Ophira Edut

I actually enjoyed this one quite a bit…most of the books about “body issues” or female sexuality (or some combination of the two) have, thus far, been by single authors. This one was a compilation of essays by a myriad of women (different ages, sizes, ethnicities) and was a really refreshing change from “hearing” about a given type of woman’s “issue” or feelings on size/sexuality/cultural background/family expectations…it was good to hear it “from the horses mouth.” I show more most enjoyed The Chosen People by Tali Edut and Marked for Life: Tattoos and the Redefinition of Self (Talvi)…there were none that I strongly disliked and I found Veiled Intentions: Don’t Judge a Muslim Girl by her Covering (Hydar) to be quite interesting and enjoyable when I hadn’t expected to like it at all. Padding It: Why I Don’t need a Plus-Sized Maxi Pad made me laugh so hard I nearly peed my pants…overall, a great read for the genre! I’d recommend it just for the varied perspectives on body image and fat issues overall. A nice change of pace from my recent reading. I give it a solid B! show less

A fairly interesting collection of essays, mostly by women but a few by men, about body image and other issues. Besides standards like weight and eating disorders, the esays cover unusual topics such as:
-being a pretty young middle-eastern woman and having men get obsessed with you
-being a plus-size model
-being a female athlete before that was acceptable
-ruminiations on being a fat amputee performance artist
-being a feminist stripper
-dealing with not blossoming into a beautiful woman upon show more puberty like you had always expected.

I was disappointed that this book didn't have any essays about women with non-mainstream hairstyles, which would have been of particular interest to me, and more essays by men would have been nice. However, it is an interesting read as it is. show less

A great anthology, but I particularly enjoyed the essay written by the vegan!