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4.0 AVERAGE
4.0 AVERAGE
Wow there is a lot of emotion packed into this book - so much that I couldn't finish.
I read this book over 6 months ago but it has taken me quite a while to gather my thoughts and emotions and write a review that can somehow give this book the honor it deserves.
1. If you're an anorexic reading this for the tips you are obviously not recovered. If you are anorexic and reviewing this, come on, this is someone's story and to dirty it by saying she is helping you continue your illness that's just wrong.
2. If you are the vast majority of people and you are just reading this and not suffering from an ED then there is no problem. I am disturbed that people are seriously reviewing this and saying it's not a good book because it is a 'trigger.'
3. Her writing is beautiful almost poetic. Her descriptions of herself are heartbreaking and raw. This book literally changed me. I would based on this book compare Marya to Sylvia Plath. (I know some people will go crazy about that.)
4. Once you pick it up, you will not put it down. Pick a quiet calm Sunday, open this book, and spend the whole day reading. I promise you won't be able to put it down.
I read this book a long time ago, and I still think about it. Look at some of the best quotes that are tagged from this book, they're beautiful and they will make you want to read it again and again.
1. If you're an anorexic reading this for the tips you are obviously not recovered. If you are anorexic and reviewing this, come on, this is someone's story and to dirty it by saying she is helping you continue your illness that's just wrong.
2. If you are the vast majority of people and you are just reading this and not suffering from an ED then there is no problem. I am disturbed that people are seriously reviewing this and saying it's not a good book because it is a 'trigger.'
3. Her writing is beautiful almost poetic. Her descriptions of herself are heartbreaking and raw. This book literally changed me. I would based on this book compare Marya to Sylvia Plath. (I know some people will go crazy about that.)
4. Once you pick it up, you will not put it down. Pick a quiet calm Sunday, open this book, and spend the whole day reading. I promise you won't be able to put it down.
I read this book a long time ago, and I still think about it. Look at some of the best quotes that are tagged from this book, they're beautiful and they will make you want to read it again and again.
Ahh, another book I purchased while reeling from my surgery and on a lot of painkillers - hence another book that's been on my Goodreads 'to read' list for over ten years. How exciting.
I hesitate to say I loved this, as it's a rough topic. But I did fall in love with Hornbacher's writing, as difficult as what she put herself through was. I wish there had been more of a psychological breakdown about her recovery, but given the timing in which she wrote this and how she was still within the grasps of her eating disorder even at the time of publishing, I can see what that wasn't the case. Besides, eating disorder treatment was still a work in progress in the mid-90s, as it is today.
A lot of reviewers mention here about how this book gives tips for those suffering with eating disorders, and that's true. It does. But I don't believe this is a reason to ban this book, to censor it or age restrict it, especially in today's culture when a lot of these tips and tricks are easily accessible with a simple Google search.
One thing... God, I wanted to shake her parents. Your child is literally killing herself, she is DYING, and you keep sending her around the country alone and leaving her by herself for vast stretches of the time? Every time you send her away, she comes back and she's worse. What the fuck is wrong with her parents?
I hesitate to say I loved this, as it's a rough topic. But I did fall in love with Hornbacher's writing, as difficult as what she put herself through was. I wish there had been more of a psychological breakdown about her recovery, but given the timing in which she wrote this and how she was still within the grasps of her eating disorder even at the time of publishing, I can see what that wasn't the case. Besides, eating disorder treatment was still a work in progress in the mid-90s, as it is today.
A lot of reviewers mention here about how this book gives tips for those suffering with eating disorders, and that's true. It does. But I don't believe this is a reason to ban this book, to censor it or age restrict it, especially in today's culture when a lot of these tips and tricks are easily accessible with a simple Google search.
One thing... God, I wanted to shake her parents. Your child is literally killing herself, she is DYING, and you keep sending her around the country alone and leaving her by herself for vast stretches of the time? Every time you send her away, she comes back and she's worse. What the fuck is wrong with her parents?
dark
emotional
sad
medium-paced
I have never read another book that has made me cringe as much as this one did. Reading about Marya's lifelong challenges with both bulimia and anorexia made me clutch at my own ribcage from time to time: when she described in detail the gaunt bones that poked through her skin, when she related the times she binged everything in her parent's kitchen only to throw it up later and flood the house with vomit, when she detailed her time in a mental hospital sneaking purges and laxatives behind the backs of the staff members. My reading time was spent thinking, "How can someone do this to themselves?" Marya gave me all those answers through her gruesomely honest narrative.
I don't think I would have enjoyed this book if it had not been written as well as it is. I was immediately drawn into her style; her use of words is quite beautiful. There are times when the story seems to drag on a bit, but this story opened my eyes to the sides of these diseases that I had no idea existed.
Finally, I think I gained the most respect for Marya when I read the following lines in the afterword of the book: "I have not enjoyed writing this book. Making public what I have kept private from those closest to me, and often enough from myself, all my life, is not exactly my idea of a good time. This project was not..."therapeutic" for me...On the contrary, it was very difficult...After a lifetime of silence, it is difficult then to speak." (275)
I don't think I would have enjoyed this book if it had not been written as well as it is. I was immediately drawn into her style; her use of words is quite beautiful. There are times when the story seems to drag on a bit, but this story opened my eyes to the sides of these diseases that I had no idea existed.
Finally, I think I gained the most respect for Marya when I read the following lines in the afterword of the book: "I have not enjoyed writing this book. Making public what I have kept private from those closest to me, and often enough from myself, all my life, is not exactly my idea of a good time. This project was not..."therapeutic" for me...On the contrary, it was very difficult...After a lifetime of silence, it is difficult then to speak." (275)
emotional
inspiring
fast-paced
this is a woman who is still in love with her eating disorder. more than that, she seems proud of it: this is how far I can go; this is how sick I can become and how much I can make myself do. it feels almost more like a celebration than a cautionary tale. and hell, maybe it is.
An interesting and in-depth exploration of one woman's life with eating disorders. Super wordy and more than a little self-indulgent in the writing department.