Cold Skin

The horror novel 'Cold Skin', written by Albert Sanchez Pinol, explores the ideas of isolation, how we (humans) get shaped by the environment we live in and what actions we can be made to do. The book tells a story of an Irish man getting stuck on an island with a German neighbor not long after a war near Antarctica. They immediately get attacked by...

The novel sets up the atmosphere perfectly. Perfectly. There is isolation; ergo, external factors are minimized. This helps to build through the book a single-story perspective, which then gets annihilated. With gruesome, unappealing characters, the reader may choose not to take sides and think about the beliefs, truth, the reasons why all of the events in the tale happen.

However, the translation by Cheryl Leah Morgan leaves out very significant facts needed to build the main character. With this knowledge, it would be easer to understand and justify some of the character's actions and beliefs.

Concluding, 'Cold Skin' is a fast, over-evening read. It will result in mixed thoughts afterwards and a bit of disgust, but that is needed to make the us question how and why were the main characters affected to do what they did. Recommended to read for those that like new adventure stories (and horror tales).