Skin Lane [Paperback]

Neil Bartlett (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 22, 2007

At 47, Mr. F's working life on London's Skin Lane is one governed by calm, precision and routine. So, when he starts to have frightening, recurring nightmares, he does his best to ignore them. The images that appear in his dream are disturbing - Mr. F can't for the life of him think where they have come from. After all, he's a perfectly ordinary middle-aged man. As London's crooked backstreets begin to swelter in the long, hot summer of 1967, Mr. F's nightmare becomes an obsession. A chance encounter adds a face to the body that nightly haunts him, and the torments of his sweat-drenched nights lead him - and the reader - deeper into a terrifying labyrinth of rage, desire and shame. Part fairy-tale, part compelling evocation of a now-lost London, Nell Bartlett's long-awaited third novel is his fiercest piece of writing yet: cruel, erotic, and tender.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Starred Review. British author Bartlett (Mr. Clive and Mr. Page) deserves to win acclaim on this side of the Atlantic for this complex and rich journey into the heart of a lonely man, framed as a bedtime story. Mr. Freeman (aka Mr. F), a 46-year-old fur-skinner, has worked in the same office at the same job in a quiet London backwater for 33 years. Then, in early January 1967, he starts to have disturbing dreams that feature the nude corpse of an attractive young man. Soon after, his boss's teenage nephew, who's never named, comes into the business as Mr. F's apprentice. After realizing that the nephew resembles the body in his nightmares, Mr. F. finds himself sexually attracted to another person for the first time—an attraction that soon escalates into dangerous obsession. With loving detail, Bartlett brings Mr. F's workplace effortlessly to life. This remarkable novel's images and characters will linger long in the reader's memory. (Nov.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

Review

"'A writer who can really change the way people think' Literary Review 'If he can do this with his first novel, what heights will his fourth or fifth reach?' Ruth Rendell, Sunday Times 'Stands head-and-shoulders above any British or American gay novel to have appeared in several years' Gay Times 'A strange, yet perfectly poised tale of male sexual longing and violent fantasy, with a chilling whodunnit at its core' Mail on Sunday 'Neil Bartlett's second novel establishes him among English fiction's flercest historians of gay male suffering' Independent 'A curious and original novel that is compulsively readable' Observer"

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 320 pages
• Publisher: Serpents Tail (March 22, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1852429194
• ISBN-13: 978-1852429195
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.4 x 1.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,657,175 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Neil Bartlett was born in 1958. He works as a theatre and opera director as well as an author. His work in the theatre includes productions for the RSC, the National and the Royal Court as well as several controversial solo performance pieces. From 1994-2005 he was Artistic Director of the Lyric Hammersmith in London; in 2000 he was awarded an OBE for his work in the theatre. Neil's first book, Who Was That Man? was a groundbreaking re-assessment of Oscar Wilde.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Living in the Aorist Mood, Never the Progressive, April 3, 2009

By 

interested_observer "interested_observer" (San Francisco, CA USA) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Skin Lane (Paperback)

Having enjoyed the author's "Ready to Catch Him Should He Fall", I read "Skin Lane" and enjoyed it as well, even though the settings and premises are very different. Neil Bartlett can bring all sorts of situations to life.

"Skin Lane"'s protagonist is Mr. Freeman, known around the shop as Mr. F., who was born around 1920, joined the M. Scheiner Ltd. fur manufacturing firm in the City of London on Skin Lane as a sweeper and rose to be the Head Cutter by 1967, the date of the events of the story. Mr. F. takes furry animal skins, chops them up to remove most traces of the individual animals and to allow others to reassemble the pieces into a fur garment that the wearer enlivens. Mr. F. lives alone in a London apartment south of the Thames.

Mr. F.'s life was like a vinyl record. There were five identical tracks for Monday through Friday, followed by two tracks for Saturday and Sunday with broken grooves allowing some slight variations. Play the record one week and then play the same record the next. He became absolutely identified with his profession, and I mean absolutely.

Mr. F. starts having a repeating dream about finding a nude youth hanging upside down, bound by his ankles, in Mr. F.'s home bathroom. In his dream, Mr. F. starts out by screaming, waking Mr. F. After months of repetition, Mr. F. brings himself to interact slightly with the body, without ever making out the body's face. In waking life, Mr. F. finds himself obsessing over the dream.

Long after the dreams start, Maurice Scheiner, the owner of the firm, announces that his sixteen-year old nephew, Ralph Scheiner, will work at the firm as a sweeper in the sewing machine area. After a brief stay there, Ralph is assigned to Mr. F. to learn about cutting the furs for later stitching. The suspicion around the shop is that Ralph will rotate around the various departments and eventually run the firm.

Even though Ralph is compliant with the procedures of the cutting department, Mr. F. regards him as a nuisance. Ralph does learn a reasonable amount and does work hard. Unlike Mr. F., Ralph has a sense of personal growth and advancement over time and a sense of the possibilities of relationships.

Then, after months of working together, Mr. F. connects a skin tone, body type, and gesture of Ralph's with the corpse of the dream. When Mr. F. shifts gears and goes out of his way to avoid Ralph, the dream relationship gets more animated, and Mr. F. starts keeping a furtive eye on Ralph from afar.

When Ralph gets into a situation that brings him closer to Mr. F., the story moves to a climax and follow-up where the extent of Mr. F.'s obsession is revealed.

The author does a fine job of bringing his characters to life. Ralph and the other workers at the furrier are quite vivid. There is a fun interlude involving the making of a fur coat for someone's mistress. Mr. F. tries not to be vivid or fun, but the author keeps Mr. F. having to react to changes of routine.

The omniscient narrator comes up with a misleading one paragraph summary of Mr. F.'s plight: "Mr. F., you see, is realizing that he has never lived in the present tense before." (Page 274 of the paperback) Mr. F. could comfortably say, "I go to work every weekday", "This is how one cuts fur", and "This is how we interact." These statements are all in the present tense. What Mr. F. has trouble saying is, "I am going to work today", "I am working on my methods", "I am feeling". Mr. F.'s vinyl record is destined never to change, grow, improve, or feel. It is always and only in the timeless present. If there is too much pressure on a record, it breaks. Then one could go out and get a new one.

Mr. F. is a sad, limited man put under pressures he can't understand. "Skin Lane" is a good book to read.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars "Mr F, You See, Is Realizing That He Has Never Lived In The Present Tense Before.", February 2, 2009

By 

H. F. Corbin "Foster Corbin" (ATLANTA, GA USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Skin Lane (Paperback)

When I finished this novel, I thought of Leonard Matlovich, who was discharged from the military in 1975, after having served in Vietnam and being honored with a Purple Heart, because he came out to his superiors. I remember his saying in TIME magazine, where he made the cover of and which I still own, that he reached adulthood without ever having touched another human being in a moment of either love or passion. That is precisely the plight of Mr. F., the central character of Neil Bartlett's newest novel, someone that I grew weary of at times but who haunts me since I finished the book. Mr. F., a little like a Kafka character and who must have been the cousin at least of the Beatles' Eleanor Rigby since he is all about loneliness, is 46 when we meet him in London in 1967, has been a Head Cutter at the same furrier business for 33 years, has the same routine both at home and work that he seldom deviates from, wears the same brown suit to work every day and takes the same route, stopping to buy the morning paper on the way, and, in the words of the narrator who speaks often to the reader, has a body "well preserved, but largely unused."

Mr. F-- that stands for Freeman-- sees his world turned topsyturvy when the owner of the company's sixteen-year-old nephew Ralph Scheiner, swaggers into his work area to learn the furrier trade from this master instructor. Mr. F's dilemma is that Ralph whom the women in the building have nicknamed "Beauty" is, to paraphrase Dolly Parton, handsomer than a body has a right to and well aware of it. Ralph also is the spitting image of the naked man who has been haunting Mr. F in his recurring nightmares. The cat-and-mouse game played between Mr. F and Beauty provides the tension in this little novel as Mr. F instructs the boy in the delicate precision of slicing animal pelts to make expensive furs for miladies and sometimes tart-types.

What keeps this novel from being better-- and there are a lot of things to like about it-- is that the author cannot decide if SKIN LANE will be a taut psychological thriller or a novel about a sad, lonely but sympathetic man who in mid-life looks into the mirror and sees a "old, ugly and confused" man who has neither loved or been loved. It seems to me that Mr. Bartlett cannot have it both ways. Mr. F is no Tom Ripley, a character whom I love reading about but would certainly never sympathize with, so the writers for the jacket blurb are wrong when they compare Bartlett's fiction to that of Patricia Highsmith.

Enough sour-graping. Mr. Bartlett can wax most lyrical, particularly in his descriptions of London at night; and you have to like a man who makes a verb out of "cuff-link." And he will tell you more than you probably ever wanted to know about the furrier business. Mr. Barlett also wrote READY TO CATCH HIM SHOULD HE FALL, a very fine novel indeed, although this one is certainly worth your time and effort. The climax will take your breath; the ending will break your heart. Unfortunately the world is full of far too many Mr. F's who watch the world go by from their windows.

4.0 out of 5 stars deep slowly simmering psychological suspense thriller, November 4, 2008

By 

Harriet Klausner - See all my reviews
(#1 Hall OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Skin Lane (Paperback)

In London forty-six year old Mr. F is a creature of habit. He has worked at the same place for over three decades never changing his work day routine or for that matter the cut and color of his suit since he bought his first one for the funeral of King George VI. Mr. F. is a private person never altering his routine for instance how he comes and goes from work at Scheiner's or when he arrives or departs never changes and has not since he joined the firm in 1934.

In January 1967, Mr. F. begins to dream of a handsome naked young male corpse. His fantasy disturbs Mr. F., but he is not sure why except he does not like change even when he sleeps. The dream repeats itself several nights in a row. An even more radical change occurs when the boss assigns Mr. F to mentor his sixteen year old nephew Ralph who has not the time or patience for old fogies like his father, uncle or Mr. F. To his shock and obsessive need, Mr. F believes Ralph is the star of his sordid nightmares.

SKIN LANE (aptly named for the fur trade as well as for Mr. F's first time desires for someone else) is a deep slowly simmering psychological suspense thriller. Mr. F. obviously dominates the tale as the audience follows him for a few months while also learning of his past. The support cast enhances understanding of Mr. F., the business and the obsession. Fans will appreciate Neil Bartlett's character driven tale of a middle age loner fixating on his apprentice.

Harriet Klausner