Likewise, literary scholars Marion Gymnich and Alexandre Segao Costa write that, in 'Isserley's view of the world, human beings have the status of cattle, and the way the men caught by Isserley are treated by the aliens can be read as a cultural-critical metadiscourse the way human beings treat animals in the meat industry' (2006, 85). This dimension falls into a long tradition of ethical and epistemological questioning of the human in science fiction, as pointed out by Sarah Dillon (2011, 134) in a thoughtful close reading of Under the Skin. It really is difficult not to read this strange, sci-fi story without detecting its political relevance. The protagonist, Isserley, is an alien surgically modified to look like a woman her job is to pick up male hitch-hikers in the byways of Scotland, only to transport them to a remote farm where they are castrated and fattened before being slaughtered and sent, as a specialty food, to the aliens' distant homeland. There's more than enough in these pages to sate the appetite of scholars of gender studies, post-humanism, animal studies, and ecocriticism. A planet collapsing under the weight of large-scale technological exploitation, here set against the pristine beauty of the Scottish Highlands? Check. A poignant critique of the mass killing of animals in the meat industry? Check. A story of physical mutilation and queer body image? Check. A female protagonist struggling with gender stereotypes and male violence in an underprivileged, rural setting? Check. At first blush, Michel Faber's debut novel, Under the Skin, reads like a post-structuralist paradise. The fantastic is so nicely played against the day-to-day that one feels the strangeness of both.

Under the Skin is a shocking and fantastical take on modern humanity * * The Week * *

It is audacious, fascinating, repellent and quite unlike anything I have ever read * * Mail on Sunday * * Recalling writers such as Jim Crace and Russell Hoban, Under the Skin, like Faber's short stories, is an extremely assured and imaginative work * * Observer * *Īstonishingly, this is Michel Faber's first novel. Would that more first novels were as adventurous or as funky and daring in their conception * * Independent on Sunday * *Ī brilliantly compressed drama of threat and ambiguity. Teases and prods the reader up a plethora of literary blind alleys before hauling them screaming towards its final, thrilling destination * * Daily Telegraph * * This is a man who could give Conrad a run at writing the perfect sentence * * Guardian * * Faber writes superbly * * Sunday Times * * Michel Faber is a masterly writer - David Mitchell One of the best-orchestrated reveals in modern British fiction. A wonderful book - painful, lyrical, frightening, brilliant.

Michel faber under the skin review