"Good in Bed" by Jennifer Weiner is just such a novel. The heroine, somewhat uniquely, is a "larger lady" which in Chick-lit terms is anyone over a size 14 (UK Size 14 - let's not get into the odd US system here, I am after all, not in the US). She has all the attending paranoia and self esteem bypass expected of big women in our enlightened society. She is, of course, reasonably successful in her job and unlucky in love, having just split up with Bruce, the man who, if not the love of her life, was a pretty good candidate until she'd had enough of his lack of ambition and drive.
She goes through the usual angst, the deep sense of loss, the denial, the yearning...that is until he gets a job at a rival magazine and starts writing about her in intimate detail.
Now this is my first problem with the book. Bruces' first article is a work of art. Entitled "Loving a Larger Woman", it is a perfect example of a modern, confused male feels when faced with the insanity of public perception. He bemoans the state of a society where good people are lambasted and ostracised because they don't fit the template provided by models in magazines. He praises the qualities that matter in people, in women and in Cannie, the main character, in particular. He documents her warmth, her comfort and her giving nature. The article is a glowing beacon of acceptibility in a world of injustice and prejudice.
It falls on deaf ears. The one line guaranteed to cause as much bad feeling in the unwary as possible - "Loving a larger woman is an act of courage" - is written large on the page.
The article is included in the text of the novel as Cannie reads it, but of course, she cannot accept or recognise the tone or context of how it was written, believing herself humiliated, despite the good reactions of her friends, family and work colleagues to the article. This sparks a whirlwind of emotional turmoil that sees her stumbling from one situation to the next, with happy and unhappy outcomes by turn. Her burgeoning success is tempered by regular articles about her, by her faliure to lose weight, by the revelation that one of her idols is a drug addled wasteland of a person, and by the death of someone close. Underlying all of this is the vast gaping hole left by her father, who walked out on them some 15 years earlier. This is something that was never really resolved, but then under the circumstances, it really never was going to be.
This book has a little of everything, pain, pleasure, loss, discovery, bitterness, misery, post natal depression, druggged up celebrities, California beachlife and a little dog.
Not a blockbuster, but a solid example of a genre which I quite enjoy reading, which I find to be a gentle escape from the norm. For an easy read and a glimpse of how our words can destroy egos and lives despite our best intentions, this is definitely a decent choice of reading matter.
