I Am a Magical Teenage Princess by Luke Geddes

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A helpless surfer girl drifts through time like flotsam, tormented by the bizarre cliches of drive-in-era B-movies. A reluctant teenage astronaut idles away her post-apocalyptic adolescence huffing gasoline and fooling around with her five brutish shipmates, all of them named Tommy. The beleaguered subject of an educational hygiene films longs to break free from the cruel social strictures of her celluloid world. A retired chimpanzee actor contemplates life after fame in a run-down motel room in Missoula. Two sisters go hunting for real-deal rebels in a desert town overrun with phony nostalgia.

In the stories of I Am a Magical Teenage Princess (ISBN 978-1907681165), released on July 18, 2012, by Chamu Press, Luke Geddes reexamines 1960s and contemporary popular culture with wit, insight, and pathos. A book for the magical teenage princess in all of us, this debut short story collection welcomes a unique and surprisingly wise voice to the world of letters.

“In a lesser writer’s hands the work would come off as puerile, but Geddes’s sure prose, empathy, pop cultural knowledge, and stoner wit make for a rewarding and unusual collection,” raves Publishers Weekly. Says Alissa Nutting, winner of the Starcherone Prize for Innovative Fiction: “With a collector’s eye, Geddes finds the intricate bewilderments that glow in the periphery of our daily world with secret magic- the prick of a mouse’s rib bone, the orphaned flecks of lipstick on teeth-  and moves them into center focus. The lasting images of these stories hang in your mind long after reading; this book is a luminous, tender gallery curated by an amazing new voice in fiction.” Says Chris Bachelder, author of Abbott Awaits, US!, and Bear v. Shark: “Never content with mere Situation- no matter how funny or glorious in its invention- Geddes pushes always to Story, where ache surpasses wink. This is a substantial and entertaining debut.”

Luke Geddes was born and grew up in Appleton, Wisconsin. His stories have appeared in Hayden‘s Ferry Review, Conjunctions, Mid American Review, and other journals. He currently lives in Ohio, where he is a Ph.D. student at the University of Cincinnati. More information: iamamagicalteenageprincess.com.

To win a free copy, post who you think is the most attractive cartoon character and why! You have until Monday, August 13th to enter.