Kim Miller
Xavier is a fine arts reviewer for a city newspaper. He loves George Bernard Shaw and hates pop culture, especially superheroes. Then he gets exposed to radioactive waste and becomes a superhero. The only way to suppress the radiation illness he suffers is to wear the costume of a comic book hero named Count Geiger. Suddenly he's got super strength, fast wound healing, hyper-sensitive hearing, although he can't fly.
Xavier has two people in his life. One is his lover, internationally famous fashion designer Bari, and the other is his teenage nephew, Michael, known as The Mick, who is living with Xavier while his parents are working in a relief centre in Afghanistan. The Mick is a pop culture officianado with a teenager's reactive attitude towards authority and parenting, even when it comes from his favourite (only) uncle.
The novel tells the story of how radioactive waste material was disposed of by a dodgy company and dumped in a local creek. That's where Xavier was exposed. But the same company also disposed of a medical radiation machine which was later stolen from the warehouse where it was dumped, then sold to a local scrap metal reclaimer who opened it and exposed his family and others to the deadly radioactive cesium inside. Count Geiger goes into action to track down the path of disposal and find justice for the dying families, as well as for himself.
Along the way the relationship with Bari rises and falls according to Xavier's handling of his own life. And he slowly comes to appreciate The Mick and his teenage attraction to his favourite rock band, 'Smite Them Hip and Thigh'.
It's a work of absurdist humour that morphs into dark satire and ends with a dose of human reality. The ending is such that people will say, "I didn't see that coming" or "yeah, that was predictable".
Xavier is a fine arts reviewer for a city newspaper. He loves George Bernard Shaw and hates pop culture, especially superheroes. Then he gets exposed to radioactive waste and becomes a superhero. The only way to suppress the radiation illness he suffers is to wear the costume of a comic book hero named Count Geiger. Suddenly he's got super strength, fast wound healing, hyper-sensitive hearing, although he can't fly.
Xavier has two people in his life. One is his lover, internationally famous fashion designer Bari, and the other is his teenage nephew, Michael, known as The Mick, who is living with Xavier while his parents are working in a relief centre in Afghanistan. The Mick is a pop culture officianado with a teenager's reactive attitude towards authority and parenting, even when it comes from his favourite (only) uncle.
The novel tells the story of how radioactive waste material was disposed of by a dodgy company and dumped in a local creek. That's where Xavier was exposed. But the same company also disposed of a medical radiation machine which was later stolen from the warehouse where it was dumped, then sold to a local scrap metal reclaimer who opened it and exposed his family and others to the deadly radioactive cesium inside. Count Geiger goes into action to track down the path of disposal and find justice for the dying families, as well as for himself.
Along the way the relationship with Bari rises and falls according to Xavier's handling of his own life. And he slowly comes to appreciate The Mick and his teenage attraction to his favourite rock band, 'Smite Them Hip and Thigh'.
It's a work of absurdist humour that morphs into dark satire and ends with a dose of human reality. The ending is such that people will say, "I didn't see that coming" or "yeah, that was predictable".