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San Miguel de Allende, Mexico: Memoir of a Sensual Quest for Spiritual Healing
Rick Skwiot's earthy, funny and self-effacing chronicle of his heathen days south of the border. With little money and few prospects the troubled freelance writer takes off to Mexico to find himself. Instead he discovers fast-living, amoral, yet spiritually grounded Mexicans who infect him with a soulful lust for life. Sexy, surreal, and darkly comic, Skwiot's vivid tale depicts his beneficent immersion into small-town Mexican life amid a group of quirky locals and oddball Anglophone expats. Along the way he paints an intimate and sympathetic portrait of Mexico and its people. Ultimately this sultry memoir seduces any reader who values honest reporting of a spiritual journey in which the author fi nds his deliverance through the senses.
- GenresMemoir
258 pages, Paperback
First published August 2, 2010
About the author
Rick Skwiot
12 books42 followersRick Skwiot's critically acclaimed novel "Fail: A Carlo Gabriel Mystery" was re-released by Antaeus Books in fall 2020 in both paperback and Kindle versions. Skwiot is the author of three previous novels--the Hemingway First Novel Award winner "Death in Mexico," the Willa Cather Fiction Prize finalist "Sleeping With Pancho Villa," and "Key West Story"--and two memoirs: the highly praised childhood memoir "Christmas at Long Lake," and "San Miguel de Allende, Mexico: Memoir of a Sensual Quest for Spiritual Healing." His new novel "The Bootlegger's Bride" is slated for July 2025 release by Amphorae Publishing Group.
He's taught creative writing at Washington University in St. Louis and served as the 2004 Distinguished Visiting Writer at the University of Missouri-St. Louis. A veteran journalist, he also works as a feature writer and editor.
He's taught creative writing at Washington University in St. Louis and served as the 2004 Distinguished Visiting Writer at the University of Missouri-St. Louis. A veteran journalist, he also works as a feature writer and editor.
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
May 10, 2012
"I felt like time was running out and that I had done nothing with my life. I felt like a man trying to catch the last train ... Mexico's clear air, bright colors, and warm people seemed a corrective for gray skies and anxious Americans ... I saw that my life was mere clay, not a thing carved in stone, and that with my own hands and those of Fate it might be reshaped." San Miguel de Allende, Mexico: Memoir of a Sensual Quest for Spiritual Healing
Rick Skwiot is a Tech-quila University Grad. He understands that Mexico is not just a place but a way of life. Its surreal philosophy blends "Lord help me to accept the things I cannot change" with orgies to rival Caligula. Not all travelers have the heart to get Mexico. Not all writers have the huevos to put it into print. In this multicultural era, it is not fashionable to say that Mexico is bizarre and comical. Yet it is, and Rick does. In this politically correct age, it is not acceptable to suggest that Mexico may be no more insensitively machismo than gringos are hypersensitively neurotic. Yet Rick dares to hint at this unspeakable truth.
His work also sheds light on the unique pathology ... er ... I mean artistic bent that moves writers to devote decades to a career nearly as promising as blacksmithery. (I, of course, am the exception. With no wounds or chemical imbalances, I immerse myself in cigars, alcohol and putas solely for you the reader.) So, if you're interested in becoming a serious writer and/or drunk, this book can help. Let's add Rick to our tortured-artist prayer list. If anyone has his address, I'm sure he'd appreciate you giving it to some religious group for a much-needed Saturday-at-dawn doorknocking.
Rick's new volume is a fast and fun read that doesn't bore or exasperate like much touted literature, but offers meaningful insight without stalling the story. Plus, he is an author who writes like a man - a species more endangered than the panda. Still, one place where this book falls short of mine is that it lacks a photo of me exuding raw animal magnetism from the back cover. (Why Rick's publisher opted against this is unclear, but I think it was a bad call.) Otherwise, I recommend this work to guys, for those times when you don't have a cold one in the fridge or a hot one on the sofa, and to ladies who like it rough - literarily speaking.
Rick Skwiot is a Tech-quila University Grad. He understands that Mexico is not just a place but a way of life. Its surreal philosophy blends "Lord help me to accept the things I cannot change" with orgies to rival Caligula. Not all travelers have the heart to get Mexico. Not all writers have the huevos to put it into print. In this multicultural era, it is not fashionable to say that Mexico is bizarre and comical. Yet it is, and Rick does. In this politically correct age, it is not acceptable to suggest that Mexico may be no more insensitively machismo than gringos are hypersensitively neurotic. Yet Rick dares to hint at this unspeakable truth.
His work also sheds light on the unique pathology ... er ... I mean artistic bent that moves writers to devote decades to a career nearly as promising as blacksmithery. (I, of course, am the exception. With no wounds or chemical imbalances, I immerse myself in cigars, alcohol and putas solely for you the reader.) So, if you're interested in becoming a serious writer and/or drunk, this book can help. Let's add Rick to our tortured-artist prayer list. If anyone has his address, I'm sure he'd appreciate you giving it to some religious group for a much-needed Saturday-at-dawn doorknocking.
Rick's new volume is a fast and fun read that doesn't bore or exasperate like much touted literature, but offers meaningful insight without stalling the story. Plus, he is an author who writes like a man - a species more endangered than the panda. Still, one place where this book falls short of mine is that it lacks a photo of me exuding raw animal magnetism from the back cover. (Why Rick's publisher opted against this is unclear, but I think it was a bad call.) Otherwise, I recommend this work to guys, for those times when you don't have a cold one in the fridge or a hot one on the sofa, and to ladies who like it rough - literarily speaking.
September 19, 2011
Rick Skwiot gives us history, culture, and humor as he describes the beauty, poverty, and peculiarities of life in small town Mexico. His words will make you feel the warm sun and the lure of tequila, but are grounded in the reality of life struggles - his own, other gringos, and his Mexican friends.
San Miguel de Allende is a contemplation of the author's own drifting life and of American culture as he learns the lessons offered by a foreign land. "At this moment, as advised, I am living inside my body and in the present. I am tasting the wine, drinking in her beauty, sensing whispered wind and beneficent sun on my skin." The book with the sexy title is alluring, like an exotic, brown-skinned woman shaking loose her tumbling hair, yet doesn't get so lost in fantasy as to miss the blemishes.
Warning: those not familiar with Spanish will need Google Translate
San Miguel de Allende is a contemplation of the author's own drifting life and of American culture as he learns the lessons offered by a foreign land. "At this moment, as advised, I am living inside my body and in the present. I am tasting the wine, drinking in her beauty, sensing whispered wind and beneficent sun on my skin." The book with the sexy title is alluring, like an exotic, brown-skinned woman shaking loose her tumbling hair, yet doesn't get so lost in fantasy as to miss the blemishes.
Warning: those not familiar with Spanish will need Google Translate
February 18, 2013
Mexico is continually in the news, so you might begin reading "San Miguel de Allende, Mexico" thinking you know what the country and its people are all about. By the time you finish, you'll think again.
Skwiot first traveled there when he was a spiritually disaffected young Midwesterner trying to distance himself from dark days and a barrage of North American angst. In a short time he decides to stay in Mexico because, among other reasons, he says "it penetrated me like a balm."
I was interested in this memoir because 30 years after Skwiot's journey, my son took a similar trip through Eastern Europe and Africa, seeking his own spiritual and sensual healing. "San Miguel de Allende, Mexico" helped me appreciate why young men leave home to head for unknown towns full of risk, mystery and magic.
In a number of ways, this book is a man's version of Elizabeth Gilbert's "Eat, Pray, Love," but without her fat checkbook and self indulgence. Both books contain an abundance of good writing, appreciation for the local food and beverage; wine for Gilbert, tequila for Skwiot. He feasts on delicious Mexican street foods like gorditas, chorizos and picks avocados off the tree outside his window. He finds peace and new respect for religion by visiting ancient shrines, pastel-colored churches and attending a friend's wife's funeral and burial.
Along the way, he introduces us to a melange of ex-pats and locals, like Ilena, an artist versed in native medicine who before his eyes, cures a sick child's fever with "a fist of dried basil stalks and a raw egg" in a glass of water. He meets Licha and Adriana, two beautiful uninhibited women with aristocratic roots who are part of Mexico's warm embrace that enabled him to begin "again to live inside my body, to live with my heart and my senses and less so merely inside my mind...."
Skwiot first traveled there when he was a spiritually disaffected young Midwesterner trying to distance himself from dark days and a barrage of North American angst. In a short time he decides to stay in Mexico because, among other reasons, he says "it penetrated me like a balm."
I was interested in this memoir because 30 years after Skwiot's journey, my son took a similar trip through Eastern Europe and Africa, seeking his own spiritual and sensual healing. "San Miguel de Allende, Mexico" helped me appreciate why young men leave home to head for unknown towns full of risk, mystery and magic.
In a number of ways, this book is a man's version of Elizabeth Gilbert's "Eat, Pray, Love," but without her fat checkbook and self indulgence. Both books contain an abundance of good writing, appreciation for the local food and beverage; wine for Gilbert, tequila for Skwiot. He feasts on delicious Mexican street foods like gorditas, chorizos and picks avocados off the tree outside his window. He finds peace and new respect for religion by visiting ancient shrines, pastel-colored churches and attending a friend's wife's funeral and burial.
Along the way, he introduces us to a melange of ex-pats and locals, like Ilena, an artist versed in native medicine who before his eyes, cures a sick child's fever with "a fist of dried basil stalks and a raw egg" in a glass of water. He meets Licha and Adriana, two beautiful uninhibited women with aristocratic roots who are part of Mexico's warm embrace that enabled him to begin "again to live inside my body, to live with my heart and my senses and less so merely inside my mind...."
August 15, 2014
One of my few experiences accompanying an ex-pat in Mexico. I love the journey of a man trying to find himself through writing - a sort of mid-life crisis, brought on by a yen for creativity and dissatisfaction with the corporate life. His search for self, both as a person living among people as well as an author, finding his place in the literary flow of life, creates a dreamy tapestry, as befits this journey outside the mundane and familiar circumstances of life and into a village where everything and everyone is new and unfamiliar. Special notes: I loved to watch him practice his craft in his notebook. I loved to learn about the culture of small town Mexico. I loved the impractical, creative rhythm of the ex-pat, not too different from my own post-college hippie years, as a "free spirit" in Berkeley.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews