Goodreads asked Benjamin Radford:

Where did you get the idea for your most recent book?

Benjamin Radford Clowns tend to be polarizing figures-- most people love or hate them, and I've encountered few people who are ambivalent about them. I had the idea for this book about 10 years ago and began doing interviews for it (look closely at the dates in some of the references), but it got shelved when I was busy with grad school and writing other books. After the (modest) success of "Mysterious New Mexico," my publisher UNM Press asked me, "So, any ideas for another book?" and I replied "bad clowns." I was fascinated by all the bad, evil, and scary clowns in pop culture and the media, and when I revisited the idea 10 years later I found to my surprise that no one else had written a book about it, so I figured I'd do it--and bring scholarship and a unique perspective on it.

flag