Most Helpful Customer Reviews
10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A Keeper, October 26, 2004
This review is from: Perfect: A Novel (Hardcover)
This was a hard book for me to review because I had an eating disorder when I was a teenager. Only in those days there was no knowledge to be had of eating disorders let alone help and support. You were just told to go on a diet. I remember a particularly nasty one where I could only eat grapefruit, hardboiled eggs, plain toast, and salad without dressing. Yet I was determined to look good in my cinch waisted skirt with layers of petticoats like all the popular girls in school.
I'm sure this is how the protagonist Isabelle Lee in Perfect feels. You'd do anything to feel good, not only in your clothes, but inside your vulnerable self. Isabelle's eating disorder is Bulimia: eat, purge, eat, purge. How else can she cover her feelings about her father's death, her mother's denial of it, and her seeming lack of popularity in her eighth grade class? To her horror her younger sister discovers Isabelle vomiting. Her mother makes her go to an eating disorder group for girls her age. To her amazement the most popular girl in school, Ashley Barnum, is there in group as well. Ashley's disorder is that of taking laxatives. They bond together to go through the stages of recovery filled with distrust, shifting friendships, courage, and finally confidence. Along the way Isabelle helps her sister and her mother face their grief, just by being more sure of who she really is.
Eating disorders are all too common in younger and younger children in our society, ranging from rampant obesity to anorexia. Perfect describes in page turning novel form how young girls can find help and support in eating disorder groups where confidentiality, mentors, and understanding of their disorder offer deep encouragement and healing. This book can give young people insight into the nature of eating disorders through a compassionate story without at all being preachy.
Perfect is a most important, even landmark, book. Kudos to author Natasha Friend for writing such an insightful young adult novel. Perfect is highly recommended for children from 10 years and older. I wish I had it when I was young. It will also be a valuable aide in eating disorder groups and women's studies groups in high school. What a great starting point for discussions.
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Whoa.. real, March 20, 2005
Perfect was a very good read.
I read it in one day.
This novel probes the life of 13-year-old Isabelle, who is bulimic. Her father is dead. It seems her whole family is unstable. Her mother, although putting on a happy facade, cries at night for her dead husband. Her annoying sister is sad, too. Isabelle is also sad. It seems she is oppressed in expressing her feelings, though, which is why she chooses bulimia - as an outlet.
Isabelle is forced to go to Group - a group that helps people with eating disorders. To her shock, Ashley Barnum, the most popular girl in school, is also in Group. They develop a friendship that makes Isabelle learn more about who Ashley really is, and, ultimately, about herself.
This book is one book that you must read. Although it is geared towards younger teens, I recommend it to anyone who is looking for a good book about an eating disorder - and, not only that, but one of coming of age. This would also be a great book for parents to read.
The characters are real. You feel their emotions, and you are taken on a journey through Isabelle's life.
Honest and well-written, Perfect is a book that should be in every library's shelves.
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Extremely acurate, great read!, February 19, 2005
This review is from: Perfect: A Novel (Hardcover)
Although I am far above the recommended age of reader, 23, I picked up this title because I have struggled with anorexia and bulimia for 12 years. Unlike many other eating disorder fictions, which I usually find cliche, too textbook case, unrelatable, this book was dead on. It did not shy away from specifics about the life of a bulimic, it was candid, emotional, and in so many parts mirrored my own life exactly. I recommend this book highly to any pre/early teen girl, and also to older teens and adults who have patients, children, siblings with eating disorders, as this book does an excellent job of explaining the mindset of someone with an e.d. Those who, like myself, have had an e.d. will relate to it. I also highly recommend "Wasted: A Memoir of Anorexia and Bulimia" for readers over 15 and "Stick Figure: A diary of my former self" for any reader over 11 years.
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