A review by melliedm
Clown Girl by Monica Drake
4.0
Sniffles, AKA Nita, brings absurdity to the darkest places. Miscarriage, sexual assault, animal abuse, emotional abuse, misogyny, medical gaslighting: all of this darkness (which remains just as dark and troubling as it sounds) lives in the same world as Drake's clowning. Set in the fictional land of metaphor and satire known as Baloneytown, Nita is the titular clown girl. We're introduced to her performing balloon art on the street post-miscarriage, where she has a cardiac episode, and things snowball from there. From her interactions with lustful colourophiles, her fellow female clowns, the other impoverished folk of Baloneytown, a cop who becomes a recurring character, and Rex Galore--the "away trying to get into clown college" boyfriend and love of Nita's life; to her pursuing of art in the face of financial need in the face of the misogyny inherent to clowning; and wow so much more; the book is relatively short but packs a real punch.
Clown Girl goes from dark to absurd without a moment's notice, but for my taste it doesn't feel like it's ever taking the piss out of any of it's topics. Maybe that's because we read the story from Nita's perspective, and it's easy to read between the lines of dread as something not far from self-deprecation, a kind of self-defense mechanism I find myself familiar with. We aren't reading it as a distant observer, but rather as Nita trying to comfort herself with things that are making her feel truly horrible: and of course she does so with goofy, often sardonic humor. And sometimes she even gets on her own case about it.
Towards the end of the book I found myself getting worked up along with Nita, and was certain I would rate this book 5*. However, the ending was a true disappointment. Without spoiling anything, I felt certain that Nita had achieved a certain kind of character development, which was instead compromised in the last page and a half. It was not a terrible ending, but it wasn't as effective. 4*.
Clown Girl goes from dark to absurd without a moment's notice, but for my taste it doesn't feel like it's ever taking the piss out of any of it's topics. Maybe that's because we read the story from Nita's perspective, and it's easy to read between the lines of dread as something not far from self-deprecation, a kind of self-defense mechanism I find myself familiar with. We aren't reading it as a distant observer, but rather as Nita trying to comfort herself with things that are making her feel truly horrible: and of course she does so with goofy, often sardonic humor. And sometimes she even gets on her own case about it.
Towards the end of the book I found myself getting worked up along with Nita, and was certain I would rate this book 5*. However, the ending was a true disappointment. Without spoiling anything, I felt certain that Nita had achieved a certain kind of character development, which was instead compromised in the last page and a half. It was not a terrible ending, but it wasn't as effective. 4*.