Wintergirls by Laurie Halse Anderson
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Wintergirls was more of a young adult, maybe mid to late teen novel but can also be appreciated by anyone who lived through those years and still recall the hurts and joys and deep heartfelt feelings that every little thing seemed to bring on.
Every one of us remembers high school and how we all made sure we were either perfectly dressed like everyone else, or perfectly dressed like no one else, we all had our body image issues, our hair issues, our clothing issues. But most of us were lucky to make it through unscathed. Most of us managed to make it to the point where we became fully functioning adults in the real world and we stopped caring so much about what others thought or about what our bodies were doing.
This book is the story about Lia...whose body image issues and friendship with someone who had similar issues fed her mind until she became diseases with anorexia. I won't give too much of the story away but unfortunately, Lia is now alone and has even more to deal with on top of her body image issues and anorexia. Lia is fresh out of a hospital and living with her Dad and stepmom and half sister. She is superficially functioning. She is lying about eating, lying about her weight and fooling her family...but the truth may be that most of them would like to be fooled because this isn't an issue that anyone really wants to deal with.
Here's an excerpt of Laurie Halse Anderson's writing:
"I pee out the extra water inside me and strip. I stand five feet, five inches tall, a little shorter than freshman year. That's when my periods stopped, too. I pretend to be a fat, healthy teenager. They pretend to be my parents. Everything is just fine." (in the book 'everything just fine' has a line through it as if it was a mistake).
"I close my eyes.
As I step on the scale, Jennifer warns Emma about ice cream.
As I step on the scale, Emma fears vanilla.
As I step on the scale, Dad swings his racket and scores.
As I step on the scale, Mom slices open a stranger.
As I step on the scale, shadows edge closer.
As I step on the scale, Cassie dreams.
I open my eyes. 099.00 pounds. I am officially standing on Goal Number One.
Ha.
If my docs knew, they'd bodyslam me back into treatment. There would be consequences and repercussions because (once again) I broke the rules about the perfect sized Lia. I am supposed to be as big as they want. I am supposed to repeat my affirmations like incantations to drive the nasty voices out of my head. I am supposed to commit to recovery like a nun pledging body and soul in a convent.
They are morons. This body has a different metabolism. This body hates dragging around the chains they warp around it. Proof? At 099.00, I think clearer, look better, feel stronger. When I reach the next goal, it will be all that and more.
Goal Number Two is 095.00, the perfect point of balance. At 095.00, I will be pure. Light enough to walk with my head up, meaty enough to fool everyone. At 095.00, I will have the strength to stay in control. I'll stand on the blocks hidden in the toes of my satin ballet slippers, pink ribbons sewn into my calves, and rise above up in the air: magical.
At 090.00, I will soar. that's Goal Number Three.
Cassie watches, half hidden in the shower curtain.
"Give it up, " she whispers."
Okay...so great writing technique. You spend the entire book inside Lia's head which is a scary place to be when you are a person of sound judgement. It's scary to me as a grown women because so many of our teens today DO think this way and Ms. Anderson does a very good job at giving us the experience of reliving those very scary mixed up teenage hormonal years where our sense of self was mostly in the toilet and was definitely never good enough.
Writing technique, I definitely give this four stars. I would go with five but there are times when you are in someone else's head that you can become confused and therefore you have to reread what you just read to understand it. Not a bad thing...just different and some might not enjoy that type of book as it's not an easy breezy read. Story gets a four, simply because it's sad and tragic...I won't tell you the ending...but the ending is why it is getting a four. :) I love the story, I love the characters. I feel Lia's discomfort at being around her Mom. I feel her aloneness in the book when she is in the house with her stepmom. Wow, that was a scary place to be as I was there so many years ago.
I will give this only a 3.5 rating for the character development. Because we are in Lia's head we don't really know what is going on with the other characters. I guess because of the way the story is told, we really shouldn't know...but I was curious.
Overall, a good read. I think teenage girls should read this with their Moms reading it as well. Everyone should know what their daughters may be going through. So as a reference tool for mother's of teenage girls, I give this a 4 as well. Obviously not everyone is developing anorexia...but they could be thinking about cutting, or taking drugs, or any number of crutches that are available to today's teens. Today they are even picking up guns before going to school...
Overall this book gets about a 3.5 - 4.0 star rating. I go with the lower rating because it's not a book for everyone. You probably have to ensure your teenager is strong enough to handle a story such as this one.
Best,
the Critical Librarian :)
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