given her own dicey and melodramatic style of parenting?? you would think that her son's life would be chock-full of nothing but art. Alas?? that's not the case. In the fine tradition of Oedipus?? Stephen Dedalus?? and Anthony Soprano?? Victor hasn't quite reconciled his issues with his mother. Instead?? he's trawling sexual-addiction recovery meetings for dates and purposely choking in restaurants for a few moments of attention. Longing for a hug?? in other words?? he's settling for the Heimlich.<p>  Thematically?? this is pretty familiar Palahniuk territory. It would be a pity to disclose the surprises of the plot?? but suffice it to say that what we have here is a little bit of Tom Robbins's <I>Another Roadside Attraction</I>?? a little bit of Don DeLillo's <I>The Day Room</I>?? and?? well?? a little bit