The Fat Girl's Guide to Life and over one million other books are available for Amazon Kindle. Learn more

Vous voulez voir cette page en français ? Cliquez ici.

Have one to sell? Sell yours here
Start reading The Fat Girl's Guide to Life on your Kindle in under a minute.

Don't have a Kindle? Get your Kindle here, or download a FREE Kindle Reading App.

Fat Girl's Guide To Life, The [Hardcover]

Wendy Shanker
4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (21 customer reviews)

Available from these sellers.


Formats

Amazon Price New from Used from
Kindle Edition CDN $9.65  
Hardcover --  
Paperback, Bargain Price CDN $2.34  

Book Description

April 15 2004
Wendy Shanker is a fat, healthy, beautiful girl who has simply had enough. Enough of family, friends, co-workers, women's magazines, even strangers on the street, all trying (and failing) to make her thin. She finally decided, "If I can't take it off, I'm going to take it on."

With a mandate to change the world-and the energy to do it-Wendy shows how media madness, corporate greed, and even the most well-intentioned loved ones prey on our shrink-to-fit minds, if not our shrink-to-fit bodies. She invites people of all sizes, shapes, and dissatisfactions to trade self-loathing for self-tolerance, celebrity worship for reality reverence, and a carb-free life for a guilt-free Krispy Kreme.

Wendy explores dieting debacles, full-figured fashions, and feminist philosophy while guiding you through exercise clubs, doctor's offices, shopping malls, and even the bedroom. She believes that you can be fit and fat, even as the weight loss industry conspires to make you think otherwise. The Fat Girl's Guide to Life invites you to step off the scale and weigh the issues for yourself.

Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought


Product Details


Product Description

From Publishers Weekly

This send-up of the thin-is-in mentality is funny enough to make even diehard dieters consider replacing their baby carrots with Krispy Kremes. Shanker, one of Us Weekly's Fashion Police commentators and a self-proclaimed fat girl, estimates she's spent 16 years trying to lose weight: "I've met with seven weight loss specialists, worked with three nutritionists and three personal trainers, tried a dozen weight loss programs, taken thousands of pills, joined six gyms, read thirty-one books and spent enough money on weight loss to buy myself an Ivy League degree." Out of this context, Shanker takes on the media, corporate America and even the medical establishment, arguing with their belief that it's impossible to be both fit and fat. "Let's take the focus off 'fat' and put it on health," she lectures. "Let's take the focus off 'skinny' and put it on good common sense. Let's take the focus off body image and put it on education, women's rights, human rights, the economy, baseball cards, anything." Although Shanker's opinions on full-figured fashion and feminist philosophy are entertaining, she's at her best writing about her stint at Duke Diet and Fitness Center, one of the country's oldest and most successful weight management centers. As her optimism about the hardcore Duke University Medical School program flags, her diary of adventures becomes increasingly irreverent, refreshing and human. Anyone who has ever tried to lose a pound will gain confidence and a sense of humor from Shanker's story.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Review

Praise for Wendy Shanker:

"A woman to watch: fierce, funny, media-savvy."-Ms.

"Gut-busting."-Entertainment Weekly

"Wicked."-Newsweek

"A bubbly diva."-Harper's Bazaar

Customer Reviews

4.5 out of 5 stars
4.5 out of 5 stars
Most helpful customer reviews
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars It's not about being funny July 6 2004
By Babs
Format:Hardcover
I am a reader from Santiago, Chile. (Southamerica, for the ones who have a question mark on your faces :)
I've been reading the other reviews and my question is: Who on God's green earth would read this book because it's funny??? If you want a funny book, read a book with jokes, but this is most definitely NOT a book to laugh AT...there are some funny situations, but don't treat it like a "funny book". It shows disrespect to the author and to all people who see ourselves pictured in this book.
After making my point clear, I have to say it is a great book! I myself am going through a "discovering myself" jorney, and this book has helped me getting to the core of my behavior; I haven't even finished it, and I already find it inspiring, not to "stop taking care of myself" or to think that being overweight is healthy, but to learn to feel good with myself, just the way I am. For all you people who think this books aims to make people want to be fat & unhealthy, I tell you, it is actually ALL THE WAY AROUND. I am "overweight" or in Wendy's words, a "fat chick" and this book has nothing but help me love myself a little bit; I still want to lose some weight, but with my feet more "on the ground"...see the difference? And like someone said, discriminating people for being fat, is just another type of racism...which speaks REALLY badly about us, 21st century people...don't you think?
Wendy, whatever you write, I'll be happy to read it! thanks for being so courageous and brave, to show the world who you really are and how proud you are of it! Hope I can be like you someday!
And I whish everybody were like that...it would be a much nicer world. :)
Was this review helpful to you?
4.0 out of 5 stars Devour This Book! Jun 30 2004
Format:Hardcover
Nicely Written.
Good humor.
A great joy to read for thin or fat.
Her mind is like going into my head. Back and forth.
One day it's ok, the next day, no.
Wendy is very real.

A joy!

Was this review helpful to you?
5.0 out of 5 stars Big Fat BRAVA for Wendy Shanker! Jun 27 2004
By A Customer
Format:Hardcover
Wendy Shanker defends and celebrates being fat - and fit - with such style and insight. Never flip or glib or emptily rah-rah, she backs up all of her assertions with thorough research and thoughtfully described personal experience. Also, she is funny. REALLY funny. While this book says everything that needs to be said about this country's evil diet industry and thin fetish, heck, I'd read anything Wendy Shanker writes.
Was this review helpful to you?
Want to see more reviews on this item?
Most recent customer reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars Truthfully Funny, Important, Good for All, Thin or Fat
I Sergio, the obsessed metal head am not only in love with heavy metal music, but also REAL beautiful women, and by that I mean Large beautiful women. Read more
Published on Jun 24 2004 by S. Morales
3.0 out of 5 stars Very Funny, could be more size positive
This book is outrageously funny and has great insights on the perils of being fat. Wendy's adventures at Duke, at Weight Watchers (although I've never been held up by robbers at a... Read more
Published on Jun 10 2004
5.0 out of 5 stars Great Book and Great Reality Check
I thought this book was smart, funny and human. Its message is really one for every woman: Stop obsessing about what you think is wrong with your body and yourself and get smart... Read more
Published on Jun 9 2004
4.0 out of 5 stars Loved the humor
I loved this book for all its wonderful stories and humor. However, I detected a message of "If you're fat, accept yourself and accept that you won't get exactly what you... Read more
Published on Jun 9 2004
4.0 out of 5 stars It's not about weight, necessarily.
The reader from Miami, FL, did not read this book, or they would have known that Wendy is actually healthier than most people, she explains why. Read more
Published on May 28 2004 by Julie A. Furstenfeld
4.0 out of 5 stars Even the title is courageous
Of course Wendy Shanker is conflicted. Who wouldn't be with the constant barrage of anorexic models and actresses and the dearth of women in the public eye who are... Read more
Published on May 7 2004 by "orianarose"
3.0 out of 5 stars Not a Bad Book but....
I thought this book was quite good, but I also found, as did another reviewer, that there were conflicting messages at times. Read more
Published on May 5 2004
5.0 out of 5 stars Feisty, Fun and Honest.
Wendy Shanker has a winner with "The Fat Girl's Guide To Life!" Clever, forthcoming and inspiring, it chronicles her struggles with weight, her self-image, and how she... Read more
Published on May 4 2004 by Suzanne
5.0 out of 5 stars Read this book!!!
Whether you're fat or not, this book is a great read. Wendy is sharp and funny and has a perspective much-missing from the pop culture she (and I) love so much. Read more
Published on April 29 2004
3.0 out of 5 stars Fat is good-- uh, I mean bad-- no, good
I was very excited to see this book out, and some great points were made, but Ms. Shanker is clearly deeply conflicted. Read more
Published on April 26 2004 by Erica
Search Customer Reviews
Only search this product's reviews

Listmania!

Create a Listmania! list

Look for similar items by category


Feedback