Stranger in My Skin [Paperback]

Alysa Phillips (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 1, 2006

Can you imagine cutting away bits of wrist skin with a toenail clipper until it meets the tender sheath of the vein? Alysa Phillips can. This young author, who became entangled with a menacing boyfriend, his cult-leader father, and the deranged vagabond who kidnapped Elizabeth Smart, helps us understand such bizarre acts of harm to one s own body. Growing up in a conventional Utah town with an exacting father who even counts the family's food, she later becomes involved with a polygamous cult and tries to cope with her various traumas through self-mutilation. You can check out a video intro to the book at: http://blip.tv/file/213649

Editorial Reviews

Review

Even after years of listening to stories of childhood abuse and sexual assault, reading this intelligent young author's intimate psychological journey took me to a deeper understanding. It was a Being John Malkovich experience, a sensation that made it difficult to put the book down, as though her life continued while I was away and I wanted to be there in case she needed me. It felt that intimate. Any reader of Stranger in My Skin will gain an understanding of the phenomenon of self-injury and experience the shattering of some of its popular myths. The author's incredible tenacity to educate herself, work emotionally, and break her silence with written word, is an impeccable depiction of how survivors describe being drawn to follow their soul's way. - --Dena Bohn, Psy.D., L.P.

Sometimes, every once in a while, a book is born from bravery. These are the books that hug our hearts, embrace our souls and make us human. Stranger in My Skin is such a book. --Front Street Reviews

About the Author

Alysa Phillips holds a B.A. in journalism from Brigham YoungUniversity. She has set up house in Alaska, Arizona, Massachusetts, and Utah. At 27, Alysa attends graduate school at Emerson College. She and her husband live in Boston.

Product Details

• Paperback: 300 pages
• Publisher: Word Warriors Press, LLC (September 1, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0974694029
• ISBN-13: 978-0974694023
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5.2 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,560,241 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Gripping Work of Emotional Honesty, November 7, 2006

By 

Elaina - See all my reviews

This review is from: Stranger in My Skin (Paperback)

As a somewhat-former cutter, I've read all (that I know of) the available memoirs about cutting, and this one is probably the best. The author describes vividly the feelings that have led her to cut, and I found that her words mirrored my own feelings and experiences. In addition, Alysa is just generally a great writer, putting phrases together beautifully and elegantly. It's a pleasure to read well-written literary nonfiction, even if the topic is a difficult one.

I would recommend this book for people who've come from rigid backgrounds and struggle with cutting. You'll see yourself often in the book. As always, of course, make sure you're in a safe place when you read the book in case you find parts of it triggering. I would also recommend this book for those who want to understand the people they love or care about who struggle with cutting.

Although the author doesn't offer a perfect, neat and tidy ending (is that kind of ending even real, anyway?), she does offer solidarity and hope that we all can begin to make better choices that lead us away from the pain we've been unwittingly subjected to.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Reviewed by Barb Radmore, January 25, 2007

By 

Front Street Reviews www.frontstreetreviews.com - See all my reviews

This review is from: Stranger in My Skin (Paperback)

Sometimes a book is born from a creative need, from a story caught in a head, a fantasy world that needs to be released. Sometimes a book comes from facts to be taught or a point to be made. And sometimes, every once in a while, a book is born from bravery. These are books that exemplify the power of words, of the sharing of an experience to both release and capture. These are the books that hug our hearts, embrace our souls and make us human. Stranger in my Skin is such a book.

Stranger in my Skin weaves it way through the life of a young woman. Back and forth through time and place Alysa Philips shares the story of her battle for survival. As the child of a Mormon family with a strict, harsh father and yielding mother she grew up in an environment she describes in terms that seem both commonplace and extreme. Her father counts the food his family eats and the gas they use with no exceptions. Her mother accepts this and adds her own brand of rigidity. It is from this background that she meets Joel, the man who will come to haunt her every minute for, what seems like now, forever. Joel is the son of a self identified doctor- a man who believes God has shared only with him the secrets to cure all disease. He uses his sons to help sell this idea of lymphnogenesis (not the real name) . His fervor forms the cult that entraps Alysa into a life of starvation, violence and rigidity.

Joel convinces her that she is ugly, unacceptable and unwanted. He and his cult family control every move of Alysa Her mother refuses to speak to her, "Instead, she emailed me or copied inspirational thoughts and scriptures onto pink cards, decorated them with stickers and left them in my shoes, under my pillow, or in my backpack. Her small notes added pounds to my backpack after I found them, but I never had the courage to throw them away." Alysa is alone to cope with the overwhelming stress of trying to measure up to the impossible as judged by the immovable. Her mother, doctors and teachers all ignore the obvious resluts of this strain, the bruises and cuts. With more strength than she ever gives herself credit for in this memoir, Alysa is able to leave Joel. Even though he continues to contact her and tries to see her, she is able to stay away. She begins a series of moves as she looks for a place that will be the answer to her search for relief, small town Arizona to Alaska and back. But the pain follows at every step in her journey; it can not be left behind.

This pain and fear in her life oozes out in the blood of her body as she self-injures. She explains she has "cut, burned, gouged and otherwise mutilated more than two hundred times." This is a powerful look at the world that engulfs her in confusion and panic. As she attempts to find out how to cope in a world seems to ignore her drowning, self mutilation becomes her tool for survival. In graphic descriptions Alysa Phillips has the courage to share her struggle though the fog and terror.

The poignant chapter, Afterword, gives a glimpse into the present, the world that still engulfs Alysa today as she tries to organize the past. The realization that she lived in the same cult with the nomadic pair David and Elidah- who becomes the infamous pair that kidnapped and held Elizabeth Smart- is a hard fact for the reader . It is interesting that Alysa does not use any of the true names of the cult or cult members to avoid a potential legal issue, which is telling in itself. The world protects the abusers but at what price to their victims, both past and future.

This book is a triumphant gift that shares its questions and fears with us. It will find its way to those who will see themselves in its pages, those that will find solace through familiarity. Self-mutilation, self-injury is no longer a hidden secret, Alysa Phillips has brought it from darkness to the front and center of society's consciousness. And in the glaring daylight it can be faced.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An emotionally overwhelming testimony that cannot be put down., November 5, 2006

By 

Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Stranger in My Skin (Paperback)

Stranger In My Skin is the true-life memoir of author Alysa Phillips, whose adolescence in a conventional Utah town turned dark and oppressive due to her controlling father and her involvement with a threatening boyfriend and his cult-leader father. The physical, sexual, and emotional abuse she suffered in her childhood left long lasting scars that simple "geographic cures" of moving herself from one place to another could not heal. Post-traumatic stress syndrome from the horrors she experienced drove her to mutilate herself and attempt suicide. Her survivor's story of a long, slow struggle toward the semblance of a normal life is an emotionally overwhelming testimony that cannot be put down.