false 22286 0976631156 9780976631156 503 127 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1167348458m/22286.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22286.Clown_Girl_A_Novel 12717 Monica Drake 545 142 3 0 false Mon Oct 19 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Fri Oct 30 22:08:16 -0700 2009 Fri Oct 30 22:09:04 -0700 2009
When you read Clown Girl, you have to realize that Baloneytown is an abstraction. Otherwise, the book is a shallow experience. It isn’t the plot that drives this book so much as the self-discovery and journey that Nita has to go through. Rather than living in her own head and dreaming these dreams, she needs to wake up and see the reality around her. The story that leads her there is secondary to her experience.

Monica Drake allows you to make Baloneytown any unhappy little town with its own crime pocket-bad neighborhood and down-on-their-luck folks dealing with the folks who thrive in the muck.

I look forward to what she writes next. Palahniuk makes her out to be a better writer than he is – and I’m not yet convinced of that. But I think…. just maybe, I want to be.]]>