09.27.2005 Fat Girl By Judith Moore Memoir (c) 2005 196 pages

Judith Moore details her formative years as a fat girl, dealing with the loneliness of being ostracized by her peers, the physical and verbal abuse of her mother, and the absence of her father. Other star players include her mean-spirited grandmother and her kind uncle.

Moore goes into explicit detail about what she feels is wrong with her to the point of emotional masochism. That explicit detail makes Fat Girl shocking and brave, but at the same time you wonder if she's enjoying seeing how mean she can be to herself. The opening sentence, "You're too fat to fuck," gives an indication of the assaults that lie within. What makes this book interesting, though, is her honesty. She reveals things some people wouldn't reveal with a gun to their head.

With the exception of two chapters, there wasn't much about her adult years, which I was more interested in. But I think this book achieved its purpose -- giving a frank and brutally honest account of life as a fat person. "When you are fat, you are fat every day." It becomes your identity, it is the indicator of what life has in store for you, and what you can expect from life. For any skinny person whose ever made fun of a fat person or looked down on a fat person, this book is a serious wake-up call. You'll thank God that it isn't your life.

4/5 STARS

FAVORITE AMAZON REVIEW by Laurel962
I got this book because it was so extravagantly praised in reviews. Ms. Moore is a very gifted writer, but this highly personal memoir is more like an expose of her deep seated psychological problems than anything illuminating about the lives of overweight women in modern society.
Clearly, Judith Moore had a very difficult childhood, marred by her parents divorce and her lack of contact with her father...her mother and grandmother were harsh (if not outright abusive), and she was molested as a youngster in a movie theatre. HOWEVER...as I read her intense descriptions of her revolting obesity and monstrously ugly body, I was expecting that she was a HUGELY overweight person -- 350-400 lbs or more and unable to climb stairs, put on pantyhose and so forth. In reality, Ms. Moore is a 60 year old woman of average height, who weighs well under 200 lbs and has never been more than about 40 lbs overweight!!! This info doesn't come out until you are nearly done with this extremely short book, and it's startling.
Obviously, some psychological problems and image disorder have rendered her incapable of seeing what she really is -- a moderately overweight, plump middle aged lady and not a huge monster. Her body dismorphia extends to others around her, as she claims her father is grossly obese but then goes on to tell us he is 6 ft tall and weighs about 200 lbs (in other words, perfectly average).
Other reviewers have mentioned the secondary issue in this book beyond obesity, which is Ms. Moore's obsession with SMELLS...she belives that she exudes a "meaty" chicken soup body odor despite regular bathing and normal hygiene. Other people smell too -- especially women and their genitalia. Frankly, this isn't true...it is an abnormal and fairly sick thing to believe (like a racist who thinks all black people "smell funny").
Obviously poor Judith Moore is so emotionally frail and mentally traumitized that she can no longer picture reality...caught in a lifelong spiral of self hatred that extends far beyond society's well documented cruelity to the REALLY overweight. It's especially sad when you realize that she is well into her sixties, and still has failed to make peace with the fact that she is just a full figured (and probably NOT obese) woman.
My biggest issue with the book is that many truly large size readers will buy this (and it's expensive for a very short book) thinking they will learn something "deep" about obesity or the problems of the overweight in society etc., only to find that Ms. Moore is far more predjudiced and hateful towards the overweight than the worst "fattie hater" out there. If you ARE large size or overweight, this book will surely make you feel hopeless and depressed...if you HATE the large and overweight, it will make you feel smug and justified (see how awful they are? They even smell bad!).
Unfortunately, Judith Moore's severe emotional issues drown out whatever she has to say about the condition of the overweight, and this diminishes her fine writing abilities here. For that reason, I can't really recommend this book...but I can recommend that Judith Moore use her profits from the book to find a really good therapist and talk out her childhood issues....

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