The Bullfighter Checks Her Makeup by Susan Orlean

I am totally unique. No one in this entire country has the merchandise we have. Also, I am practical. I will not make certain flavors. Mango I won't make. Weird stuff I won't make. Some guys who worked for me a couple of years ago, they broke off on their own, and started making the oddest-ball-flavored ices in the world - mango this and banana-something that - and, of course, they eventually went out of business. I found out some guy was carrying their merchandise and carrying mine also in his store, and I said to him, 'No way you're carrying both. Carrying both! You can drop dead.' And you know what? Three weeks later, he did. No kidding. But I had nothing to with it. He had heart trouble. The fact is, though, I am very vindictive. I am. You might think: Peter Benfaremo, he's a short guy, he's a plumpy guy, what can he do to hurt me? Well, I have my ways.

-"Nonstop," from The Bullfighter Checks Her Makeup

If I'm remembering correctly, my first introduction to Susan Orlean's work was via the film Adaptation. Intrigued by the wild and crazy plot, I went back to the source material, which was Orlean's book The Orchid Thief. My parents had both read it and enjoyed it much earlier, and, belatedly, I caught on. It was a fascinating read, and Orlean's name stuck in my mind.

Thus, earlier this month when I checked out my grab bag of books from the library, her collection of essays, The Bullfighter Checks Her Makeup, was among them. I am pleased to report that it was a good choice.

The Bullfighter Checks Her Makeup is a compilation of profiles of people Orlean deemed "extraordinary." Most of them were previously published in The New Yorker, and they date back as early as 1987. Luckily for the reader, Orlean really does have a knack for finding extraordinary people, who are all the more interesting because you've never heard of them before*. This isn't Barbara Walters' Most Fascinating People, in other words.

Take Peter Benfaremo, the Lemon Ice King of Corona, whom I quoted above. Or Colin Duffy, an average ten-year-old boy Orlean decided to profile instead of Macaulay Culkin, then also ten. Or the sisters who were in the outsider band The Shaggs. All actually fascinating, and Orlean has a lovely, dry wit that makes reading the profiles a pleasure. She is also adept with description ("The Maui surfer girls love one another's hair. It is awesome hair, long and bleached by the sun, and it falls over their shoulders straight, like water, or in squiggles, like seaweed, or in waves. They are forever playing with it - yanking it up into ponytails, or twisting handfuls and securing them with chopsticks or pencils, or dividing it as carefully as you would divide a pile of coins and then weaving it into tight yellow plaits.") She uses words like "bosky." She's a really good writer, is what I'm saying.

My attention did flag a few times, notably in some of the longer profiles. I also wasn't a huge fan of the title essay, mostly because I find the whole bullfighting culture pretty nauseating. In general, though, it was a very interesting book - and it really made me want to go get some ice from Corona.

Up next: A friend lent me Divine By Mistake, a fantasy novel by P.C. Cast. I think I'll try that before delving into the Keats bio.


*Exceptions: Tiffany, of "I Think We're Alone Now" fame, and perhaps some tennis players and a basketball player if you were following those sports in the mid-90s (I was not). Also, Silly Billy (aka David Friedman, although he's since changed his name) is now somewhat well known as a member of the Friedman family featured in the documentary Capturing the Friedmans.