Backlist Best Seller: GEEK LOVE
A former Paris Reviw editor pays tribute in Wired this week to the “dazzling oddball masterpiece,” Geek Love, by Katherine Dunn (Knopf, 1989), on the 25th anniversary of its release, citing its many well-known fans. Author Karen Russell recalls discovering it at 15, “I felt electrocuted when I read that first page with Crystal Lil and her freak brood. I stood there in the bookstore and my jaw came unhinged. No book I’ve read, before or since, has given me that specific jolt.”
Although it had success in its day (it was a National Book Award finalist), the novel brought in more royalties for Dunn last year than in any year before.
The piece also includes some lore for publishing geeks; it was legendary editor Sonny Mehta’s first acquisition for Knopf and was designed by the then little-known Chip Kidd’s.
All copies are out in circulation at the libraries we checked.
March 12th, 2014 at 1:28 pm
I’m so happy to see this book get it’s due. Well this dark tale isn’t for everyone, I was completely transfixed by this story. If you like dark, strange, and quirky this book is for you!
March 12th, 2014 at 1:30 pm
I read this when it was first published and thought it was the weirdest book I had ever read but it’s my “go-to” book for patrons who want something “different” (other is anything by Chuck Palahniuk). Dunn is “local” so it’s good the book is still doing well.