![]() ![]() And so he manipulates and bullies and even murders to maintain his power. He is jealous of the Siamese twins' musical act. The trouble is that Arturo cannot stand to share the limelight. At first the faithful - called Arturans or ''the Admitted'' - lose their fingers and toes, then bits of their arms and legs, then all their limbs and at last they are lobotomized in one of Arturo's rest homes. And so Arturo, with the help of a sinister nurse and the telekinetic powers of his little brother, obliges them. Arturo has great charismatic powers and eventually he creates a religious cult whose thousands of followers are not freaks. He is smart and cruel and he takes over the show. He killed the Lizard Girl and others as well. Arturo or Aqua Boy or Arty wants to be boss freak. Janus died at birth, but the Lizard Girl died mysteriously at 7 months.Īnd this becomes the rub. ''We had such hopes for her,'' Crystal Lil sighs. These include Janus, perfect apart from a second head emerging from the base of his spine, and the Lizard Girl, who is green and has a long tail. Finally come the failures, the freaks who didn't make it and are preserved in alcohol in a 50-foot trailer called the Chute, which the curious can visit for a buck. Although he looks like a ''norm,'' Chick has amazing telekinetic powers which prove him to be his parents' masterpiece. The youngest is Fortunato, nicknamed Chick. It was a disappointment when I emerged with such commonplace deformities.'' My mother had been liberally dosed with cocaine, amphetamines, and arsenic during her ovulation and throughout her pregnancy with me. ![]() My father spared no expense in these experiments. ''I was born three years after my sisters. Next is the narrator, the hunchback dwarf Olympia. Next are the beautiful Siamese twins Electra and Iphigenia: two bodies above the waist, one body below. The book centers around Binewski's Fabulon, a carnival run by Aloysius Binewski and his wife, Crystal Lil, whose attractions include their own children, born as freaks owing to their parents' careful experimentation ''with illicit and prescription drugs, insecticides, and eventually radioisotopes.'' Remember, this is basically a comic novel about love, betrayal and power.įirst to be born is Arturo, or Aqua Boy, who has flippers instead of arms and legs. In ''Geek Love'' there is a lot of spectacle. Dunn, who is the author of two earlier novels, ''Attic'' and ''Truck.'' When the extravagance is not integral, then it functions as spectacle. The difference, perhaps, is that it is necessary that Gregor Samsa be changed into a bug: it is integral to the story. Similarly, Katherine Dunn must have experienced a happy moment when she decided to have her novel narrated by a bald albino hunchback dwarf by the name of Olympia Binewski, later known as McGurk. How Kafka must have guffawed when he hit upon the idea of transforming Gregor Samsa into a gigantic insect. One of writing's many pleasures comes from seeing just how much you can get away with. ![]()
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