| Skin Deep: Tattoos, the Disappearing West, Very Bad Men, and My Deep Love for Them All | 
 enlarge | Author: Karol Griffin
Publisher: Harcourt
Category: Book
List Price: $24.00
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Avg. Customer Rating:  9 reviews
Sales Rank: 91810
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 304
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.8
Dimensions (in): 7.6 x 5.2 x 1.1
ISBN: 0151008841
Dewey Decimal Number: 391.65092
EAN: 9780151008841
ASIN: 0151008841
Publication Date: October 6, 2003
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Condition: Millions of satisfied customers and climbing. Thriftbooks is the name you can trust, guaranteed. Spend Less. Read More.
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| Editorial Reviews:
Product Description
Believing herself a daughter of the West, Karol Griffin took the myths of the place-and of the outlaw-on faith. When she walked into the Body Art Workshop in Laramie, Wyoming, she found what she was looking for: a culture on the fringe of polite society, complete with outlaw signature. Soon Karol was a full-time tattoo artist, an occasional outlaw, and a tattooed woman looking for love in all the wrong places. By the mid nineties, the West had been invaded by suburban culture; and tattoos had become a mass commodity of coolness, compelling Karol to go even farther to find the authentic outsiders she romanticized. She eventually hooked up with a real old-fashioned Wyoming outlaw, complete with felony convictions and out-standing warrants-which is how Karol wound up looking down the barrel of a gun held by a tattooed caricature of true love.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 4 more reviews...
 Confused rebel gal learns life February 28, 2007
I found this book on a remainder table at Stanford. Thought it would be fun. Turned out to be compelling, hard to put down, especially after being hooked in by the author's, er, "relationship" problems in the opening chapter. Spurning "traditional values," she falls prey to the romanticized ideal of a "Western outlaw" life and men to her regret with that last relationship. Overall a gripping memoir. I found amusing that "the counter-culture girl" couldn't cut it in SF's Mission District, the haven of SF counter-culture types. Perhaps as she raises her child she'll learn that there are a thousand gray areas between "boring" and "outlaw"...and there is a reason outlaws are outlaws!
Takes the myths of the West on faith February 7, 2004
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Karol Griffin takes the myths of the West (and surrounding the outlaw image) on faith in Skin Deep as she encounters a body art workshop in Laramie Wyoming, only to find a new vocation on the fringes of polite society. Griffin's newfound career as a tattoo artist leads to plenty of social insights and commentary in this lively unusual, "reader engaging", and very highly recommended discourse.
worth reading November 16, 2003
I am from Laramie, Wyoming and I know this author personally. I thought Karol did a fine job of portraying the town and area and the blend of tattoong history interspersed with incidents of this author's life made a rich tapestry of a tale. I could identify with this girl who didn't quite fit in so she finds herself in an unusual job, living a nonconventional lifestyle. Yeah, she has a little attitude problem but thats half her charm. The book read like fiction rather than nonfiction with vivid scenes and well-drawn characters. I'm not into tattoos myself, yet I enjoyed a look into this very different subculture and this authors personal take on it.
thumbs up November 16, 2003
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
The last three people who posted reviews didn't bother to read the book first. At least I did my homework. I usually dont like nonfiction accounts of peoples lives but I found this to be a very interesting book. This writer seems sincere in her desire to tell her lifes story as a tattoo artist. It appears she got the bad end of the stick a time or two even though she brought a lot of it on herself. Though I can't figure out if this chick is for real or a poser, that doesn't really matter. The book was well written and she comes off as a person trying to make some sense of her nonconventional life, mistakes and all and she should be respected for her candidness.
 Too Kool For School November 6, 2003
3 out of 6 found this review helpful
Karol Griffin? If you only knew her from this book, you'd think: Great writer, awful attitude problem. If you've ever gotten a tattoo or piercing, you know that the Gods of Body Mod can be, shall we say, a little snotty. If you're not the "right" kind of client, you get icy treatment. I made the cut, as it were (I had 25 piercings by 1991, and back then, maaaan, that gave me The Cred), but I always hated hated hated that McOutlaw audition process you had to go through. "Are you a non-conformist just like us? Well, okay then! If not...hmph." Griffin drips contempt for every deb, dude, novice, suburbanite, sorority girl, or otherwise non-hipster damaged person who crosses her path, and who crosses the threshold of the tat shop. Mix that with her hue and cry over the corruption of the West (oh GOD, that cliche again?) *and* the corruption of the sanctity of tattooing and you've got a great writer who you can't stand! Shame. She's got some real chops. Only in the afterword does she a) pretty much confess that she herself is a whitebread exile in the McOutlaw world or b) show any thoughtfulness and generosity toward others regarding external markers and what they mean about identity (she finally realizes they don't mean much at all. welcome to adulthood, dollface.) It's savagely ironic for someone who sells their tattoo skills to whine about the increasing popularity of tattooing. If you want to stay pure, stay out of the marketplace and stay in your tidy, kooler than thou bubble. It'll be lonely as hell, but at least you'll be assured that everyone around you meets your exacting alterna-snob standard. Her use of language is fun and alive, but what she's choosing to communicate is petty and ugly and, frankly, about as tired as a tribal tat on the lower back.
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