TJ Klune’s The Bones Beneath My Skin takes place in the past, way back in the ancient year of 1995. On the surface, its plot could be described as X-Files-esque (something I’m sure wasn’t lost on Klune, especially since he has a character call out the “new show” in the book). But while the novel includes a shadowy government agency that not only knows extraterrestrials exist but has at least one in captivity, it’s not a fast-paced thriller.
At its core, The Bones Beneath My Skin is a sentimental story in the best way: A tale of finding love and hope when neither of those seem within reach. It’s about found family, in this case how three people who have faced grief and trauma come together to make a home, a place where they are loved for who they truly are.
We see this story unfold through the eyes of Nathaniel Cartwright, a twenty-something journalist who, after getting fired from the Washington Post for cause, finds himself heading to his estranged parents’ isolated cabin in Oregon—the only thing (along with a battered white-and-green truck) that he’s left with after they die in a murder-suicide instigated by his father.
Nate, unsurprisingly, is a wreck on both fronts: He hadn’t spoken to his parents for years after they rejected him for being gay, which complicates his feelings about their deaths, and he doesn’t know what he’ll do now that his journalism career has ignominiously ended. His plan is to head to the cabin for a few months and figure out what to do with his life. But when he gets there, he finds a gun-wielding Alex and a curious ten-year-old girl who calls herself Artemis Darth Vader. The two are clearly on the run, and Nate becomes wrapped up in their lives, even after he’s given multiple opportunities to leave. Even Nate doesn’t understand at first why he stays, but to the reader it’s clear that he finds an acceptance in Art and Alex that he needs, and they in turn find the same in him.
A conversation between Art and Nate early on not only hints at this but also captures Art’s often-comedic uncanniness:
“You’re not toast,” she said. “You can be Nathaniel Cartwright. Then you can be someone else. And then if you don’t like it, you can be Nathaniel Cartwright again. You’re not toast. Bread doesn’t have a choice. You do.”
To butcher this metaphor, we are, indeed, not bread. But sometimes we feel we’re nothing more than stale sourdough when external forces—sometimes familial, sometimes governmental—demand that you must be toast and nothing else. Nate, Art, and Alex’s relationships with each other are a balm to this bread-burning despair. If your heart is hurting, especially if you feel unknown and unloved, The Bones Beneath Your Skin can be your ballast, buttressing your hope as the world becomes increasingly grim (which right now, it is).
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The Bones Beneath My Skin
This is the core of the book, including the romance that develops between Nate and Alex. As such, while the three eventually end up on a road trip that involves crashing through police barriers and getting chased by helicopters, the pace of the story is relatively slow. The secret government agency chasing them is almost incidental to what’s at stake for the three core characters and what The Bones Beneath Your Skin wants to explore; the book will make you think about what it means to be human, the good and the bad, and that, while most of us undoubtedly feel lost at times, that feeling—like everything—will change.
Those who like the sci-fi part of sci-fi reads will not be disappointed either. There are aliens involved throughout, and the worldbuilding around how some of those aliens view the world and interact with it is interesting on its own, and even more intriguing when you consider how their constitution complements the overarching themes of the book. And without getting into major spoilers, the way one of those aliens can interact with humans creates unexpected dynamics with other characters later on in the story, when the three are seeking refuge while on the run.
Klune self-published a version of The Bones Beneath Your Skin in 2018, making it one of his earlier works, even though it’s now getting a re-release via Tor. This is worth noting for two reasons. First, given the current state of… everything, it’s disheartening that the book’s undercurrent of alienation and fear remains all-too relevant. And secondly, the writing—while still excellent—is less subtle in communicating its themes than later works of his, such as The House in the Cerulean Sea or Under the Whispering Door. That’s not a bad thing, and can even be a welcome change for those looking for clear reassurance that who you are is wonderful no matter what it feels like the world is telling you.
“You think yourself alone. You think yourself lost. We wanted to show you that there was so much more than this place,” a character says at one point in the book. “We didn’t come to hurt you. We didn’t come to save you. Only you can do that. We came to be your friend. To make you understand that, in the end, you are never alone.”
None of us are ever alone. And books like The Bones Beneath Your Skin remind us of this. We can make a home when it seems insurmountable to do so. You can find others to support you—and you them—and carry each other with love and, perhaps, willful resistance against the evil and injustices surrounding us.
The Bones Beneath My Skin is published by Tor Books.
