I have to admit that I’m still struggling with whether or not I like this book. Living in Ethiopia, your selection of possible reading material decreases significantly. As a result you learn to read books that you normally wouldn’t bother picking up back home. This book happens to be one of those books, for me. This book was one such book. I chose it for the simple fact that I have a friend we affectionately call Skippy, and the title of the book says that “Skippy Dies”. I figured, I might as well learn how and why Skippy dies.
I’m not giving anything away by saying that Skippy Dies. As a matter of fact, he dies in the very first chapter of the book. Subsequent chapters, until 2/3rds through, are all of the events leading up to Skippy’s death, told from the point of view of several different characters. The last bit tells of the events thereafter.
I would read a little, dislike it, and then put it back down, thinking that I would just stop reading it altogether. But, for some reason, I kept going back to it. I hated the way it made me feel most of the time. But, I couldn’t help but be curious how events would unfold for these characters. I wanted to know who would get what was coming to them.
There were only two characters I actually liked, Skippy, the love-sick, self-conscious, focus of the story, and his fat, nerdy pal Ruprecht, who is obsessed with alternate dimensions and donuts. All the other characters were, well, either idiots or deusch-bags. Maybe that is part of the problem I have with this book. I want everyone but Skippy and Ruprecht to suffer. It elicits vengeful thoughts in me. When everyone had to lie in the graves they dug for themselves, I was happy about it. I’m not accustom to being happy about human suffering, no matter how much I don’t like a person. I know, I know, it’s just a book, but somewhere out there there are real kids going through some of this crap, and I’d hate to think that I would wish them anything but the best of luck.
I’m coming to the realization, as I write this, that the story line was just a little too realistic for me. I like to check out of the real world for a while when I read. There are too many drugs, too much cheating, too many people treating each other badly, too many people feeling sorry for themselves, too much selfishness, in Skippy Dies.
Even though I’m not happy with how the story made me feel, I have to say that it really is a well written book. After all, I did end up reading it all the way through. I like his writing style, I liked the flow. As I read I started thinking that it would make a pretty good movie. I came to find out that it is indeed being made into a movie, or has been already. I’m not sure. I think I could handle the movie version better.
I guess I should mention that the story is set in an all boys high school in Ireland. A few times you take a visit to one of the teacher's houses, an all girls school, a donut shop, and the home of the girl who Skippy professes his love to. I could also mention that there are a couple of messed up love stories. This isn't much of a book review, but that's okay seeing as I have hard feelings towards the story and it's inhabitants.
