A review by znnys
Geek Love by Katherine Dunn
5.0
I didn't know what to expect going into this book but I honestly really liked it. It definitely has some dated elements given that it was published over thirty years ago, and I found the ending kind of rushed, but ultimately what struck me was how thoroughly this story is about the commodication of the human body.
The Binewski kids were damned from the start. Their parents created them for profit and valued them for how they could be exploited. It colors every interaction they have and every choice they make. Oly is a fantastic narrator, she's quiet enough to give us the full perspective on a lot of scenes but it's warped by her obsession with Arty. I love that she was such a flawed person. There's a part where she says Miss Lick is so willing to trust her because people see her and automatically assume she's good. Arty's "religion" is built on this, too - the "inspiration porn" that's imposed on people with disabilities, that the Binewskis learned to exploit to their advantage. Even then, the Binewski parents are portrayed as pitiably naive as Oly and her siblings get older - after creating children to exploit, they eventually lost control of them. Arty learned the art of commodication from his father and mastered it. This entire story is the consequence of exploiting children's bodies.
So much of this book is about all the facets of bodily autonomy. The convergence of sex and body and exploitation is particularly fascinating. Miss Lick's crusade feels like an inverse to the twins - the twins, having been puppeteered by their parents their whole life, start doing sex work to profit off their unique appearance, whereas Lick thinks "mutilating" people will save them from sex work. She says it herself but her entire venture isn't unlike Arty's.
Honestly I felt like the ending was too abrupt and I was disappointed to learn that. I ended up really liking Chick and the twins and their fate was sad and also just felt a little too rushed for me to feel satisfied by. Arty, too, having been built up as this huge force, also had an anticlimactic ending. For all the detail in the beginning and middle of the book it feels completely rushed by the end.
There's a lot more I could say but despite the flaws I think this story is going to stick with me for a long time.
The Binewski kids were damned from the start. Their parents created them for profit and valued them for how they could be exploited. It colors every interaction they have and every choice they make. Oly is a fantastic narrator, she's quiet enough to give us the full perspective on a lot of scenes but it's warped by her obsession with Arty. I love that she was such a flawed person. There's a part where she says Miss Lick is so willing to trust her because people see her and automatically assume she's good. Arty's "religion" is built on this, too - the "inspiration porn" that's imposed on people with disabilities, that the Binewskis learned to exploit to their advantage. Even then, the Binewski parents are portrayed as pitiably naive as Oly and her siblings get older - after creating children to exploit, they eventually lost control of them. Arty learned the art of commodication from his father and mastered it. This entire story is the consequence of exploiting children's bodies.
Spoiler
The most disturbing culmination of this is after the fire, when Lil finds Al's body and tries to have sex with it so they can "start all over again."So much of this book is about all the facets of bodily autonomy. The convergence of sex and body and exploitation is particularly fascinating. Miss Lick's crusade feels like an inverse to the twins - the twins, having been puppeteered by their parents their whole life, start doing sex work to profit off their unique appearance, whereas Lick thinks "mutilating" people will save them from sex work. She says it herself but her entire venture isn't unlike Arty's.
Honestly I felt like the ending was too abrupt and I was disappointed to learn that
Spoiler
a pretty anticlimactic fire is what killed off most of the familyThere's a lot more I could say but despite the flaws I think this story is going to stick with me for a long time.