To quote Chuck Palahniuk, Clown Girl is its own reality. Clown Girl author Monica Drake has created the story of Nita, a student of the art of clowning who has fallen on hard times. Her mentor and lover, Rex, has gone off to try to get into a prestigious clowning school leaving her living with a pot dealer and trying to scrape by doing corporate clowning with fetishists. Nita is also being wooed by a local cop who seems to be around every corner while trying to keep her dignity.
I read Clown Girl and thought it was a wonderful book. Like life, full of contradictions. Some contradictions, like the romance between the clown and the cop, were adressed by the characters themselves. Others were maybe only my take on the book, but I found it funny and sad, exotic and yet very ordinary... There are so many great authors in the Portland area, of course, Chuck Palahniuk, but one of my very favorites is Katherine Dunn, who I believe is writing for the Willamette Weekly now. I want to thank Monica Drake for realizing that maybe she is a writer and I look forward to reading more of her work.
Zoetica
NEWSWIRE
Los Angeles, CA
FEB 20, 2007 06:00 AM