From School Library Journal
Grade 7-10-Sophomore Virginia Shreves lives in Manhattan and attends a prestigious private school. She lives by her Fat Girl Code of Conduct. She has a budding romance with Froggy the Fourth, but she doesn't want his wandering hands to feel her fat. Her baggy clothing helps her to "hide." Her mother, Dr. Phyllis Shreves, is an adolescent psychologist obsessed with her imperfect daughter's weight, and her father is rarely around. Her older sister joined the Peace Corps to escape mom, and brother Byron is big man on the Columbia campus-until he's suspended for date rape. Finally, Virginia stands up to her mother and takes charge of her life. Strong points in the novel are the issue of date rape and its consequences and, however glossed over, eating disorders. Parental pressure is overdone. Mom and dad are stereotypical of adults so involved in themselves that they cannot see their child for who she is. Some passages are very well done, but the book has an uneven quality in prose style and character development. Told through first-person narrative, journal entries, and e-mail, Virginia's story will interest readers who are looking for one more book with teen angst, a bit of romance, and a kid who is a bit like them or their friends.Gail Richmond, San Diego Unified Schools, CACopyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Booklist
Gr. 7-10. Fifteen-year-old Viriginia Shreves is the blond, round, average daughter in a family of dark-haired, thin superstars. Her best friend has moved away, and she's on the fringes at her private Manhattan school. She wants a boyfriend, but she settles for Froggy Welsh, who comes over on Mondays to grope her. The story follows Virginia as she tries to lose weight, struggles with her "imperfections," and deals with the knowledge that her idealized older brother has committed date rape. There's a lot going on here, and some important elements, such as Virginia's flirtation with self-mutilation, are passed over too quickly. But Mackler writes with such insight and humor (sometimes using strong language to make her point) that many readers will immediately identify with Virginia's longings as well as her fear and loathing. Her gradually evolving ability to stand up to her family is hard won and not always believable, but it provides a hopeful ending for those trying stand on their own two feet. Ilene Cooper
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved


Card catalog description
Feeling like she does not fit in with the other members of her family, who are all thin, brilliant, and good-looking, fifteen-year-old Virginia tries to deal with her self-image, her first physical relationship, and her disillusionment with some of the people closest to her.

ANNOTATION

A 2004 Michael L. Printz Award Honor Book

FROM THE PUBLISHER

Fifteen-year-old Virginia Shreves has a larger-than-average body and a plus-size inferiority complex. She lives on the Web, snarfs junk food, and follows the "Fat Girl Code of Conduct." Her stuttering best friend has just moved to Walla Walla (of all places). Her new companion, Froggy Welsh the Fourth (real name), has just succeeded in getting his hand up her shirt, and she lives in fear that he'll look underneath. Then there are the other Shreves: Mom, the successful psychologist and exercise fiend; Dad, a top executive who ogles thin women on TV; and older siblings Anaïs and rugby god Byron, both of them slim and brilliant. Delete Virginia, and the Shreves would be a picture-perfect family. Or so she's convinced. And then a shocking phone call changes everything.

With irreverent humor, insight, and surprising gravity, Carolyn Mackler creates an endearingly blunt heroine whose story will speak to every teen who struggles with family expectations -- and serve as a welcome reminder that the most impressive achievement is to be true to yourself.

FROM THE CRITICS

Publishers Weekly

"Chubby" New York City teenager Virginia Shreves is having a hard time: not only is her best friend, Shannon, spending the school year out west, but Virginia's being pressured about her weight by her family-especially her formerly fat mother, a prominent adolescent psychologist. Lonely and insecure, Virginia has even started to hurt herself. When the brother she worships is suspended from college for date rape, the news shocks Virginia into realizing that her "stellar" family isn't as perfect as her mother says it is, and that she doesn't have to conform to her mother's expectations. Mackler (Love and Other Four-Letter Words) occasionally uses a heavy hand when it comes to making her points ("Recently, I've been finding it harder to pretend that everything is A-OK"), and some of the plot elements, such as the overweight teacher who looks out for Virginia, or Virginia's discovery that a popular girl has an eating disorder, seem scripted. The date rape story line, on the other hand, is gutsy; her brother wasn't just accused of date rape, he actually committed the crime. Ultimately, readers will find it easy to relate to Virginia; she loves junk food, gets nervous about finding someone to sit with in the cafeteria and can't believe that Froggy, the boy she has secretly made out with after school, could be interested in her, not just using her. The e-mails she exchanges with Shannon, and the lists she makes (e.g., "The Fat Girl Code of Conduct") add both realism and insight to her character. The heroine's transformation into someone who finds her own style and speaks her own mind is believable-and worthy of applause. Ages 14-up. (Aug.) Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.

Children's Literature - Claudia Mills

Fifteen-year-old Virginia Shreves is the only imperfect member of her perfect, affluent, high-achieving, upper-West-side family￯﾿ﾽor so she thinks, until the day a devastating phone call comes to her parents about her older brother, Byron. Some of the central elements of Virginia's story are overly familiar: the fat girl who has to learn to accept her body, the e-mails to the best friend who has moved away, the child psychologist mother who understands everybody else's children except for her own. Moreover, Virginia's growing independence from her family's ideals and values manifests itself in fairly trite and stock ways: through dying her hair purple and getting her eyebrow pierced. None of this matters. The details of high school life are carefully observed in a fresh, non-cliched fashion, from the eccentric old teacher who sings corny songs for his students, to the creation of a student "webzine" where kids who don't fit in can find their own voice. The phone call regarding Byron introduces explosive and sensitive issues that are relatively new to teen fiction. Most of all, Mackler has created in Virginia such a believable, funny-voiced, deeply pained character that readers will be rooting for her every step of the way, and cheering through their tears at her new-found strength and dignity in asserting herself against her well-meaning but overbearing family. You go, girl! 2003, Candlewick,

VOYA

Virginia Shreves has some serious issues with which to deal. Her body and her inferiority complex are both larger than average. Her best friend just moved away from home in New York City to Walla Walla, Washington, and just might forget Virginia completely. Froggy, her potential boyfriend, is a great kisser, but he never speaks to her outside their Monday afternoon trysts. Worst of all, she is convinced that she was switched at birth because her family is a collection of thin, bright overachievers. Her adolescent psychologist mother is a diet and exercise fanatic, and her jet-setting father openly prefers skinny women. Byron and Anais, Virginia's older brother and sister, are slim, brilliant, and successful-hard acts to follow. Subtract the oddball Virginia from the equation and this fabulous foursome equals a perfect family. At least they seem perfect until an unspeakable act and a telephone call change everything, and Virginia learns that people are not always what they seem. Mackler allows Virginia to narrate the story of her family's destruction and struggle for redemption in a voice that is dead-on, whether sassy and self-assured or agonized and self-destructive. Hilarious, insecure, hopeful, clueless-Virginia is a treasure. All readers will wish they could tell her that themselves. From the eye-catching silver foil cover, with title graphics looking like lipstick, to the upbeat ending, this novel is a required purchase for public library young adult collections. The occasional use of strong language and a few mild sexual allusions are appropriate and well done. VOYA Codes: 5Q 4P S (Hard to imagine it being any better written; Broad general YA appeal; Senior High, defined as grades10 to 12). 2003, Candlewick, 256p, Hansen

KLIATT - Michele Winship

The title alone is enough to pull teens in, but the spunky narrator in Mackler's second YA novel will keep them reading. Fifteen-year-old Virginia Shreves is a thick girl in a thin world, and a thin family. Being 15 is tough enough, but Virginia's best friend Shannon has moved across the country, and she's trying to figure out if Froggy Welsh the Fourth is actually a boyfriend or just trying to cop a quick feel during their weekly make-out sessions. Her "perfect" family only makes matters worse. Her older, very together sister Anais is in Africa in the Peace Corps, and her brother Byron, the rugby god and straight-A student, is sailing through his sophomore year at Columbia. Her mother, the exercise fiend psychologist, is constantly trying to get her to diet, and her father constantly reminds her how pretty she'd be if she just lost weight. Virginia finds refuge at school with Ms. Crowley, a language arts teacher, and looks forward to visiting Shannon in Seattle over Thanksgiving. Then the world falls apart. Byron is kicked out of school under circumstances that shock Virginia, destroy her image of her "perfect" brother, and send her parents reeling. As she struggles to come to terms with such life-altering circumstances, Virginia realizes that she has been programmed to please others and to go with the flow, and she decides that enough is enough. She books her trip to Seattle, gets her eyebrow pierced, dyes her hair purple, and finally asserts herself to her mother. In accepting herself, she accepts the flaws that really do exist with the rest of her family, including Byron. Funny, touching, and very real, Mackler depicts both the trials and triumphs of adolescence when, like Virginia,we search for, and hopefully find, ourselves. KLIATT Codes: JS￯﾿ﾽRecommended for junior and senior high school students. 2003, Candlewick, 256p.,

School Library Journal