Screw Inner Beauty: Trash The Diet And Self-Loathing And Get On With Your Life (2009) - Plot & Excerpts
The first few chapters of this book are full of true laugh-out-loud moments. If you're familiar with either Kate's or Marianne's online personality, you can often tell whose words you're reading. Reading this is like sitting down for a late lunch with your best girlfriends, with pitchers of margaritas kept full at all times.[return]Like that same late lunch where, once a few cocktails have been thrown back and the lighthearted catching up is out of the way, you get into the real nitty gritty of what's going on in your lives, the book takes a turn for the more intense in the last third or so. I felt truly overwhelmed by much of what was discussed in the last few chapters in particular, and upon finishing, I wanted to go immediately back and begin again, annotating as I went. This is not just an anti-diet book. This is not just a fat-positive book. This is not just a feminist book. This is a couple of best friends whispering everything you need to hear about your value as a person, in black and white in front of your face. You know that scene in Good Will Hunting where Robin Williams's character says "It's not your fault," over and over and OVER until Will finally breaks down? That's what this book is like. Highly recommended for anyone who has ever suffered from low self-image or self-worth because of body image issues. Otherwise known as "everyone." This was a weird and scary read for me because five years ago I lost a significant amount of weight, and as this book repeatedly asserts that all diets and/or lifestyle changes are doomed to fail in at least five years, if not sooner, it made me feel like I had a sword hanging over my head. There's powerful words on self-acceptance and confidence and not falling into that destructive pattern of assuming all your problems revolve around your weight (this hit close to home, because I truly believed that losing weight would magically transform my entire personality and life and when it didn't happen I felt TOTALLY RIPPED OFF) and I really believe in the concept of health at any size, but a lot of the book is written in a really self-consciously irreverent, informal blog style that comes off as abrasive in print. Also, this is more of a general complaint about the advice for ladies genre, but when self-help authors try to encourage we the readers to grab life by the throat and take those sky-diving lessons or salsa classes or learn French I have a total "BUT I HATE HOMEWORK!!!!!!" reaction. I never want to do any of the self-improvement shit self-improvement books recommend, and it makes me feel like a real dullard. I'm not even one of those people who brags about just wanting to stay home and marathon all 8 seasons of some show all the live long day, the typical self-improvement activity chart is just not my steez.
What do You think about Screw Inner Beauty: Trash The Diet And Self-Loathing And Get On With Your Life (2009)?
My review will be printed in the Aug/Sept issue of BUST magazine. Go check it out.
—Kat
This and Fat So?! By Wann are my two favorite books on this topic. I love them.
—berly
Inspiring, let me to book Intuitive Eating which was more specific and helpful.
—julia_as
Had a problem with the whole 'you need a good partner' chapter
—Trekjeft
