Sketchtasy

by Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore

Sketchtasy takes place in that late-night moment when everything comes together, and everything falls apart--it's an urgent, glittering, devastating novel about the perils of queer world-making in the mid-'90s.

This is Boston in 1995, a city defined by a rabid fear of difference. Alexa, an incisive twenty-one-year-old queen, faces everyday brutality with determined nonchalance. Rejecting middle-class pretensions, she negotiates past and present traumas with a scathing critique of the world. Drawn to the ecstasy of drugged-out escapades, Alexa searches for nourishment in a gay culture bonded by clubs and conformity, willful apathy, and the specter of AIDS. Is there any hope for communal care?

Sketchtasy brings 1990s gay culture startlingly back to life, as Alexa and her friends grapple with the impact of growing up at a time when desire and death are intertwined. With an intoxicating voice and unruly cadence, this is a shattering, incandescent novel that conjures the pain and pageantry of struggling to imagine a future.

“Immersed in the '90s queer culture of Boston, Alexa is a mess. She's a queen in crisis, desperate for relief from the sinister traumas of her past and the ominous threats of her present. She's searching for hope, even as she becomes mired in an unforgiving cycle of addiction. Sketchtasy is a breakneck spree through a cultural moment, scratching off the patina of nostalgia to show how urgently relevant it still is. If you've heard her read, you know Sycamore's voice is one in a zillion. She's at her very best here.” —Dave Wheeler, associate editor, Shelf Awareness

"Reading this was like a night of stealing other people's drinks, or a much-needed slap to the face, or a little of both. Bold, glittering, wise, fun, the novel as found poem alive in the mouth of this truth-telling queen, making her way through a wasteland of other people's lies (and a few of her own), and looking for something near paradise. Follow her and live." —Alexander Chee, author of The Queen of the Night

“If Sketchtasy doesn't become a classic, we are doomed. Mattilda has such complete command of craft here that she is able to evoke experience, rather than simply describe it. Whether or not we identify with her characters, she lets us into their hearts and perceptions through sheer talent, raw honesty, and the sophisticated ability to handle word order, duration, pacing, and soul. The form of this novel is determined organically from the emotions at their core. A lesson in how to write, how to remember, how to grapple with history.” —Sarah Schulman

"Sketchtasy is a vivid masterpiece that rivals the likes of Last Exit to Brooklyn by Hubert Selby Jr. It’s dangerous, hilarious, scary and transcendentally beautiful. Sycamore’s prose is so searing, you might want to read it with sunglasses." —Jake Shears, musician, actor, and author of Boys Keep Swinging

“Every sentence in Sketchtasy is a living thing, fierce and funny and a little bit dangerous—a voice made of coke dust and club lights, cut with crackling insight. I was completely addicted to the story of Alexa's search for connection, set in the gritty Boston nightclub scene in the ‘90s. Nobody writes like Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore—most writers wouldn't dare try.” —Julie Buntin, author of Marlena

Genres: Fiction, Queer, LGBT, Novels, Transgender, Queer Lit, Gay

256 pages, Paperback

First published October 16, 2018

About the author

Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore is the award-winning author of The Freezer Door, a New York Times Editors’ Choice, one of Oprah Magazine’s Best LGBTQ Books of 2020, and a finalist for the PEN/Jean Stein Book Award. Winner of a Lambda Literary Award and an American Library Association Stonewall Honor Book, she’s the author of three novels and three nonfiction titles, and the editor of six nonfiction anthologies, most recently Between Certain Death and a Possible Future: Queer Writing on Growing Up with the AIDS Crisis. Sycamore lives in Seattle, and her new book, Touching the Art, will be released on November 7, 2023.

Reviews

[Julie Ehlers · Rating 5 out of 5]

Early in my publishing career I read a short story by Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore. If I recall, it was only a few pages long, but I never, ever forgot it. The voice! I never forgot it. I noticed over the years that Sycamore was publishing books, but my (long-subconscious) fear of no author living up to my first experience with them kicked in, and I never got around to any of them. Until now! When I won a copy of Sketchtasy in a Shelf Awareness giveaway, I was psyched! And when I read a few pages and realized the voice was similar to what I remembered, I was even more psyched.

Sketchtasy is a novel about Alexa, a young queer person living in Boston who's estranged from her parents, and her friends who are mainly in the same boat. Beyond that, it's a little difficult to describe. It takes place in the 1990s, so AIDS is a factor; there's a lot of drug-taking and some turning of tricks, and friendships form and lives come together, and then things fall apart and have to be rebuilt, over and over again. Alexa’s voice is humorous and casual, even gossipy at times, certainly drug-addled (which is part of the point) but there's also a lot that's sad and poignant about this book, and a lot that's emotionally astute.

This novel isn't necessarily for everyone. At times, the level of TMI approached The Pisces. But, you know, The Pisces was about a woman having an affair with a mermaid, and Sketchtasy is about things that actually happen in our actual world. Honestly, I get so bored sometimes of reading about privileged white people and their stupid problems. The whole time I was reading Sketchtasy I was acutely aware that for some people, back in the 1990s and even up to the present day, this book isn't fiction. It's a representation of a life that I have no experience with, but I was very grateful to get a glimpse of it. It's one of those books that you live along with the characters; once I was done it took a few days for me to shake it.

I was going to give this 4 stars, but the level of emotion I'm feeling as I'm writing this makes me want to bump it up. This is a wholly original work from a wholly original mind, and I'm very glad I had this opportunity to read it.

[Chris · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is my first (but definitely not last) book by this author. I was absolutely blown away by how much I enjoyed this novel. Set in 1995 and using first person stream-of-conscious writing style I was thrown into a whirling spinning drug laden world. I must be in the target demographic, because I could grasp every mid 90's references. The writing is fluid so I felt as if I were coasting through each 'trip', revelation, and self discovery seamlessly. I felt a total connection with the primary character and found many similarities with in my own 90's gay experience.

Definitely Queer Literature at it's finest. Highly recommend this novel to anyone who remembers or would like to get a sample of what life was like in big city gay life in the 90's.

I received a copy of this novel free of charge in exchange for my honest review.

[Katrina Rose · Rating 2 out of 5]

Sketchtasy held so much promise yet fell incredibly short of my hopes for an LGBTQ book. It’s pride month and as a flaming dyke (not a butch – look it up) I am reading every gay and lesbian book I can get my queer little hands on.

Sketchtasy reads like what I can only imagine is a heavy drug haze. As someone whose never touched a hard drug, its hard to immerse myself in a story surrounded by drugs. Especially when the main character is perpetually snorting coke, ingesting K, and combating it with Xanax and alcohol.

The book moves so fast, with dialogue imbedded within the narrative it’s difficult to follow along. The characters are introduced at rapid speeds with gender pronouns switching so constantly its near impossible to keep up.

The premise for Sketchtasy could have been great, and maybe it is for someone who can relate. Dr. Suess is that you? Anyhow, I’m going to chalk it up to a lack of understanding on my part. Except that I have read books like the Crank series by Ellen Hopkins and absolutely loved every minute of it. So maybe it’s the writing style, maybe it’s the subject. If you’re looking for a fast paced, ever moving, rollercoaster queer book – you may like this one.

I was offered a copy from edelweiss in exchange for my honest review.

[Sassafras Patterdale · Rating 4 out of 5]

i love being lucky enough to get to read queer fiction before it releases! eep! i feel bad that people have to wait for October for this book - Mattilda is such a queer literary treasure <3

[Sarah Schulman · Rating 5 out of 5]

So well written it is exciting to read.

[YYJE · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found this book almost hard to read — I remember those days, and I remember those people. A very real portrayal of the way some people lived and died.

[willowdog · Rating 1 out of 5]

Ah, youth. They believe they have so much to say. The trials of Alexa are written in a stream of consciousness style--long paragraphs, little content. Finding a place in the world, when you surround yourself with drugs, prostitution, bar hopping, possible incest, and other shadows of life, has been told much more successfully by others.

Thanks to Treeline for this electronic edition.

[Andrea · Rating 5 out of 5]

Glowing review to come! I loved this book!

[Madeleine · Rating 3 out of 5]

a gorgeous story of how desire and loss cling to one another in the fast-paced backdrop of 90s boston. i’ve never been particularly interested in boston but this plus eileen myles has me curious about queer boston histories outside the suffocating university presence. really skilled drug writing. that said, stream of consciousness narratives have never really been my thing (tragic as i love a good party story), though sycamore bends the form effectively.

[Peter Landau · Rating 4 out of 5]

When I was young, I though homosexuals were special. They were inherently on the outskirts of the mainstream and so I believed they were better than the rest. They were outside looking on, which gave them a better perspective on how lame society is. Then came gays in the military and same sex marriage. Boy, was I wrong. The truth is homosexuals are no different than everyone else and most are uninteresting. Not the ones in this novel! While my cultural touchstones differ from the characters in the book, the experience was relatable. It’s written as an immersive experience, which embeds you not only in the mind but the body of the narrator, which is no small feat.

[Eli · Rating 5 out of 5]

Honestly weird this book didn't get more attention cuz it fucking slaps.

[Juliet Escoria · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book literally took my breath away, multiple times, with its astonishing moments of quiet beauty, in an otherwise frenetic, maximalist (in the best sense) book. This will stay with me for a long while. So many things to admire. Mattilda is a true visionary.

[Jacob Wren · Rating 5 out of 5]

https://youtu.be/FfJyyYzg7zE

[Ralph Bardsley · Rating 4 out of 5]

This review first appeared in New York Journal of Books https://www.nyjournalofbooks.com/book...

“Everything in Boston is about no one noticing.”

In Sketchtasy, Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore attempts to take a page from Bret Easton Ellis or Chuck Palahniuk, with a fierce, glittery, fast paced romp through 1990s Boston. While not as well executed as Glamorama or Invisible Monsters, the book tries to create the dreamlike quality and thrilling pace of those novels. The story follows Alexa, a twenty-something “queen” living in Boston on her own terms, through a swirl of drug-addled days and nights that all seem to blend into one another. While the book celebrates the independence of its main character, there is a profound sense of loss and emptiness that pervades the story from start to finish. This book, while not always an easy read, touches on some social issues – from AIDS to queer bashing – that are as important today as when the book took place. The power of the book, is that it forces the reader to take notice of these issues that are sometimes uncomfortable to look at.

The novel is at times confusing and disorienting, as the first-person narrative moves quickly, almost jerking the reader from scene to scene. The descriptions of 1990s Boston are charming in their authenticity. For anyone who spent time in Boston as a young person during this period, Sycamore will bring you back to clubbing on Lansdown Street, cocktails at Luxor in Bay Village, a night of dancing at Chaps, or just watching the chic bartenders at Club Cafe.

But the charm of the novel ends with its nostalgia. The jerky pace of the narrative attempts to convey the drug-addled mindset of Alexa, as she goes from one high to the next, with the hangovers and let-downs of regular life in between, but it’s not an enjoyable read. The result is a book that is hard to follow, with characters that are difficult to form a connection with. The author often loses the reader, and unlike Ellis, who uses a similar narrative technique in Glamorama, there isn’t enough substance to keep the reader hooked.

But, and here is the important difference, where Ellis creates a series of intricate and deft scenes in Glamorama, linked with the fashion and clubbing scene in New York during the 1990s, Sycamore creates a disjointed, lonely and sad story of gender-fluid youth with daddy issues, living in a rundown neighborhood on the outskirts of Boston. Ellis created a fantasy that glamorized vapidity and emptiness, whereas Sycamore seems to be forcing the reader to look at social injustices in a way that makes us realize the world is unfair.

The book does remind us of the importance of people who stand up for themselves and who are brave enough to live on the periphery of acceptance. In one passage early in the book, Alexa is on the subway when she is asked by a young boy if she was gay. “Honey, I said, I’m a faggot. And he scrunched up his face and said ew, that’s GROSS. And then can you believe some old woman sitting there looked at me like I was the one creating a scene.”

Unfortunately, the message of the novel comes at the price of an enjoyable read. The book, while good hearted, is hard to follow and the narrative is congested. Recommended if you are looking for a night out in 1990s Boston. If not, you might want to take a pass on this one.

[Julene · Rating 4 out of 5]

It took me two starts to get into the book and that was after I heard Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore read from "Sketchtasy." The second round I was ready and heard her voice, but there are many characters, and the book moves so fast that I had to use a notepad and write down the names so I could track the connections. The book is truly genius, written from within action from start to finish.

Alexa, the main character has an alternate name, Tyler, that she cannot face. That boy was abused, and she has remembered, and she is running. Using drugs and partying, yet deeply lonely. She has a few moments of feeling at "home" when her friend Joanna moves in with her. Joanna is doing her best to be clean and sober so they make a pact to only drink wine with meals. Their connection is good, but then Joanna enters AA and gets a sponsor, soon she leaves to go live with that sponsor, who she has started having sex with. This is heartbreaking. And the partying starts again and Alexa moves out of the house they shared.

After Joanna moves she is no longer there to answer the phone and tell Alexa's mother her son is not home, Alexa has the conversation she thinks she has been building to with the therapy her father has been paying for. Telling the truth that he sexually abused her.

After that Alexa moves to live with the man who has been paying her for sex, Nate. There are no more calls with the parents, no more therapy sessions. Now she's in the home of an older man who travels a lot, and so she continues with friends living the club life.

For a while she too goes to AA, Nate supports his effort and stops serving him cocktails. He meets one man who speaks well. Then, a brief surprise when Joanna shows up on her way to the same meeting, but doesn't come in after she smokes her cigarette, as promised. Alexa exits, no one comes out after her, there a a moment she looks back and wonders if the new friend will. So she wanders Boston to her old friend's apartment who has drugs ready and she's off again, ending the book flying high.

Coming to the end, I wondered how the book would close. Healing and success with AA or not? The answer was not, but at least Alexa does not die, as so many gay men or lesbians have died in LGBTQ literature. So that is a relief.

Reading the book I felt constantly on the edge of fear, would Alexa be harmed in a street fight? Would she survive? There are two deaths from AIDS. Adrian and Alexa both get tested and are negative, they have a brief relationship. But whether Alexa is positive is ambiguous by the end of the book

Important books are noted that he reads with Nate, (who believed for most of the novel Alexa was in school): Rebecca Brown's "The Gifts of the Body," David Wojnarowicz's two books, "Close to the Knives," and "Memories that Smell Like Gasoline."

This book is layered with meaning and excellent in its portrayal of a smart boy/girl who grew up traumatized from sexual abuse. It is a view of a club party scene from the mid-90s. I wonder if Mattilda will write another book about Alexa and her future.

[Devin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Content warning in this book: child sexual abuse, incest, and rape.

Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore has broken all the rules in this incredible work. I've read a good slab of her non-fiction, and in this one fiction read, I find I love it as much as I love her non-fiction. The way she chaotically weaves through first and second point of views in a stream of consciousness that somehow still makes sense, is incredible. Stream of consciousness writing is a style that is so frustratingly difficult, despite how seemingly liberal the technique is, and she just wields it as a weapon of queer storytelling here.

Sycamore takes us out of San Francisco and New York City, centers for HIV/AIDS during this time, to Boston, or a neighborhood in Boston -- or several neighborhoods in Boston, actually. Very briefly to Florida, but mostly Boston. Alexa serves as crossroads of contradictions between storytelling: she is an unreliable narrator, but also incredibly perceptive, very open and very guarded. Even with the reader, she is secretive; moments of introspection either end too soon or cut out altogether -- even we as the reader inside Alexa's head, are unclear and left in the dark. Although there are many locations Alexa is at, there is only one location that ties everything together -- Jeannine (you have to read the book to figure this one out). Every other location fades out quickly and pretty soon, I found myself forgetting what each place was -- were they at Bertucci's? Polly's apartment? They're on a bridge at some point, and then under it, and then there's a hot tub. And a lot of other places.

Sycamore does something I HATE but in a good way -- she removes main characters from the book with no explanation and no ending for them. It's suspenseful, but through a critical lens, it is symbolic of how quickly queer people died of AIDS back then. They're there, and then they aren't. There were so many characters who I, when I realized I was at the end of the book, found myself going "wait, no, what happened to them?" They vanish, behind doors and death.

Overall, a phenomenal book. One of the best works of fiction I've read in awhile.

[Kelly · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mixed feelings about this. At times the content was dark, spoken on a time where AIDS was killing so many gay men, when LGBTQ were abondoned by family members, often turning to prostitution due to not being hired places, being used and abused as a fantasy, rampant drug abuse and rape in this LGBTQ, discrimination, depression, the underground nightlife, trauma, etc. The dark moments are where I connected most. I felt it, I felt what he was saying.

But then..... he often lost me with his style of writing. He reflected many times on his moments when he was using loads of drugs, going in so many directions and no clear train of thought. Interrupting his own sentences to hop from one thing to another. He would be: "in the kitchen, need spinach for this recipe, now I'm writing the song lyrics from that night, go go go too sexy, too sexy, too sexy for my, oh my this guy is so creepy, my hair is amazing and so is this purple carpet, I think I like Nate, I need a bump of K, where is my orange juice, my father comes to me in my dreams, the therapists chair, where are polly's boots?, oh those beats are so good from the DJ, I love to shower oh the water, I can't get my dick hard I am too high, we are on the bridge to watch the sunset, no I don't like nate he goes to the same restaurant every night, I need a pizza.... " it was overwhelming and confusing. Much of the book read like a long run-on sentence of incongruant thoughts that took away from the connection I was making to his story. It was like he wrote in his journal while he was high, and had no one edit it before he published it. Some people might enjoy this style of writing, as it portrayed his reality. I did not.

3 stars for the parts I loved and minus 2 starts for the parts I didn't.

[Karen Mahtin]

TW for this book: drugs, incest, rape, theft, AIDS illness and deaths, and hot gay sex.

At first I was pretty annoyed at all the descriptions of different highs, but Mattilda's descriptions are so beautiful. The drug use is an important theme as it affects every aspect of her life. After a while I realized that the prominence of the descriptions reminded me of Kerouac or Kesey or someone else I read 20 years ago.

I'm from Boston and was an active member of the (sober part of the) queer youth scene during the time in which this novel takes place - I even recognized a character as a now-dead member of that community. It was fun to follow Mattilda to clubs that I've heard of (and in some cases, been to), and to places like Dollar a Pound and other parts of Cambridge and Boston that were so important to me in my high school and college years. There is a beautiful section that I guess I'd describe as a stream of consciousness narrative that combines a lot of stories that Alexa hears at AA... it's all so familiar and foreign at the same time. A lovely book, but if you find any of the issues in the trigger warning disturbing, just avoid reading it (at bedtime).

[Rob Forteath · Rating 5 out of 5]

The author demands that you put some effort into the first half of the book, following Alexa through a revealing, dense stream of enhanced/suppressed consciousness. While charging self-destructively through sensual overload, suppressing the trauma, somehow Alexa moves into a place to confront and continue. We readers are aware of the enormous cost being paid for any eventual future closure, and fear for Alexa constantly.

Alexa's private trauma is playing out while the community is being torn into by AIDS. The stress and the frantic abandon are wonderfully handled here, and every change of direction is perfectly natural. Ordinary moments and horrible ordeals are laid out for us in startlingly honest, affecting prose.

Overall this story is a brilliant achievement, a display of prodigious writing skill combined with empathy that draws you deeply into the characters.

[Marianne · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's a bit like Virginia Woolf and a bit like Kerouac but with mostly short chapters and a whole lot of 90s drug/club/queer culture. I had to stop reading to be sad a whole bunch of times but also it is utterly gloriously joyful and laughs and cries and bellows in the face of the real terror I also remember feeling as I watched people I cared about die.

CN: dangerous use of drugs and alcohol, alcoholism, recovery; sexual abuse of children, including the protagonist as a child, experiences and artistic depictions of being abused; rape of adults and coercive sex; sex work, including in unsafe contexts; homophobia, including homophobic violence; many uses of the f-slur though most of them by people reclaiming it; AIDS, grief, loss, medical settings; protagonist experiencing complex PTSD including graphic depictions of specific symptoms

[Kalen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don't even know how to begin talking about this book so I'll let Julie Buntin do it for me:

"Every sentence in Sketchtasy is a living thing, fierce and funny and a little bit dangerous—a voice made of coke dust and club lights, cut with crackling insight. I was completely addicted to the story of Alexa's search for connection, set in the gritty Boston nightclub scene in the 90s. Nobody writes like Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore—most writers wouldn't dare try." —Julie Buntin, author of Marlena

[Abby · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the second queer novel I've read this year set in the 1990s & it's been fun to revisit that time and place again through these talented authors. Sycamore has such an incredible voice and her characters glitter on the page. I was completely sucked into the world of Alexa and her friends -- the drugs, the tricks, the late-night club scenes. Totally captivating and frequently heartbreaking. Highly recommended for fans of Michelle Tea and Andrea Lawlor.

[Rudy Russell · Rating 5 out of 5]

Struggled with the first couple of chapters as the writing is really dense and confused me before I got into the rhythm but so glad I perservered, stunning evocation of trashcan queer icons suffering and stumbling through the 90s. Big recommend for fans of Valencia and the like. Trigger warnings for most things.

[Jordan Villanueva · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sketchtasy made me feel like I was on just as many drugs as the narrator, which was amazing. The voice and style of this novel was flawless yet overwhelming at times. I wish there was a bit more continuity between chapters. It was hard to conceptualize the depth of relationships when characters went in and out so quickly.

[Erin Read · Rating 3 out of 5]

There were moments where I enjoyed this book very much, and other times it honestly gave me anxiety. Taking a full on incoherent drug binge every few pages does distract from what the story is really trying to convey.

[Lesley · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not really sure what to make of this one. Kept reading to see if it went anywhere, but it didn't. What I did enjoy about the book was the vibrant language, that was almost poetic in parts. If you're looking for a story with a plotline and a finish, this isn't it

[Abbey Gates · Rating 4 out of 5]

I couldn’t believe how deeply I felt immersed in Alexa’s mind. As someone who hasn’t done many drugs, I truly felt like I was tripping along with them, falling into the experience of addiction in a way no other book I’ve read has quite mastered. It was a somatic experience. Strange. Heartbreaking.

[Vera Wilson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Won a copy of this. Started a couple times before, but lost interest. So tried again. Guess just not to my liking, but found book a little boring.

[Sara · Rating 4 out of 5]

The very end was surprisingly moving and put me in mind of the most affecting passages from Jean Rhys. Oh!

[Erin Ronald · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was chaotic and devastating. Pinpoints of hope smothered by more trauma. The narrative was hard to stay focused on, bit that worked perfectly for what this book was. Still, ouch...my heart.