Book Review of 13 Ways Of Looking At A Fat Girl by Mona Awad

In 13 Ways Of Looking At A Fat Girl, Mona Awad deconstructs the myth that fat people are somehow inherently more self-serving or self-indulgent than anyone else. The sad fact that resonates throughout the story of Lizze, the titular character, is that she is constantly viewed through another character's gaze. Consequently, in addition to wearing her own fat, she is also saddled with the burden of wearing the unmet expectations, body judgments, false perceptions, stereotypes, and disappointments of those who encounter her. Who is Lizzie, really? After reading 13 Ways Of Looking At A Fat Girl, it is difficult to say. That is like asking how a mirror looks. (Not the frame, or any sort of decoration... but the actual mirror.) Of course you don't know how it looks! You know how YOU look IN it. Lizzie functions the same way for the other characters, even though they are supposed to be in her story.

Whether it be her Mom, a female co-worker, a classmate, a "friend," her Dad, a male co-worker, a pushy saleslady, or a potential love interest, not one person asks Lizzie (or attempts to help her) define who she is for herself. To them, it doesn't seem to matter who she is. Who she is, after all, is fat. Is there anything else?

Awad's eloquent take on what it means to be a fat girl is heartbreaking--namely because it is so accurate, and it does not shy away from the brutal (pardon the word choice here) underbelly of the issues fat girls face. Everything from body acceptance to clothing shopping, from our parents' judgments of how we look to what men assume about us simply because we are fat is examined without mercy. I appreciate that, because without mercy is exactly how fat people are forced to live our lives. But the point Awad makes without ever actually coming right out to say it is this: wouldn't it be nice to have a 14th way of looking at a fat girl, and wouldn't it be a less convoluted world if that way were her own?