63 pages • 2 hours read
Katherine DunnGeek Love
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1989A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
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BetaBook 3, Chapters 20-22Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Book 3: “Spiral Mirror”
Book 3, Chapter 20 Summary: “The Fix Unfixed”
Oly describes a day at the carnival. Dr. Phyllis complains to Arty about the number of Admitted surgeries she is called on to perform. Horst and Sanderson argue over who should get the amputated limbs. Oly watches Lil sew costumes in the family trailer.
Suddenly, Oly hears Elly yelling and Iphy begging someone to leave them alone. The Bag Man is trying to follow them around, despite their protests. Lil says that somehow the Bag Man seems familiar. Oly says nothing, as Arty made her swear to tell no one that the Bag Man is Vern Bogner. Oly is not jealous of the Bag Man, though he worships Arty and has taken over some of Oly’s caretaker duties, since she is still Arty’s confidante and handles his personal needs. Arty tries to get information on the twins from Oly, but she will not tell him about their sexual exploits, so Arty instructs the Bag Man to be their bodyguard. Elly, in particular, is angry and afraid.
Tomaini, the twins’ piano instructor and pimp, convinces them to take on a “client” who is willing to pay $10,000. Elly accepts, in order to spite Arty. Tomaini is supposed to distract the Bag Man by getting him drunk, but the Bag Man suspects something is amiss and bursts in on the encounter. The client runs away and Oly, hearing all the commotion, runs into the twins’ trailer.
The Bag Man brings Tomaini to Arty, where the piano teacher confesses that he has been pimping for the twins, claiming that they’d coerced him. Arty expels Tomaini from the camp. Oly tries to comfort Arty, but he’s tearful and wants to be left alone.
Later, Arty goes to speak to the twins. Oly and the twins expect Arty to angrily lecture them, but he asks in a sad, vulnerable voice why the twins did what they did: “Iphy, tell me. Did she do it to keep you away from me?” (244). Iphy calmly replies, “No, I wanted to” (244). Arty swiftly returns to his van and calls for the Bag Man. Arty decides to “give” the twins to the Bag Man, to keep them out of trouble. The Bag Man decides that this means he will marry Elly and Iphy, and claims to love them completely.
Oly finds Arty watching Dr. Phyllis perform surgery, with Chick there to keep the patient from feeling any pain. Arty flatters Oly by paying attention to her and making her feel needed, but he refuses to go see the twins. Oly is upset that Arty will not call off the Bag Man from the twins, so she goes into the family van and gets Al’s gun. Oly heads to the twins’ trailer and they are devastated to hear that Arty will not relent. Oly offers to go ask Al or Horst for help, but the twins feel that will not do any good. Oly leaves the gun with them.
Al is enthusiastic about the Bag Man marrying the twins, Arty having told him it is a great idea. The twins are resigned, knowing that Al has no power in the family anymore, but they still tell Al that they don’t want to marry the Bag Man. Al dismisses their words cheerfully. Oly considers who else she might go to for help, but knows that the carnival staff would never interfere with family business.
The Bag Man goes to the twins. Elly pulls the gun on him, but he is so meek that Elly cannot bring herself to shoot him, so they submit to him.
Oly hears a gunshot and runs to get Arty and together they rush to the twins’ trailer. In the bedroom, they find the Bag Man dead on the bed, the twins hysterical, and Lil standing by the bed with the gun in her hands. Lil then says, ‘‘I finally remembered where I’d seen him before” (254).
This scene is followed by an excerpt from Sanderson’s notes, in which he transcribes Lil’s statement to the police. Lil describes how she realized that the Bag Man was the man who had tried to kill her children years ago.
Al asks Arty if he knew the identity of the Bag Man and Arty says he did not. Arty says they are lucky Lil remembered him and that she had come into the trailer just in time. Elly furiously says that Lil was not in time, and that the Bag Man ejaculated as he was shot. Iphy says that they had not been able to use their diaphragm. The police come and confirm that the Bag Man’s fingerprints match those of Vern Bogner, who had been sought for leaving his mother’s custody. No charges are filed against Lil.
Book 3, Chapter 21 Summary: “On the Lam”
Chick is sitting on the twins’ lap, reciting a poem, when he suddenly turns to face the twins and then climbs off their lap. Once Al and Lil go to bed, the twins ask him what was wrong. Chick says, “I just didn’t know you had that little guy in there with you.” (257) In this way, the twins find out they are pregnant.
The twins go with Oly to see Dr. Phyllis, requesting an abortion, but Dr. Phyllis refuses, saying that Arty wants them to have the baby. The twins ask Chick if he can remove the baby, but Arty has told him not to.
Next there are excerpts from Sanderson’s notes, in which he describes how the carnival is in an uproar because the twins have run away. One of the redheads helped them drive to a clinic to have an abortion. Oly helps Arty search phone books for possible facilities and Arty transmits orders to the carnival employees searching for the twins. Chick is with one of the vehicles and he locates the twins. The guard driving the van with Chick storms into the clinic and pulls the twins off the examination table before the abortion can take place. The twins struggle, but Chick puts them to sleep with his powers.
Back at the camp, Arty goes into the twins’ trailer to berate them and Elly attacks him. Oly and a guard pull them apart. Arty confines the twins to their trailer, with no one allowed in except himself and Oly. Lil becomes upset when even she is not allowed in.
Sanderson sees Chick stomping on an anthill, which surprises him since Chick is always so mild and gentle. Sanderson comforts Chick and asks what the problem is. Chick weeps and says that no matter how he tries to do good, everything turns out wrong. Sanderson attempts to get Chick to tell him if the “wild stories” Sanderson has heard about Chick around the midway are true, but Chick withdraws and says they are just stories. Sanderson speculates to himself that Chick has developed an inferiority complex from not being “special” like his siblings.
Book 3, Chapter 22 Summary: “Nose Spites Face, Lip Disappears”
The twins are still confined to their trailer and their performance tent is dismantled on Arty’s orders. Arty consults with Dr. Phyllis about the twins and comes up with a plan, which makes Chick extremely upset. Oly asks Arty what he’s doing and he answers that Dr. Phyllis “was just going to get rid of the parasite” (268). Oly assumes this means an abortion and tries to explain how much that upsets Chick. Arty sends Oly away dismissively and she tells him angrily, “Are you swallowing your own line of shit, Arty Binewski? Aren’t you forgetting that you’re just a two-bit freak with a gimmick?” (269).
Arty punishes Oly by relieving her of all caretaker duties and by not allowing her to see the twins. Oly gives up trying to defy him and is allowed back into the twins’ trailer. Oly tries to warn the twins that Arty is planning on having Dr. Phyllis perform an abortion on them, but Elly laughs harshly and neither will speak to Oly. The twins deteriorate, doing nothing but sitting on their bed all day. Oly says, “But I saw knowledge grow in Iphy’s face and harden in Elly’s. They knew more than I did” (270).
The day comes when the sedated twins are taken from their trailer and brought to the surgery. Arty is dismayed that the twins look so ill and unkempt. Oly still tries to make Arty reconsider. She wishes that Al and Lil could help her, but she drugged them with sedative drops the night before, the same drops she gave Elly and Iphy.
The following account comes from Sanderson’s notes. The reader finds out that Dr. Phyllis performed a lobotomy on Elly, completely incapacitating her mentally. Dr. Phyllis becomes inspired by the experience, believing that all the Arturans should undergo a lobotomy as it’s the fastest course to Peace, Isolation, and Purity. Dr. Phyllis causes a schism in the church by espousing the idea. Arty cannot contend with the unrest among his followers because he’s so distressed and consumed by Iphy’s complete retreat into herself.
Dr. Phyllis goes on strike, refusing to perform any more surgeries. Arty begins making rounds in the Admitted camp, speaking to his followers personally and ensuring they have what they need. Sanderson remarks to Arty that there will be trouble because of Dr. Phyllis’s intransigence, but Arty replies that he had long planned for this and had been having Dr. Phyllis train her own replacement for years.
Lil is so debilitated mentally that she cannot see how Elly is “gone” and that their lives are in chaos. Lil keeps going through the motions of what the children liked to do when they were young. Oly becomes angry and confronts Lil, saying, “Everything’s changed […] It’s dumb, Mama. Stop pretending. There isn’t any family anymore, Mama” (277). Lil reflexively strikes Oly with a spoon, the first time she’s ever hit Oly. Oly rushes out and feels sorry, realizing that she’s alone in her misery over what the family has become. She wishes Lil would be miserable with her. Instead, Lil is cheerfully anticipating becoming a grandmother, thinking that Iphy is probably carrying twins because her belly is so large.
Oly fantasizes about running away from the carnival herself with the Human Pincushion, called the Pin Kid, a young man who is a dwarf and a hunchback like herself, and who seems to like her.
Book 3, Chapters 20-22 Analysis
Oly remains loyal and in love with Arty, no matter what. When Arty asks if she wants him to find her a boyfriend, Oly is filled with happiness that Arty cares about her. She is pleased when he asks her to carry him down the stairs, showing that he needs her. Oly feels guilty that she really doesn’t want the twins to escape the Bag Man and at how pleased she is that Arty is angry with the twins, “delighted that he didn’t want to see them […] delirious at the thought of them being utterly out of the running for Arty’s attention” (252). Oly is also instrumental in the betrayal of the twins, having drugged them so the surgery could be performed on Elly.
Oly is fascinated and mystified by sex. She understands so much about the human condition because of her upbringing and a lifetime of seeing people come close to the ultimate mystery of death, but “this is a real mystery [she] have never touched, never scratched” (241). Oly witnesses the sexual appetites of norms, as well as those of her siblings, and they seem like something that she will never experience. Because Lil is so far gone mentally, because the twins are preoccupied with themselves, and because she has no outside friends, Oly has no one to discuss her sexuality with, as a most typical girls would. Her fantasy of running off with the Pin Kid and living a “normal” married life outside the carnival is appealing to Oly.
Arty gets his long-desired wish in these chapters, finally separating Elly from Iphy mentally, if not physically, but he finds that the reality is a sad disaster, with Iphy feeling further away from him than ever. Sanderson notes, “Arty has a revolution to contend with and where is he? Mooning over his lost love—not Elly, but Iphigenia” (72).
