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When I went to High School in Kansas I soon learned that an author had gone to the same one as me. After a few years, I found Scott Heim's first book "Mysterious Skin". I read it and it was like a punch in the chest. The story takes place in my community and amongst the people I thought I knew. I also share the same sexuality as the main character. I found the book to be a sweet and painful release to the suffering I've gone through in this state of Kansas. The hurt and horror of this book was all to familiar. Heim's words and language, his graphic paintings of reality, and his twists of beauty and perversity pour out onto the pages of this unworldy novel. Don't expect to read it and pass it off. His books will live in your memory for a long time. To take his work to heart is to look at this world with wider eyes. Definately, this book is a must. Even though the book hurts so much to read and you will want to put it away, you can't. And in the end, through the horror, you will see the beauty of his work.

Ich find das Buch echt toll. Es ist auch nicht all zu schwer zu verstehen. Die Story an sich is echt interessant. Es wird mehr oder weniger das Leben von zwei (oder mehr?) Menschen beschrieben. Und ich find das Leben andere Menschen einfach faszinierent.

The honesty of this novel through its fierce imagery and changing narrative left me with a lump in the back of my throat. It has the effect of passing through a car accident: you are captivated and horrified at the same time as events unfold themselves to you. His juxtaposition of the disturbingly dangerous erotic encounters of one main character and the almost sterile sexlessness of the other provides a wonderful balance and an insight as to how two human minds are affected forever by a common childhood molestation. The almost polar obsessions that form as these two boys grow up don't pit one character as the moral superior of the other, but creates an empathy from the reader for these two souls as they drift through events from which they consciously or subconciously are looking for answers. The climax of the novel is almost anticlimactic in that their meeting again is inevitable but Heim's magic of language, metaphor, and imagery creates a powerful scene as these characters finally look to each other for the truth. For the author to weave a story around such daring subject matter was bold enough, but to create such dualing forces throughout the novel (desire vs. love; reality vs. fiction; Kansas vs. New York) without going to extremes or stereotypes drew me in.

I had trouble starting Mysterious Skin as for some reason, I was confused by the narrative so I automatically assumed it was a fairly perfunctory read. However, half way into the novel I was pleasantly suprised. Heim has written a lyrical, beautiful and quite eloquent first novel and the suject matter of chilhood molestaton and the subsequent denial certainly packs a wallop! I loved Heim's use of similie and metaphor and his descriptions of the natural landscape of Kansas are breathtaking and wonderfully realised. He captures the constant eb and flow of the world that Brian and Neil wonder in; a world that keeps them a prisoner. This novel makes you change the way you view the world. Also fascinating is the portrayal of small town life and the adolescent gay angst that builds up in such a small "close" community. I too grew up in a small community so I could definitely relate to many of Brian's and Neil's yearnings, frustrations and fears. The time period - the early 1980's - the age of "new wave" music, dyed hair, back mascara etc, encapsulates and captures the isolationism and loneliness of growing up being "different" in a small, provincial community. Heim is also an expert at bringing the different narrative threads together and he keeps us guessing right up to the climax of the novel where Brian and Neil meet and confront the horrific childhood injustices done to them. Life in Mysterious Skin is hard, gritty, realistic - witness Neil's sexual escapades in Manhattan towards the end of the novel. This is gay New York at its best and the author shows his keen eye for understanding and observing the wilder, racier side of gay life. Heim never compromises and weaves a wonderful tapestry of mid western life with remarkable candor. A great piece of work and one of the best gay novels to encapsulate the trials and tribulations of small town life. This is a gay novel that not only deals with serious issues but also portrays the all enveloping angst of a disenfanchised generation. I await more work with eagerness!

Terrific! Why isn't this book a movie? I loved the ending and it was sad and important and I wished it could have gone on a little longer. But it's still a 5-star book. Great cover too!