Beautiful Blemish

by Kevin Sampsell

Kevin Sampsell likes secrets. In the short story collection Beautiful Blemish, Sampsell dives deep into the human psyche to reveal the layers of secret desire, loneliness and hope buried in our hearts. The stories in Beautiful Blemish display an American voice that mixes humor, experimentation, and unflinching pathos to full effect.

Genres: Fiction, Short Stories, Literature

100 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2005

About the author

I am the publisher of Future Tense Books in Portland, Oregon. I work at Powell's Books and also make collage art. I have written reviews and articles for various papers and mags. I have a few books out. My memoir, A Common Pornography, was published by Harper Perennial and my novel, This Is Between Us, was published by Tin House Books. I also edited Portland Noir, a book of crime fiction published by Akashic Books. My book of collage art and poetry, I Made an Accident, came out in 2022 from Clash Books.

Here's a few links to some stuff:
My essay on the loss of a friend, the loss of a book, and depression
My Tumblr of collage!
Flash Fiction on X-R-A-Y
My essay on Prince nostalgia and going to see The Revolution
My essay about coronavirus closing down Powell's
Short story at Hobart
The sad history of my football fandom
Flash Fiction on Wigleaf
My Paper Trumpets collage column at The Rumpus
Excerpts from This Is Between Us
My Longreads essay about my mom's Alzheimer's.
My Salon essay about suicide.
Short story on Joyland
Short fiction at The Rupture
Memoir excerpt on Smith Magazine.
I Know Who You Raped Last Summer.
My essay on bookselling and winning a Patterson bonus
On my first three kisses
Poems on Ink Node
Flash memoirs at 3am Magazine
Bookslut Interview
Flash Memoir pieces on McSweeney's
Fiction piece ("Options") on Identity Theory

Interview on The Rumpus

Reviews

[Imogen · Rating 5 out of 5]

I liked this little book but I feel weird saying anything more about it because Mr. Sampsell just became my friend on goodreads this week and we've exchanged a couple friendly e-mails and I internet like him so while I don't have anything bad to say about it I feel weird being effusive or anything. But somebody sold this to my store so I read it and I liked the story about the old people boning, how there was a tender story about 3-dimensional old people boning and then not long after that a story where a weird old guy is just kind of a cartoon punchline in two dimensions. Kind of like how Slavoj Zizek won't pick a single standpoint on anything, you know? Kevin Sampsell is the Slavoj Zizek of very short stories. Hi Kevin. FIVE STARS

[Emma Alden · Rating 5 out of 5]

Decided to reread this the other day because I’ve been missing my pal Kevin a lil extra. Sure enough, it held up. Just as weird and hilarious and freaky as ever. Tried to read “Earrotica” to someone and they didn’t totally get it so I had no choice but to ditch them. I love this brain. Where would we all be without Kevin Sampsell? Don’t even want to know.

[David Abrams · Rating 4 out of 5]

Kevin Sampsell writes short stories--most of them brief as a lightning flash (thus the term "flash fiction")--that explore themes of sexuality, the need for belonging, and consequently the tides of loneliness that sweep over us all every now and then. Like the Polaroid photographs taken by several of the characters in this collection, "Beautiful Blemish" reveals itself slowly, the real gut-wrenching moments fading into view before our very eyes. Sampsell pulls back our society's Band-Aid so we can all see the beauty of our blemishes.

[Andrea · Rating 5 out of 5]

I think Kevin Sampsell is brilliant. His writing is unique--funny, creepy, honest--highly recommended.

[C · Rating 3 out of 5]

After reading (and loving) Sampsell's memoir, I was expecting a different style to these stories (which makes me think that I might rate this collection higher after a reread down the road when I won't be saddled with those expectations...). They feel like a more 1990s aesthetic (if that makes sense at all), sort of fitting in with that small press post-Bukowski (not that these are Bukowski-esque at all, really) feel from the mid to late 90s.

They're odd pieces. Off-putting at times but typically in very interesting ways.

I don't know what else to say. It is an odd collection that I feel like I should read again at some point.

[Kevin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Word Riot did a great job with this book. And hey--two years later, there are only a couple of stories I feel dorky about.

[in8 · Rating 4 out of 5]

In the first story of Kevin Sampsell’s new collection Beautiful Blemish, a man collects lost or discarded gloves. He tries to find homes for the used gloves, either by finding its match, the rightful owner, or even by donating them to amputees. Even though this is one of the few stories told in 3rd person, this lost glove collector is Kevin Sampsell and this is what he does: He finds matches for the misfits and freaks of the world, and gives them accommodating places in his stories. He is a shepherd of misfortune and imperfections. In Old Man, Sampsell takes in an old homeless man as a pet. By doing these things, he pares human behavior down to basic animal instinct. He causes us to take a step back and question the practices of contemporary human culture. The things that might make perfect sense or that we take for granted, like having pets, or letting our elders live homeless, suddenly don’t make sense, and the things that initially don’t make a lot of sense, like “getting drunk to save your marriage” suddenly make perfect sense.

… at least in Kevin Sampsell’s world, specifically Portland, Oregon, where most of the stories seem to be set. Maybe this collection had special appeal to me, being that I am originally from Portland, and am of the same generation as Sampsell.

Sampsell’s approach is scientific, rooted in acute observation of his real world subjects. He is a master of painting these blemished people, of accentuating moles to beauty marks, of finding inspiration in people’s imperfections or contradictions. The stories are rife with 30-something year old adults still grappling with adolescence, at parties, at malls, karaoke bars or dance night at Red Lion Inn. Sure these Diane Arbus-esque characters and places might seem mundane and too familiar for some, but Sampsell has the ability to make the ordinary seem extraordinary or relevant. As he reveals through his narrative in On Your Bed, “I tried to be honest, but creative. I tried to think of an abstract sort of truth.” And Sampsell might stand on the shoulders of Ray Carver or Gus Van Sant, but both have moved on leaving Sampsell the burden of helping to carry this Pacific Northwest torch in a post-grunge era.

Personal favorites of mine (maybe because my father worked as an insurance salesman in the very mall where the story takes place) included, Skip the Walker, in which the narrator, Carol, is stalked by a creepy old mall walker who ends up seducing her mother. Freaky as it all is (think Cocoon but even creepier), you can’t help but to get sucked in, “he offered his arm and as if in a sudden trance I grab inside his elbow and feel myself being pulled into the suddenly large swarm of mall walkers” (at which point a combination of all the matching sweatsuits, the muzak and fast food chains and Christian Supply Centers cause her to go into a seizure and wake up in a Chick Filet staring at a manager with a name tag). His writing style is convincing enough that you physically feel sick when the characters get sick, or you work up a sweat when the characters do.

But the most beautiful blemish for me was Blowjob, and not so much for the details of the “blowjob from hell” (of which none are provided), but where the blowjob takes place (a cemetery) and the anti-climatic aftermath (as he backs the car out of the cemetery he runs over and gets stuck on a few tombstones), ending with, “we looked back at the dark landscape, with all its concrete teeth sticking up and poking out of the ground. The ground so dug-up and reapplied.”

Sampsell’s Beautiful Blemish is just that.

[Malbadeen]

Sarah has reads so many books to me while driving to various places, I was happy to return the favor by reading this collection of stories to her while she did the driving for a change.
I feel our friendship has reached a new level now tat I've read to her aloud about:
-someone getting a blow job in a cemetary
-someone's ear fetish
-a man giving another man a hand job as he begins to realize he is not as committed to being gay as he had once thought himself to be.
-an elderly couple lavishly indulging in agressive sex play
etc, etc, etc,
what I'm trying to say here is, this is a great collection of stories - maybe not one you want to read aloud to your platonic chum on the way to the movies.

To be fair not all the stories are overtly sexual in content (oddly I managed to hit on the majority of them when reading aloud.

I especially liked "Gloves" and "I Heart Frankenstein"

yay for Portland author - Kevin S!

[Juliet · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very much enjoyed this! Quirky, poignant, hilarious, offbeat, and elicitous of many inappropriate titters.

I was just finishing up the last story, sneakily reading it in my office--and read the phrase, "We have nicknames for some of the regulars like 'The Erotic Chubby' (an overweight man with a suave and confident attitude)"--and this weird little coughing/laughing sound blurted out my mouth--and my boss looked at me.

I couldn't help myself, because I love nicknames and because I visualized 'The Erotic Chubby' as looking like a cross between the Pillsbury Dough Boy and the Bob's Big Boy icon, with slicked back pompadour and crescent roll pelvic gyrations.

I could go on, but I should get back to work.

Fun, unique, weird, misfit-esque yet relatable book. I will be foisting it upon my husband tonight--and I hope to acquire more Kevin Sampsell books in the semi-near future.

[Ryan Werner · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sampsell puts it all on the line here, and while there's a bareness I can respect, the writing doesn't always add up for me. The structure of the oddness reminds me of Gary Lutz without the obsession on vocabulary. I like the ideas of these stories, but the nakedness of the feelings becomes the driving force too often.

The most successful stories in here end up finding a solid middle path between a story and an emotion. The results look a lot like the short fiction of the 80's, a sort of Wolff or a Hempel twisting motion. The story about the mall walker is the best example here, and the real winner for me in this collection. Makes me curious as to how much Sampsell's progressed in the decade-plus since its release.

[Fernando Fernández · Rating 2 out of 5]

If it hadn't been published by an independent press (respect!), I would have rated it with one star (1'5), given that it is too often gimmicky, the seams are blatant, and life is not as present as the crudeness of some of its topics could make it to be. Its writing seems underworked, and same goes for the stories.

[Ben Bush]

There's a great range of pieces in here from formal experimentation to slice of life. The title story is about senior citizens talking dirty during sex and is really funny and fun while, ahem, "affirming" their sexuality rather than mocking it.

[Sara · Rating 4 out of 5]

bought it new at pegasus books in downtown berekely, raced home and devoured it the same day.

[Blake Nelson · Rating 5 out of 5]

I dig the Sampsellian story form

[J]

Yipee! The book arrived from Powells yesterday! It's so petite!

[Becky Ohlsen · Rating 4 out of 5]

http://bookmunch.co.uk/view.php?id=1550

[Dena Guzman · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you read Sampsell, you best get your hands on this. It's like the roots to the tree. It's my favorite.