Life in the Fat Lane. Cherie Bennett. 1999. New York. Reed Business Information.
Annotation: A perfect, popular, pretty girl named Lara suddenly develops a disease that causes her uncontrollably gain large amounts of weight.
Justification for Rejection: Bennett provides a detailed account of all characters, which was good. She did a great job of portraying her brother and parents to make the story very believable and to enhance Lara's preoccupation with being skinny. When Lara starts gaining weight, her mother does not understand, and Lara does all she can to take the weight off, but nothing is working. She eventually gets diagnosed with Axell-Crown Syndrome (which is not a real disease). It was good to see how Lara's perceptions of overweight people changed and that beauty is not all about looks. It is an issue that many young girls can identify with as they deal with their own body image issues.
The reason for my rejection is that it seems a little unrealistic. The syndrome is made up, so something like this would probably never happen to a popular girl who has it all. I know that many girls can relate, but I find it hard to believe that she still keeps her boyfriend and best friend, who do not seem bothered. In real life, I think that teens that age would get more caught up in looks and possibly distance themselves from that person.
Genre: Ya Fiction
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