The zany and joyous female embrace of an extreme kind of porn-scripted sexuality is a new literary trend, or maybe a new life trend, seen recently in Miranda July’s All Fours, and now in the disturbing grunge confection Paradise Logic, by Sophie Frances Kemp. Early accolades have hailed Kemp’s heroine, Reality Kahn (get it?) as the manic pixie dream girl of the Gowanus Canal, and editor Olivia Taylor-Smith’s introduction letter to my advance reader’s copy says we have a lot to learn from her, such as learning to “live with an open heart, love earnestly and wildly, find beauty in the mundane and grotesque, and to always, always follow your dreams…” This may be the book’s intention, sort of, but a look at Kemp’s crazy-eyed author photo, intended in jest, but maybe not so much, suggests the con in Reality Kahn is something the reader should look into. Let us not forget that the Gowanus Canal is a neon-green Superfund site allegedly infected with syphilis.
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