The Girls at 17 Swann Street

The Girls at 17 Swann Street  by Yara Zgheib     384 pages (I read a galley - book is due out in 2019)

Per Goodreads, the description of this book is: My name is Anna. 

I am a dancer, a constant daydreamer. 

I like sparkling wine in the late afternoon, ripe and juicy strawberries in June. 

I believe in the rich taste of real vanilla ice cream, melting stickily from a cone...

I am madly in love, I am madly in loved. 

I believe in living life with purpose, but in floating through the day too. 

I have books to read, places to see, babies to make, birthday cakes to taste. I even have unused birthday wishes to spare. 

So what am I doing here?

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What this book doesn't tell you, and what I can reveal without much of a spoiler, is that Anna is receiving treatment for anorexia and is living at a house in St. Louis with a group of other women who are also in treatment.  I really enjoyed this book and found it was introspective without being annoying, realistic, but written in an engaging, lyrical way. You understand how Anna gradually descended to the state she's in when she enters the house on Swann Street, and while there is some back-and-forth in time, it's never jarring.  I started this book and found it difficult to put down ---- in fact, my husband remarked that's how he knew I had a book I was enjoying because if I had 10 minutes to wait for something in the oven, I was reading the book.

I liked that while the main perspective is Anna's, there is also some perspective coming from her husband when he's communicating with her. It was especially interesting to read Anna's interpretation of their relationship, and then how her memories of something would be changed when her husband would talk to her about the reality of those memories. Her exploration of how she got to Swann Street and also how she is going to get better and go back home, makes for a fascinating and compelling story.

Skin And Bones

Skin And Bones by Sherry Shahan, 259 pages

Jack is anorexic.  In a program trying to recover, he meets the girl of his dreams and also makes a a good friend.  Nicknamed Bones, at first he simply tries to keep losing weight, despite the efforts of the doctors and counselors but as time passes and Bones sees what is happening to Alice, the girl he likes, he starts to see his problems in a new light.  This was an extraordinary book about teens with body image and food issues, especially since anorexia is more common for girls.  I think that a lot of teens would like this.

Thinner Than Thou

Thinner Than Thou by Kit Reed, 334 pages


 This novel is set in the semi-future where youth and thinness has become the new religion, pushing all other religions underground. Leading this new religion is Reverend Earl who preaches about the Afterfat, where you eat whatever you want and still look like a Greek god. The narrative itself focuses on several characters Annie, an anorexic, and her friend Kelly, who are imprisoned in a religious convent for people with eating disorders, It also follows middle-aged Jeremy who discovers that Sylphania, Reverend Earl's exclusive weight-loss spa is a concentration camp where failure to lose weight and tone up leads to brutal punishment. And hidden under all of this lies a world of teen competitive eating contests, fat porn, and where an underground railroad of rebellious religions.

I originally saw this book on a science fiction display and thought that it sounded like an interesting read. After reading I still think it's an interesting idea, but I feel that it wasn't as good as I would have liked it to be. My first problem with the book was the pacing, some parts of it just seemed unnecessary and really only added onto the overall length. My other complaint with this book was deciding whether or not it actually glorified eating disorders or not which I can't really discuss without spoiling certain parts. Over all it was kind of interesting, but I wouldn't necessarily recommend it. 

A Trick Of The Light

A Trick Of The Light by Lois Metzger 196 pages

Mike is hearing a voice in his head.  Even though Mike is a pretty good student and an athlete with a good friend who shares his interest in stop action movies, the voice has started telling him that he’s not good enough, that he is fat, and that he could be better and stronger.  Mike listens to that voice and starts eating less, exercising a lot more, and losing weight.  A lot of weight.  So much weight that the people in his life start to notice and may start to interfere.  A really awesome story about a boy with anorexia.  Because a lot of people believe that eating disorders are only a problem women and girls suffer from, this is a very compelling story that many teens would like