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gregisdead121_ 's review for:
Mysterious Skin
by Scott Heim
Mysterious skin:
I first came upon this story through its indie cult adaptation by Greg Akari. Unaware of it's premise I was hit with a sledge hammer of emotion,this delicate bright vibrant film somehow delivered devastation as mediation on memory. The film though beautifully adapted and amongst my favorite I've ever seen ,is one I haven't been able to rewatch. And I think that will be the same with this novel .
Scott Heim is a very gifted writer. Writing with the scarcity of a Hemmingway scholar with a penchant for diaristic excess. His concept of telling this rather somber bildungsroman through a multitude of perspectives is one of my favorite things about this book. It gives it the opportunity to explore a complex and harrowing experience and consequence through a myriad of lenses. Which is fortunately adeptly rendered through distinct personable points of view which help piece through uninformed or forcefully forgetful ,observations of the ruins of two vastly different men who at 8 were broken the same way.
I also love how brave this book is. Part of the reason this story has had the effect on me that it's had is because of its unprecedented honest when confronting it's topic (which though often explored in the post Metoo world isn't in this depth)and not being afraid to go to dark places. And by dark places I don't mean recounting nauseatingly violent sexual assault scenes in unnecessary detail but instead focusing on the consequences.
The multiple points of view are best used in telling both Brian's and Neil's parallel journeys with trauma. From Brian's sci-fi mystery that seeks to find an extraterrestrial reason for the unaccounted hours of his childhood, who's journey is trying to remember to Neil's debauched self mutilation as he tries to make himself forget what he wishes he wouldn't remember . One story is a perfect tail of traumas ability to embed itself within your body but hide from your mind. It's a story that impacted me deeply as I'd gone through similar circumstances (not childhood sexual assault but a violent reoccurring familial event ) and would often have these slivers of moments- a fist, blood,crying, food- then just tell myself they were something else: a dream,a memory of something I'd seen on TV. I'd always default to making it not real until one day I had asked my sister about it and her face for a second lit up in excited shock before confirming sadly that it did happen. That she also had thought it had been a weird dream. But it hadn't. Scott Heim captured that journey with a frank perspective I feel has to have come from his own life because no one can write so eloquent about this phenomenon without being informed somehow, I refuse to believe it.
The second main story is one of stagnation, living within the awful. Not forgetting it but instead trying to master it. Recklessness, self mutilation, regret and desire. Never have I read a book where the victim whilst victimized had gentle relationship with their abuser. Where with time the victim knows what happened was wrong but doesn't know how to want anything else, FUCK! Like just fuck! Watching this want become an impetus disposition for the victim to copy the abuser is the greatest tragedy of this whole book. It's the moments I almost stopped reading entirely. But once read were the most worthwhile.
And it's not difficult to see the point of this story isn't about overcoming, getting better, a beginning leading to a satisfactory end. But about as the title, mysterious skin ,suggests coming to terms with the experiences encoded into our bodies. Discovering the mysteries beneath the skin . And as it often is for many of us- not solving them.
I don't know ,I fucking love this story :the film &especially this book. It's such an honest depiction of childhood and adolescence, of living with trauma, of survival . And I've never cared for such a perplexing array of people the way I did here. I will definitely never reread this but God will it be amongst my favorite.
I first came upon this story through its indie cult adaptation by Greg Akari. Unaware of it's premise I was hit with a sledge hammer of emotion,this delicate bright vibrant film somehow delivered devastation as mediation on memory. The film though beautifully adapted and amongst my favorite I've ever seen ,is one I haven't been able to rewatch. And I think that will be the same with this novel .
Scott Heim is a very gifted writer. Writing with the scarcity of a Hemmingway scholar with a penchant for diaristic excess. His concept of telling this rather somber bildungsroman through a multitude of perspectives is one of my favorite things about this book. It gives it the opportunity to explore a complex and harrowing experience and consequence through a myriad of lenses. Which is fortunately adeptly rendered through distinct personable points of view which help piece through uninformed or forcefully forgetful ,observations of the ruins of two vastly different men who at 8 were broken the same way.
I also love how brave this book is. Part of the reason this story has had the effect on me that it's had is because of its unprecedented honest when confronting it's topic (which though often explored in the post Metoo world isn't in this depth)and not being afraid to go to dark places. And by dark places I don't mean recounting nauseatingly violent sexual assault scenes in unnecessary detail but instead focusing on the consequences.
The multiple points of view are best used in telling both Brian's and Neil's parallel journeys with trauma. From Brian's sci-fi mystery that seeks to find an extraterrestrial reason for the unaccounted hours of his childhood, who's journey is trying to remember to Neil's debauched self mutilation as he tries to make himself forget what he wishes he wouldn't remember . One story is a perfect tail of traumas ability to embed itself within your body but hide from your mind. It's a story that impacted me deeply as I'd gone through similar circumstances (not childhood sexual assault but a violent reoccurring familial event ) and would often have these slivers of moments- a fist, blood,crying, food- then just tell myself they were something else: a dream,a memory of something I'd seen on TV. I'd always default to making it not real until one day I had asked my sister about it and her face for a second lit up in excited shock before confirming sadly that it did happen. That she also had thought it had been a weird dream. But it hadn't. Scott Heim captured that journey with a frank perspective I feel has to have come from his own life because no one can write so eloquent about this phenomenon without being informed somehow, I refuse to believe it.
The second main story is one of stagnation, living within the awful. Not forgetting it but instead trying to master it. Recklessness, self mutilation, regret and desire. Never have I read a book where the victim whilst victimized had gentle relationship with their abuser. Where with time the victim knows what happened was wrong but doesn't know how to want anything else, FUCK! Like just fuck! Watching this want become an impetus disposition for the victim to copy the abuser is the greatest tragedy of this whole book. It's the moments I almost stopped reading entirely. But once read were the most worthwhile.
And it's not difficult to see the point of this story isn't about overcoming, getting better, a beginning leading to a satisfactory end. But about as the title, mysterious skin ,suggests coming to terms with the experiences encoded into our bodies. Discovering the mysteries beneath the skin . And as it often is for many of us- not solving them.
I don't know ,I fucking love this story :the film &especially this book. It's such an honest depiction of childhood and adolescence, of living with trauma, of survival . And I've never cared for such a perplexing array of people the way I did here. I will definitely never reread this but God will it be amongst my favorite.