Synopses & Reviews
"I wish to be the thinnest girl at school, or maybe even the thinnest eleven-year-old on the entire planet," confides Lori Gottlieb to her diary. "I mean, what are girls supposed to wish for, other than being thin?"
For a girl growing up in Beverly Hills in 1978, the motto "You can never be too rich or too thin" is writ large. Precocious Lori learns her lessons well, so when she's told that "real women don't eat dessert" and "no one could ever like a girl who has thunder thighs," she decides to become a paragon of dieting. Soon Lori has become the "stick figure" she's longed to resemble. But then what?
Stick Figure takes the reader on a gripping journey, as Lori struggles to reclaim both her body and her spirit.
By turns painful and wry, Lori's efforts to reconcile the conflicting messages society sends women ring as true today as when she first recorded these impressions. "One diet book says that if you drink three full glasses of water one hour before every meal to fill yourself up, you'll lose a pound a day. Another book says that once you start losing weight, everyone will ask, 'How did you do it?' but you shouldn't tell them because it's 'your little secret.' Then right above that part it says, 'New York Times bestseller.' Some secret."
With an edgy wit and keenly observant eye, Stick Figure delivers an engrossing glimpse into the mind of a girl in transition to adulthood. This raw, no-holds-barred account is a powerful cautionary tale about the dangers of living up to society's expectations.
Review
Compelling. (Booklist)
Review
It reads like a novel. (Boston Globe)
Review
Poignant...Gottlieb is dead-on about society's irrational attitudes towards women's bodies. (Washington Post Book World)
Review
Very, very funny...an entertaining and thoughtful coming-of-age story. (Martha Manning, author of Undercurrents)
Review
Sarah Saffianauthor of Ithaka: A Daughter's Memoir of Being FoundLori Gottlieb's eleven-year-old self is a singular storyteller of unblinking candor and precocious insight. As rife with wry humor as it is lacking in self-pity, this fast-paced chronicle of late-1970s adolescent anorexia is narrated with a light touch, and yet is chilling and poignant in its straightforward simplicity.
Review
Martha Manningauthor of Undercurrents: A Life Beneath the SurfaceLori Gottlieb's approach is compassionate, and very, very funny. More than just a book about anorexia, Stick Figure is an entertaining and thoughtful coming-of-age story that deals with an almost universal theme -- negotiating the minefields of early adolescence and living to tell the tale.
Review
Peggy Orensteinauthor of School Girls: Young Women, Self-Esteem, and the Confidence GapBy turns earnest and funny, hopeful and tragic, eleven-year-old Lori is a latter-day Alice: She takes us through the distorted looking glass that's held up to young girls and into the harrowing land of eating disorders. There is no other word for it: You will devour this book -- and, hopefully, keep right on eating.
Synopsis
Based on her childhood diaries, Gottlieb's book chronicles her preteen battle with anorexia nervosa. A precocious chess-loving student with a straight A average, young Lori aspires to supermodel thinness in an attempt to reconcile society's conflicting messages and to gain her parents' attention.
About the Author
Lori Gottlieb, a medical student at Stanford University, is a former Hollywood executive. Her work has appeared in Salon, Slate, and Daily Variety, among other publications. She lives in California.
Table of Contents
Contents Part One: Winter 1978
"Who Do You Think You Are, Young Lady?"
Captain of Justice
Power Paragraph
Real Women Don't Eat Dessert
Thunder Thighs
Sex Education
Chameleon
Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness
"That's My Girl"
The Lori Monument
Sorry About the Milk Shake, Mr. President
Day of Atonement
Part Two: Spring 1978
Please Help the Hungry
Lactose Intolerant
If You Can Pinch an Inch
Level F, Section Pink
Facts and Figure
Shrink Me
Absolute Delight
Don't Talk with Your Mouth Full
Chewing on Air
"Hello, Angels....It's Charlie"
E Is for Electrolyte
Part Three: Summer 1978
Breck Girl
Fractions
Brownie
Camp Cedars
Nora
Hey, Taxi
Shereen's Jeans
Life without Andy Gibb
Cutting the Fat
Secretary School
North Star
Do Not Resuscitate
Stick Figure
Eggshells
You Can Never Be Too Rich or Too Thin
Epilogue
Acknowledgments