“An eloquent crime novel—street poetry renders the city in lush, sensual language and a heroine’s raw will to live.” — Foreword Reviews (Benjamin Welton)

Street poetry. Beauty. Danger. Survival.

Skinless takes place in New York City at the turn of the millennium, against a backdrop of small‑time drug dealing and violence. The story follows Charmay, a survivor of sex abuse and teenage homelessness, caught in the grip of alcohol addiction as she struggles to find her identity while trying to make it in the entertainment industry. She drinks to numb and sings to soothe the raw vulnerability she calls “skinless,” then slips into Cindy, the smooth persona she’s built to survive on wealth and manipulation.

In a world chasing quick fixes and the American Dream, Charmay is entangled in a web of money, ambition, and hunger for intimacy. Her past blurs with her present as she longs for her estranged father and the girls she once was, while clinging to a hustler‑lover she needs to trust, a Wall Street financier obsessed with Cindy, and a producer who cuts her open to get to her honest voice. Desire and danger spiral. Hustles collide. Charmay turns to Cindy. Beats. Bullets. Bedsheets.

Skinless becomes a strange evocation of the turn of the 21st century in America—the times we live in and the forces we live by—a real‑life portrait of a world gone off its orbit.

Skinless is Book 1 of the series Charmay: New York Noir.
Companion album: Skinless: Songs from the Book (coming Dec. 2025)

For readers of: The Bell Jar, The Basketball Diaries, Cherry, Breakfast at Tiffany’s, Just Kids, Lush Life

TV/ Film Comps: The Sopranos, The Deuce, George & Tammy, True Romance

“Maggie Moor has a voice unlike any I’ve ever encountered—both hip and illuminating, a voice that lifts the mind to a place it’s never been.”—Kate Lardner, author of Shut Up He Explained: The Memoir of a Blacklisted Kid

“Most of the book’s sentences vacillate between beauty and despair. Charmay expresses euphoria, sadness, anxiety, and anger as she shows off her raw will to live… her street poetry, in which the city’s colors and sensations are highlighted in lush, sensual language. A humane portrait of often inhuman actions, Skinless is an eloquent crime novel about a woman’s relentless desire to survive.”—Benjamin Welton, Foreword Reviews

“Skinless is a revelation. Meet Charmay. Skinless is also a revolution—of survival… In a word, Skinless is a stunner.”—Stacey Donovan, writer, editor, ghostwriter; author of Dive and The Red Shoe Diaries book series

“Skinless immerses you in a voice. Duality between Charmay and Cindy…fighting for space inside one woman. Like living in a story than just reading one.”—Goodreads 5 ⭐️ (sec. ed 2025)

Across two years slipping between past and present in New York’s underground, we see it through Charmay—our velvet‑voiced, street‑smart, trauma‑bruised singer who, by night, becomes Cindy. Three forces keep the pressure on: producer Eddie Cruise hears fire and pushes her voice raw; Sam Black earns her trust even as danger gathers; and Rex Raven opens glittering doors—and traps. Between gigs and after‑hours sessions, Charmay chases Eddie for a record deal.

Surrounding her is a family out of true: parents who unsteady her; Wanda, five years ahead, aloof; Aidan, two years behind, at the crux of the storm. Hart, the uncompromising vocal coach, pulls her toward the mic until the truth shows through. In Sam’s orbit, Eric—a recent law grad itching to go into business—stirs the pot. Comic detours arrive via Doctor Ski, Sam’s psychologist who meets the couple once, and Doctor Doggie, the dog‑obsessed referral who sends Charmay sideways. Down in Miami, Sam’s Cuban‑American family—his parents and sister Barbie—spin a fun‑loving visit that barely hides the fractures. And Sam’s vendetta zeroes in on Jesse—a well‑educated son of a state judge, newly addicted as he chases a rock‑drummer dream, naive as a deer—putting their cash side hustle on a knife‑edge as his loyalty comes into question.

The city adds its chorus. At Lucky Strike, Rex Raven and his trio of associates hold questionable court while a pop singer and a little wicked man slip between sets. In a Tribeca loft, Director O., a power filmmaker, works the room to woo Charmay as Eric’s friends whirl through—and after the party, the NYPD pays a visit. At Hudson’s, Felp presides, Max the vampiric maître-d’ deadpans, Frank hits his cues, and a jazz singer scores the night. Elsewhere, at Darling’s Gentleman’s Club—where Cindy takes shape—Gil, ever loyal, offers dad‑like counsel; at Chanel, where Rex suits Cindy up, an associate fashions her armor; and at Fortunoff’s, Stringbean, the comic diamond rep, performs a sales routine to seal the deal for Rex and Cindy.

Across town, Sam and Charmay explore La Trapeze—a crisscross club of hidden fantasy—while the Morgan Hotel homes the late‑night Sam‑and‑Jesse scheme. A penthouse suite at the Peninsula glitters above it all; underground Brownies steams in the small hours. After hours at Nightingales, the East Village haunt, Hart pushes Charmay to the raw as Skinny on guitar and Bleu on bass lay down a pulse that follows her home, Jesse’s wide‑eyed college friends crowding the tables.

And through it all, family moves like silent snipers; Charmay muscles through her father’s abandonment as the inner voices swell. Woven through that chorus is a reflective voice—steady, lucid—speaking from the other side now, threading hope through the noise. But back in the story present, Charmay runs from Skinless toward Cindy for solace; in the desperate hours, she writes songs on New York City streets, fleeing surfacing shadows—figures from the past and Skinless flashbacks, PTSD flares that render her formless—tilting the present into a waking nightmare.

Yet that reflective line keeps time, offering spiritual ground born of metaphysical and hard‑earned experience. In the end, the click of Charmay’s heels on New York City pavement becomes the pickup into the next song.

For readers who love literary noir, psychological suspense— with a hard‑boiled edge— and honest first person narrative.