Waisted

January 15, 2019
How far will a woman go to lose weight? Acrobat Films intends to find out by hosting an extreme weight-loss program, but they may have chosen the wrong women for their documentary.Alice signed up for Acrobat Production's second documentary after ruining her husband Clancy's awards night. His film, De Facto, lost to Acrobat's debut: Waisted, the first in a planned trilogy examining women and weight. Worse, Alice's sheer fatness embarrassed him. When she married Clancy, Alice was thin--thin from heartbreak over her last relationship and then with joy over her newfound love for Clancy. Seven years and countless bags of M&Ms later, she can barely squeeze into a size 18. Desperate and furious with Clancy's disapproval, Alice is ready to defect to his enemy's camp. There, at the posh Privation mansion, she joins six other women, including Daphne, a talented makeup artist who ended up at Privation despite her husband's delight in her every curve. Acrobat's methods, however, quickly devolve from extreme to degrading. Naked weigh-ins, Machiavellian trainers, Byzantine exercise equipment, starvation rations, and speed (masquerading as not-so-mysterious "vitamins") quickly melt off the pounds but also break down the women's psyches. That is, until Alice, Daphne, and their roommate, Hania, decide to fight back. The consequences of Acrobat's unmasking, however, remain frustratingly unclear. Meyers (The Widow of Wall Street, 2017, etc.) spins a compelling tale, raising critical questions about familial, social, and cultural messages about body image; each woman at Privation, fat-shamed on a daily basis, has lost her sense of self. Yet Meyers' portraits are also riddled with every stereotype of the overweight American woman, traumatized by well-meaning but bitterly critical mothers and judgmental husbands, stuffing down her emotions with handfuls of sugar and butter. Although Alice, Daphne, Hania, and the other women rebel against Acrobat's evil plan, their lives post-Privation remain food- and body-size obsessed.A Cinderella tale for fat-shamed women that unfortunately misses the mark.

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March 1, 2019

Alice and Daphne are both successful professionals, wives and mothers, and obsessed with their weight--the number on the scale takes precedence over everything else in their lives. The two women meet at an extreme weight-loss camp in Vermont where they agree to be filmed for a future documentary called Waisted. There, they are starved, humiliated, and force-fed speed. When they learn that the purpose of the documentary is not to chronicle their weight loss but to conduct a cruel experiment, they devise an escape plan and have the camp shut down. Back home and still fighting their own personal demons, the women, along with the other camp participants, release their own film, telling their side, and struggle to find what will make them whole. VERDICT Meyers (The Widow of Wall Street) delivers a timely examination of body image, family, friendship, and what it means to be a woman in modern society. It will appeal to anyone who has ever dreaded stepping on a scale; even those who haven't will learn from it. Culturally inclusive and societally on point, this is a must-read. [See Prepub Alert, 11/26/18.]--Elisabeth Clark, West Florida P.L., Pensacola

Copyright 2019 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

March 25, 2019
Meyers’s lackluster latest (after The Widow of Wall Street) concerns what turns out to be an unscrupulous documentary about weight loss, and what two participating women do to avenge themselves. After Alice Thompson’s filmmaker husband, Clancy, admits that her weight has lessened his attraction to her, she agrees to appear in a rival documentarian’s new project involving a weight-loss camp. Makeup artist Daphne also signs up after a lifetime of being harangued by her well-meaning mother. Though the women were enticed by promises of a well-organized wellness center, they’re subjected to verbal cruelty, grueling exercises, and a reliance on amphetamine pills. Alice and Daphne escape the film set and use stolen footage to make their own exposé, but the girl-power ending feels forced. Meyers’s prose is often overwritten: “Machinelike, she scooped out the candy, shoved in the pieces, masticated, and began again, hardly waiting to swallow as her full hand stood ready like an eager soldier, prepared to send the next wave of reinforcements to their deaths.” Some details also require a suspension of disbelief: after a day of hard physical activity, participants have to force themselves to eat their meal of tofu and veggies in a broth. This heavy-handed novel falls short.

April 1, 2019
To Alice and Daphne, being thin is taking over their world. They become fast friends when they both sign up for a program promising dramatic weight loss in one month. Alice, Daphne, and the other participants sign a contract, agreeing to always be filmed, with the end result being a documentary for all to see. However, what they signed turns out to be not what they signed up for. Meyers (Accidents of Marriage, 2014) exquisitely explores body image, family, and marriage in this surprisingly deep novel. Though she starts with a fictionalized version of the TV show The Biggest Loser, she dips into major issues of race, culture, obsession, and sisterhood. Taking on the timely topic of how a woman is perceived in today's society, she twists it into how far women will go to be what society deems right, and at what cost?a marriage, a family obligation, a personal goal? A compelling story that will leave readers giving their scale the side eye. Perfect for fans of Kristan Higgins and Jennifer Weiner.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2019, American Library Association.)