Thin is in. Everyone, but everyone, has been taken in by Hollywood's standard of beauty, tummy tucks and fad diets. Its hardly a stretch to imagine a world where thinness is revered as godliness, where a health guru's name is substituted for a higher power. When fat is so revolting that it becomes a guilty pleasure for the masses. Where the anorexic and the obese are hauled away by frightening nun-like figures to rehab centers in the middle of nowhere, and all those over retirement go off to "travel the world". Rather like David Levithan's Wide Awake, this book is mostly concerned with its hypothetical future, using characters to service it rather than vice versa. The novel boasts multiple narratives: the twins searching for their anorexic older sister whom their parents turned in to the Dedicated Sisters, along with their sister's boyfriend; the twin's mother, also looking for her oldest and struggling to deal with the expectations of middle aged women (the face lift); Annie, herself, trapped in a Dedicated center of unknown location, and the businessman within the most holy and grueling of weight loss centers, Sylphania (results guaranteed MEANS results guaranteed). They all manage to tie in rather nicely by the end, though the ending has a frustrating, should've-seen-THAT-coming quality. Reed's prose also speaks to anyone who hasn't fit the standard of beauty, particulary the Fat. That hidden, humiliated rage always seethes just beneath the text, and that lends the book much of its impact. Maybe it will lack the hit to the fashionable waifs of Seventeen, but for everybody else this is a must-read.
Final Verdict: 4Q, 5P
No comments:
Post a Comment