Skinless - Paperback

Lower East Side, NYC, 1999-2001. Fresh from teenage homelessness and trauma, Charmay-velvet-voiced, street-tough-sings to find the self she lost. Struggling to survive the PTSD she calls "Skinless"-and alcohol's grip-she invents a glittering alter ego, Cindy, an elegant, high-earning magnet for power and manipulators. Past and present blur as she slips through the city's underground; three forces converge: a mercurial producer she chases, a hustler-lover she needs to trust, and a Wall Street financier who bets on Cindy, not Charmay-each claws her raw, pulling her toward a different self. Family ties-and a father's silence-pull her toward Cindy; the music pushes her to face Skinless. Pressure builds-hustles collide-masks switch places, tangling her in a web of deceit, control, and longing for intimacy. Cindy makes a play. Beats. Bullets. Bedsheets. When the curtain falls, her choice is stark: wear the mask that kept her alive-or sing in her honest voice and walk into the unknown. Told in Charmay's raw first-person voice, Skinless is razor-taut literary psychological suspense-a portrait of a woman fighting to heal. For readers of The Bell Jar, Just Kids, and literary noir.