Wintergirls by Laurie Halse Anderson

Summary and review:

Wintergirls begins as Lia learns that Cassie, her former-best friend, is dead. Cassie died alone in a cheap motel room during a cold New Hampshire winter's night, after having left 33 messages on Lia's phone. Lia refused to pick up the phone when Cassie called; Lia also encouraged Cassie's bulimia by making a pact with Cassie to be "skinniest" when the girls were in eighth grade. And now Lia is haunted by Cassie's ghost.

Wintergirls seems like an attempt at poetic prose--different sizes of fonts, repetition, crossed-out phrases, even pages left entirely blank. I sometimes found the style irritating and distracting, but at other times I felt that it captured the confusion, compulsion, and disjointedness Lia suffered because of her disease. One of the most commonly used stylistic devices was crossed-out text, but I'm not actually sure what that meant. Sometimes it seemed like the struckthrough phrases were Lia's attempt at sarcasm, other times they seemed like the conscious censoring of her thoughts to conform with what she feels is acceptable to others, and then there were times when it seemed like the very opposite, as if Lia were rebelling against what she was supposed to feel in order to express her version of reality.

Lia, I would imagine, was a difficult character to write. Typically in order to receive positive reviews, a book needs a sympathetic main character. Lia...isn't really. It is extremely frustrating to watch Lia do things that are so destructive and appear so irrational, especially when she seems to know better at times. Unfortunately, that's the nature of the beast. Anorexia (officially, "Anorexia Nervosa") is, from what I understand, a compulsive disorder, meaning that those who suffer from it are driven to act in a way that is irrational and destructive. Like Lia, those who suffer from anorexia may know that they harming themselves but their disease leads them to continue on the same course regardless.

I don't feel that I gained any insights to the causes of anorexia--rich, upper-middle class white girls with difficult family lives who feel pressured by their parents and want control over their lives. Not much new there. There were places in which Lia's way of thinking was eye opening, however. The way that food conjured up opposing feelings of desire and disgust and the ever-receding target weight were interesting. I was actually worried at times that it was too explicit; some of Lia's methods for hiding her weight loss and disguising her refusal to eat seemed a bit too educational.

I was really conflicted by this book. While the topic is obviously important, I don't know enough about the disease to say whether or not Wintergirls really captured the essence of anorexia. It was definitely not pleasant to read; if terrifying and disturbing were what Anderson was going for, than it was spot on. ★★★★★★☆☆☆☆ (6/10)

Content:

Blood and gore: The description of Cassie's death are disturbing, and Lia is a cutter as well as suffering from anorexia.

Sex: N/A

Language: Not extreme, but the F-word is used (just once, I believe) and other curse words are scattered throughout.