This is going to be a bit of a change up to the usual Freak O’ The Day routine. This weeks freak is a book about a magnificently off kilter family of circus freaks: Geek Love by Katherine Dunn.
This book is like a golden treasure to me. From start to finish it still ranks up there as one of the most surprising, endearing, turbulent, emotional, refreshingly shocking novels I’ve had the please of getting my paws on. It’s pushy, it’s funny, it crosses the line, it doesn’t pull any punches and it goes for your gut regularly in ways you just don’t quite see coming.
The story revolves around a circus family and the type of drama that surrounds carny folk of their caliber: the demands on a mother & father to produce children with monumental circus freak potential & the lengths Crystal Lil & Aloysius will go to reach their goal; the rigors of growing up as a conjoined twin beauties…an albino hunchback miss with a heart of gold; the stress of being involved in making a livelihood off of such a business at a point in history where such entertainments are slowly falling out of favor thanks to a lambasting by do-gooders who’d call such careers “exploitative” and “demeaning”; what it is to be a frighteningly intelligent mastermind trapped in the body of a lobster- boy off shoot with flippers for hands & feet…. and what that type of entrapment does to the sweetness & goodness that lies inside…and the plight of the “pickled pug” babies in their terminal incubator jars….And many many more amazing wonders await you at the heart of Geek Love. You just grab yourself a chicken and bite off it’s head because this ride is just that kind of wild. It is a rich tapestry Katherine weaves for you with this book and you’ll be swallowed up whole by the story and the depth of the characters within just a few moments of reading.
There’s a lot going on in this book and you almost wouldn’t guess it because it’s a super-fast read like nothing else you’ll read anytime soon. Well…except for maybe that true crime novel about the Lobster Boy & his murderous streak.The only downside is that Katherine Dunn never wrote another book like this one. The book is so good you can’t help but put it down and wonder if you’ll ever find anything like it ever again. What I would do for Katherine to write another absolutely compelling novel about the circus life. Mind you, Katherine recently fought off a purse snatcher…Seriously. She’s 64 years old and loves boxing… And knows how to box for crying out loud. Impressivo!
If anyone of you readers out there know of another book like this one please feel free to fill me in. I really mean it! Now go out there and get your read on!! I might cook up my own circus life speculative fiction novel, ala Neil Gaiman, in the meantime.
