Skinny
by Donna Cooner
I was really impressed with this story of a girl who undergoes bariatric surgery to come down from 300 pounds and get a chance to star in the high school musical. An interesting thing is, at the end she still weighs a lot more than most girls her age (I hope that's not a spoiler), but is able to run three miles, wear normal clothes, and be treated like a normal, attractive teenager. And there was the unsaid implication that, even if she stayed at that weight, things would be okay.
I find that a little remarkable. And just a bit of wishful thinking on the part of the author. It's very possible that her family and friends might accept her new weight, since they know where she came from, but very impossible that the rest of the world would.
But whatever. It was all good, with a complicated, intriguing family dynamic; a tricky, twisty interplay of friends and frenemies; and most realistic of all, a hyper-critical inner voice named "Skinny" that kept knocking her down when she was struggling the hardest just to stand up.
However...despite all my liking for the story, I'm not sure 15 is an appropriate age to make a decision about a life-altering surgery, and I'm not sure the book should have presented it so rosily. Yes, the after effects were described well enough and she did experience some of the problems that might happen when you have a drastically reduced stomach size. (If you're curious, WebMD.com has a long list of potential side effects.) But I the can't help wondering if a better use of her medical plan benefits might have been cognitive therapy to squelch her evil inner demon and learn positive coping strategies. I can't help wondering how she is going to cope with the next set of painful life events that come down the line. You know there will be some--a death, a loss of a job, a failed relationship. How will she cope then?
Not part of the story, though. And it's only a light-hearted, fun story even though it touches on very serious topics. Enjoyed; enough.
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