Wintergirls

What I Liked:
One of the other books that gave me this feeling was another Laurie Halse Anderson novel, Speak. Both of these books ripped me up inside. They hurt almost physically. They’re visceral and unpleasant and eye-opening. In a lot of ways, I hated reading them. At the same time, though, I’m so impressed by the strength of the sensations that Anderson can elicit in her fiction and I know that this intense discomfort I’m feeling is something she’s created and that she’s teaching me and expanding my understanding.

Laurie Halse Anderson is, without a doubt, one of my favorite authors, even if I did somewhat hate the experience of reading two of her books. I’ve read four and each one had such a unique narrative voice. Some authors have essentially the same sort of characters over and over, but, for all that Anderson’s MCs (at least in the ones I’ve read) are white females, they’re quite disparate. The first person perspective of Lia in Wintergirls particularly stands out. The narrative is frenetic, jumbled, nonsensical, messy, and rambling. It takes some time to adjust to, but, once you get there, the writing is such a beautiful chaos of pain, loneliness and little bits of hope.

Going into it, I thought Wintergirls was a novel about a girl with an eating disorder, which it is, but it’s also much more than that. Lia’s mental problems extend further than anorexia, which is a symptom of larger issues. What’s fascinating and intensely painful is the odd mixture of self-awareness and complete lack of self-knowledge Lia’s mental processes exhibit. She knows that she’s in a danger zone weight wise, that she’s hurt people before because of her poor nutrition, and that she craves food, but at the same time she still truly believes herself to be disgusting and fat even as she stares at her protruding ribs. Being in her head is, I repeat, intensely unsettling and eye-opening.

At the novel’s start, Lia has been released from treatment for the second time. She’s living with her father and stepmother, having finally escaped from her Mom Dr. Marrigan. Immediately her goal is to slough off all the weight she was forced to gain in order to get out of the hospital. The death of her best friend, Cassie, accelerates this unhealthy backslide. Cassie and Lia both had eating disorders and encouraged one another in their behavior. Honestly, I’m not really sure what to make of the relationship between Cassie and Lia, except the way that friendship can actually be really unhealthy for you no matter how much you love each other, much like a romantic relationship can be.

Because Laurie Halse Anderson doesn’t write garden variety YA, Wintergirls isn’t about romance. Lia isn’t fixed by the love of a hot boy. The only one who can fix Lia is Lia, even though her parents and her psychologist are trying to help her as much as they can. Though I feel like the parents were a bit unobservant, they were trying, which automatically qualifies them for a good parenting award in YA fiction.

The Final Verdict:
I don’t even know what to say about this book, other than that it hurt my brain and that you should read it, if only to admire how talented Laurie Halse Anderson is. This goes on the list of books I’ll need to reread at least once and maybe multiple times to really fathom.

Laurie Halse Anderson has a legion of fans and Wintergirls wont disappoint any of them.  It is a stark portrayal of teenagers coping (or not) with eating disorders.  You cant be too squeamish to read Wintergirls, but it is so worth it.

The setting:  Lia is sixteen.  Her parents are divorced.  Her teacher father has remarried.  Her heart surgeon mother has not.  She has been in rehab twice.  After the second incarceration, Lia moved in with her dad.  She adores her younger step-sister, Emma.  Her parents dont understand her at all.  Lias childhood best friend, Cassie, was just found dead, alone in a sleazy motel room.  Cassie had called Lia 33 times the night she died and Lia didnt answer the phone.

In Wintergirls, you count calories with Lia.  You step on the scale with her and obsess that in rehab you were forced to eat so now you weigh 105 when you really want to weigh 95 or 90 or really 85.  You cope with never being warm enough because you dont have enough body fat and you are always tired, despite the fact that you sleep constantly.  You live the nightmares that Lia has about Cassie and the arguments she has with her parents.  You learn how she fools her parents into thinking that shes eating.  It is as real a depiction of eating disorders as can be written. 

As she did in Speak, Anderson has taken a difficult and important subject and put it in perspective.  While it doesnt answer the question of why some people develop eating disorders and some dont, it provides an understandable setting in which to get a better handle on these disorders.  Teens will relate to Lia and Cassie, the hardships they suffer in school and the tension that develops between teens and parents.  And parents can relate to the helplessness they feel in trying to understand the whys and the treatment of eating disorders.  And everyone will understand the devastation that occurs to the family members of someone with an eating disorder.

Almost everyone knows someone with an eating disorder, whether they are cognizant of the fact or not.  I cannot think of a person, adult or teen, who will not be affected in some way by reading Wintergirls.  Definitely in my top 5 books of 2009, Wintergirls is a must read