In Rueben Dass’ Skin, Alysha, known more commonly as Aly, leads a successful career as an investigator, achieving her childhood dream and following her father’s footsteps. Suddenly, Aly and her partner Raj come face-to-face with their hardest case yet — solving a series of murders in Kuala Lumpur that are leaving young women brutally abused and skinned alive. Together the detective duo try to stop this evasive killer before they claim more victims.
Readers follow along Aly’s daily life, getting occasional glimpses into moments from other perspectives. Even when perspectives switch, the flow of the story is not disturbed thanks to Dass’ smooth transitions. The story is primarily told from Aly’s point of view, though in certain, mostly lighthearted moments, it will switch to someone else in the room. These instances emphasize how much Aly’s peers care for her.
One of the reasons Aly is so well-liked is her strong personality. She’s confident in her work, and she’s a go-getter, never hesitating to put herself in danger to keep others safe. However, she faces her own struggles, suffering from insomnia and panic attacks. Other characters in the story are just as layered and well developed like the serial killer. Although it doesn’t excuse their actions, learning about how they became this way and analyzing it together with Aly allows readers to feel a mix of emotions from pity to hatred.
The novel covers lots of ground, keeping readers engaged throughout all the various developments. Dass excels at providing just the right amount of details to immerse readers in the scene, while leaving room for imagination. This also opens things up for interpretation for the characters as well, as Aly and Raj take note of different things that help them investigate the case. Despite this book containing themes of sexual, physical, and mental abuse and mentions of anxiety and panic attacks, and blood and goriness, Dass sufficiently explores these subjects in a manner that is not overwhelming and propels the story.
The story begins with a scene that can only be understood once the readers reaches the end of the novel. So much happens throughout the novel that it becomes natural to forget how the story even started. That is until the last few chapters. This clever way of tying the book’s end to its beginning tempts the reader to restart the novel and look for all the clues they missed the first time around.
Ruben Dass’ Skin places readers in an investigator’s shoes. Dass’ effective writing offers a strong detective duo and an enticing murder mystery that sets up the universe for potential future cases, and Skin is a compelling introduction to their world of crime-solving.
