For Teens - Skin
The Age
Saturday March 4, 2006
BOOK REVIEW: Skin A.M. Vrettos Egmont, $14.95
DEATH COMES EARLY IN Skin: it's there to confront us on the first page of this desperately sad young-adult novel. Sixteen-year-old Karen has starved herself to the point of collapse, and she is so small she "looks like she could fold into a paper cup".It is her 14-year-old brother Donnie who, as narrator, uses this stark simile, and Skin is his story as much as Karen's. Against the backdrop of their parents' fracturing marriage, both Karen and Donnie start to disappear. As Karen becomes physically smaller, Donnie feels that he is becoming invisible. "This is happening to me too, you know," he tells his mother.Karen's legacy to Donnie is a command to "know thyself". The novel attempts to provide relief from its bleakness by allowing Donnie to discover and assert himself, and thus make himself visible again.By focusing on Donnie rather than Karen, A.M. Vrettos has avoided the impossible task of getting inside her anorexic character's head, realising perhaps that she could never explain the inexplicable. There is even a set-piece where Karen, in clunky dialogue, pronounces that there is no single, clear-cut reason why an individual becomes anorexic. Nevertheless, there is a disturbing implication underlying some parts of the novel that the family difficulties are causing Karen's illness.This isn't the only false note that Vrettos strikes. Donnie's narrative voice is sometimes too naive, sometimes too knowing. But Skin is a moving novel, with some powerful scenes and effective use of language.
© 2006 The Age