It's a very nice book. If it makes a difference to your opinion it was shot many years back and on 4x5.
As for taking the country by storm, it may be a matter of perspective. I was actually having a conversation the other day and we wondered what happened to her recently (not just her, but she was mentioned among photogs we respected but weren't sure how their careers were doing).
The American art world stopped being, primarily, about art in the mid 1980's. Like lots of things in the states, the dealers and middlemen, the nouveau riche collectors, the investors started to drive the market. The more money in the system, the worse it gets, so with every speculative bubble, there is a surge in the market. That is why, since the dot com boom, then the real estate bubble, the gallerists and dealers would try and sell anything that had a smiling bullshit artist (pun) attached, who would be good with buyers, knew which fork to use when eating lobster, carries an Hermes address book and wears sharp suits. Lost in this surge of crap were real artists like Katy G. They rose, then faded as the business side lost interest, and their money. The photo market suffered a real bubble as it displaced painting as the art form of choice, mainly because its all figurative. Painters were displaced, and many good ones were passed over. Remember Sicily Brown? She took the art world by storm in the late 90's, then was displaced by photography as the "it" medium.
All of my fine art friends moved to Europe, because its not boom and bust. Its a longer healthier career. Nan Golden would be dead if she still lived in the US.
