Stan Kaminski, a down-on-his-luck Polish immigrant, tries to scratch out an existence in 1990s New York City while avoiding the colorful, nefarious characters he encounters at every turn.
When Stan is asked by one of Manhattan’s wealthiest landlords to find a lost woman, he refuses at first. But money lures him in. As Stan searches for the brilliant but troubled Charmaine, he becomes ensnared in a waking nightmare full of mystery, multiple murders and the sword of a serial killer.
“The Skinny” is about the conflicts that come with change as one New York vanishes and another appears to take its place. It explores the constant struggle between the rich and the poor, how the addicted mind battles itself for answers, the way one mystery is solved only to open the door to another, and what hope actually means.
The evils of Gilles de Rais make their way into the plot of “The Skinny.”
Some years ago I co-authored a book with Dr. Helen Morrison called “My Life Among The Serial Killers.” Dr. Morrison is kind of like the real life Clarice from “Silence of the Lambs,” except she is a doctor and a lawyer. During that book, we wrote psychological profiles of serial killers from the past.
The story of Gilles de Rais, who fought alongside Joan of Arc, had a lasting effect on me. For research, I read a translation of his trial by the Catholic Church. It was tough going, shocking, and because his violence was against children, his misdeeds kept me up at night. Even during the day when I read what de Rais had done, I had to take a break to go to Bar 6 around the corner from my apartment at the time.
He used a short, sharp sword called a braquemard. That antique sword is important to the story I tell in “The Skinny.” There’s a twist regarding the blade that I hope you don’t see coming. I think that’s why Christopher Byrd, who writes for The New Yorker, said “The Skinny is a book about flawed, vulnerable people that is by turns open-hearted and wised-up. Its twists are unexpected, its ending lands just right.”
New York City is full of dead bodies, everywhere.
I’m certainly not the first to say that New York City is a dark character in my book. Stan Kaminski, my flawed sleuth, feels the grit and grossness of 1990s New York with every step he takes. He hates the smell of Macanudo cigars, big with the newly rich at that time in history. He worries that a rat might bite him if he falls asleep on the street while waiting to find Charmaine Kasimierz, a troubled but super-smart young woman who finds late winter in the city too much to take.
In my research, I found New York City to be full of dead bodies. Depending upon whom you ask, there are 10,000 to 20,000 bodies buried under Washington Square Park, and a violent scene in “The Skinny” occurs there, within the fabled Washington Square Park arch. In the 1800s, Corlears Hook Park along the East River was rife with malaria, violence and murder. Even recently, a car plowing through the park on July 4th killed four people. In “The Skinny,” Stan feels like he’ll be murdered in the park, and he has reason to think that way. And a scene in a small Irish cemetery in Queens leads Stan to think about his life in Krakow, and how he once slept on the one of the graves in a Jewish cemetery because he felt he had nowhere else to go, and maybe nothing to live for.
New York City, often beautiful and magnificent in the sunlight, is called the greatest city in the world. But at night, or even on a windswept, rainy afternoon, everything and everyone in New York can feel foreboding, from the rustling of a bird in a bush to footsteps trailing behind you, even if they’re a few steps away.
How video games were an inspiration, like Sam Lake’s Alan Wake series.
Video games can inspire the plots for books. During the day, I write reviews and features about games as a columnist for the New York Times. So the idea of immersion I felt in the better game narratives crept into my story. The dark nature of New York City is partially inspired by Sam Lake’s frightening Alan Wake horror series. While “The Skinny” is not a horror story per se, it has that Sam Lake vibe. Lake himself is inspired by everything David Lynch, so much so that many photos show him drinking coffee, like FBI Agent Dale Cooper in “Twin Peaks.”
From the first paragraph in “The Skinny” onward, I hope readers will feel that Sam Lake/David Lynch vibe. In fact, many of my Instagram posts feature music by Angelo Badalamenti. It’s the right music.
There’s a nod to Grant Theft Auto as well. Later in the book, there’s a frantic car chase that begins across the river from Manhattan in Jersey City. It’s fraught and it’s frantic, and it’s inspired by the minds at Rockstar Games.
I was influenced, too, by L.A. Noire, another game published by Rockstar. When that game was released in 2011, it felt like you were deep in a sometimes grimy, always sunny Los Angeles where everyone seems on the take, from bad cops to horrible politicians.
Another inspiration was Walter Mosley’s vivid “Devil in a Blue Dress” novel, in which every character, even those who exist only on one page, were wonderfully rendered. I mention that here because I hope that memorable piece of print fiction is turned into a game at some point in the future.
Polish Culture is so deep and compelling.
As Stan Kaminski moves through downtown New York City’s underbelly, one constant is Polish culture. This Polish immigrant is on a mission to find Charmaine, a young woman who’s dealt with some very bad people. The horrible sight of a school-age child being attacked by a falcon makes Stan think of folktales and myths that were even more violent than the Grimm Brothers could conceive. But generally, Stan sees things through the lens of all things Polish, like pop music from polkas to Bobby Vinton. He uses the words of his mother country for emphasis. He likes New York, but he wishes he could be in Poland.
The East Village was a bastion for Polish (and Ukrainian) immigrants from the mid-20th century onward until the 1990s. It was a tight knit enclave. By the time Stan begins his sketchy work for a rich Polish landlord, Poles (and Puerto Ricans) were being driven out of Manhattan by the high real estate prices that come with gentrification.
Stan salivates over Polish food like pierogi and sausage at his favorite East Village bar on Avenue A, and he has a soft spot for Bertha, the old, baseball bat wielding woman who runs the bar.
Before arriving in 1990’s New York City, Stan worked security for the Polish movement Solidarity, particularly for Polish union leader Lech Walesa. But he has nightmares about something his wife almost unwittingly did that made him leave Poland, shaken and embarrassed. While Stan’s English isn’t the greatest, he knows his culture well from the greatest authors to the dazzling salt mine sculptures in Wieliczka.
I didn’t think it would be, but going small was the way to go.
“The Skinny” is an immigration story and bigotry is a sad, pervasive fact here. It’s told from the perspective of someone for whom English is a second language. I think you’ll find some beauty in the writing and in the characters you meet.
But two of the bigger publishers wanted me to change Stan, the narrator, so that the occasional Polish word wasn’t used. If I did that, the book would be published in a bigger way. That, in itself, felt prejudiced, at least to me. So I put my draft in a drawer. Eventually, Measure Publishing asked if I had done any fiction. They liked “The Skinny” as it was written. But I polished up the draft a few times before it went to press. I had input on everything from the cover to the kind of paper that would be used to the number of books in the first run. The contract was structured so that royalties are much more than the going rate, and they will come sooner rather than later.
This is the beginning of what I hope will be a trilogy. I like Stan Kaminski as a nuanced character, and I feel there can be more books written through his eyes. But the second book will be told from the perspective of Charmaine Kasimierz – because her real story will be even more compelling than the Charmaine which Stan has so carefully observed.
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Harold Goldberg has written for the New York Times, The New York Times Book Review, Vanity Fair, Esquire, Boys’ Life and elsewhere. His narrative history of games is “All Your Base Are Belong to Us (How 50 Years of Videogames Conquered Pop Culture)” Random House, and he co-wrote the bestselling “My Life Among the Serial Killers” (Morrow) with Dr. Helen Morrison. “The Skinny” is his first novel.
