Palahniuk has revealed that the graphic novel script for his 'dark and messy' continuation of the Fight Club story is complete

Breaking both the first and second rules of Fight Club, Chuck Palahniuk has revealed that the graphic novel sequel to his most loved book is steaming ahead.

The bestselling and controversial US author announced in July, to an audience of delighted comic book fans, that he was writing a "dark and messy" sequel to Fight Club, set "10 years after the seeming end of Tyler Durden".

"Nowadays, Tyler is telling the story, lurking inside Jack, and ready to launch a comeback. Jack is oblivious. Marla is bored. Their marriage has run aground on the rocky coastline of middle-aged suburban boredom. It's only when their little boy disappears, kidnapped by Tyler, that Jack is dragged back into the world of mayhem," the author said last summer.

Now Palahniuk has told his official fansite that his "graphic novel 'script'" for the sequel has been sent to the writer Matt Fraction, and to "an unnamed publisher for review", and that it will stretch to seven issues.

"Matt writes his own series called Sex Criminals and does very well," wrote Palahniuk. "He's been my go-to adviser about format and other considerations of graphic scripts. I'll be choosing an illustrator based on their response to the script. The sequel will consist of seven issues, totally more than 210 pages. Fingers crossed."

Fraction tweeted: "#fightclub2 #ohyeahitsfuckinghappening". He also blogged to his followers: "What's the first rule of Fight Club?", referencing the famous line from the book: "The first rule of Fight Club is: you do not talk about Fight Club."

Palahniuk has previously expressed reservations about presenting the sequel, which he says has been percolating in his mind for years, in graphic novel format.

"My only worry is about presenting it in the form of a graphic novel," he told Hustler Magazine. "The medium shapes the messages, and I'll be relearning how to tell stories. My tendency is to hold the entire plot in my mind until I'm afraid of forgetting it. Once I start writing, I can't stop. That feverish, ill-fed, exhausting stint of writing is the only part of the process that I fear."

David Fincher's acclaimed film of Fight Club, starring Brad Pitt and Helena Bonham Carter, was released in 1999, three years after the novel was first published.