Book Review: Wintergirls

Laurie Halse Anderson tackles another tough topic in Wintergirls: Anorexia. But, as if that wasn't enough, she adds self-mutilation to the mix.

According to the book's blurb:

Lia and Cassie were best friends, wintergirls frozen in matchstick bodies. But now Cassie is dead. Lia's mother is busy saving other people's lives. Her father is away on business. Her step-mother is clueless. And the voice inside Lia's head keeps telling her to remain in control, stay strong, lose more, weigh less. If she keeps on going this way—thin, thinner, thinnest—maybe she'll disappear altogether. 

I went into this book expecting to be disturbed, but never so poetically. If the image of anorexia and Lia's life doesn't stick with you, how the author paints it will. I haven't been so powerfully moved by the tragic beauty of a book since reading The Sky is Everywhere. While I enjoyed Anderson's Speak, Wintergirls rocked the foundations of my world. If I had to describe it in a word it would be: unsettling.

I've never suffered from an eating disorder, but I think that at some point in our lives, every girl considers it. We all feel that pressure to conform the stereotypical image of beauty, and hope that by being thin it might give us an ounce of self-worth. It's that very relatable aspect of this story that makes it so potent.

Yet Wintergirls goes a step further and shows the glittering, bloody edges of what happens when a girl goes too far for her perfect body.

But Anderson does it perfectly. We see everything from Lia's perspective and never through the author's lens. We see how RIGHT it is for Lia to do what she is doing, all the while recoiling because we know it's wrong. Lia is one of those girls whom you like despite what she's doing to herself. She's endearing. She tries so hard, but can't help but feel out of control. Her only way to have control is to starve and cut herself.

This book will make you wince, cry, shudder. But you won't be able to stop reading. And even when you're through, you won't be able to stop thinking about it.

Recommended: Absolutely.
Rating (out of five stars): 5 -- A perfect book, in my opinion.