Oh, the plus size heroine. You may choose from the following options:
1. She diets her way to happy endingness, because nothings says “blissful sex and unlimited love forever after” like losing weight and having thin thighs.
2. She diets her way to happy endingness after seeing the visual holyshit that is her head photoshopped onto a thin body. Once this, she suffers from absolutely no misapprehensions as to what her body looks like and instantly adapts to a gym-centric, carrot-stick-loving life, because thin is so in. (No, Jemima J, I have still not gotten over that one).
3. She’s the plucky, plump sidekick of awesome, a sterling character inside a sexually unacceptable and therefore sexually unthreatening character who compliments but doesn’t compete with the heroine.
4. Like the heroine who is so very very accomplished but does nothing but fuck up left right and center, she’ll go on and on about how big and unattractive she is, how she’s larger than the other women she knows and it bothers her, yadda yadda – and then you find out she’s a size 10 or some shit like that.
Weight is a tricky issue for the heroine, who must be a perfect embodiment of all that is perfect without pissing us readers off too much. Lately there have been more explorations into The Land of The Plus Size Heroine in all genres, but mostly it’s a matter of omission. As Robin Uncapher wrote back in 2006
Out-of-fashion beauty was one of the main problems our thin, wide-eyed heroines had to overcome. What these girls had to worry about was being too beautiful, so beautiful the randy heroes could not keep their hands to themselves.
More recently, though, something completely new has happened in the world of romance. A small number of romance writers have been writing women who look more like most of us, not just by being plain, but by feeling overweight. Books like Ruth Wind’s Beautiful Stranger, Justine Davis’ A Whole Lot of Love, and Suzanne Brockmann’s Get Lucky started popping up.
Of course, as Robin points out, once you name a number as a size, a whole lotta women on either side of that number line up to argue about where the real “fat” line lies. Is it size 2? Is it size 14? Is it no size at all? Or is it every size, since so many women suffer under the idea that they are far, far too big for the ideal. Smart authors, if you ask me, leave it up to the reader and never name a number at all, leaving “plus size” in the mind’s eye of the beholder.
So are there plus size heroines that aren’t going to diet their way to happy endings, thereby reinforcing the damaging stereotype that only thin people deserve happiness? Are there heroines who remain their size and then move on to happiness? One Bitchery reader wrote:
I’m looking for romances that feature larger heroines. I’m wondering if you can poll the readers for their recommendations. I don’t care the sub-genre of romance, I just want to have a list of books that feature larger women.
The Rotund did a romance novel review in which the heroine was constantly bringing up her eating habits even though she was an okay size.
It got me thinking that I hadn’t read many and so I’ve gone looking and found some to order, but just want extra feedback.
Thanks to Barb Ferrer, I have read A Whole Lot of Love (among the worst titles ever, really) and it’s marvelous. The heroine, Layla Laraway, is a larger woman blessed with a hot-sex-on-chocolate-silk voice, and she’s a fundraising mastermind. When she meets The Hero, a hottie mchot executive named Ethan, he’s initially smitten with her voice, and has to adjust to the fact that his imagination of what she looked like doesn’t match reality (which he does quickly, thank heaven).
Her insecurities are real, but only part of the obstacles between them, and the heroine herself is marvy. In fact, Alzheimer’s Disease is often more of a focus in the narrative than Layla’s size. And, most importantly, her size is part of her character, not an obstacle to her happy ending – as in, she doesn’t have to make half of herself disappear to earn her future happiness.
So what other plus-size heroines have you read and liked? And which ones made you want to scream at the reinforcement of what The Rotund calls the “hegemony of Thin?”
ETA: While wandering around my house far, far from the reaches of the internet (it’s a scary place, that part of the house – there’s a mountain of laundry that never gets smaller) I realized that there are actually potentially two types of plus-size heroines. One: the kind for whom weight is a conscious issue but hopefully for the sake of a narrative not the only issue, and two: a plus size heroine whose size is a matter of fact element to the story, who doesn’t agonize over it at all.
It seems to me (and I haven’t caffeinated yet fully so I am happy to be disagreed with) that the place in which the openly imperfect heroine* most comfortably resides is historical romance. There are some historical heroines who aren’t visually perfect, for weight reasons or otherwise (note: examples blocked by lack of caffeine), but of course the hero, through the rose-colored lenses of her Magic Hoo Hoo, finds her fascinating. In contemporary romances, it might be more difficult to create an openly imperfect* heroine for weight reasons specifically because of the fatism that affects contemporary society, wherein if you’re fat you’re presumably lazy.
Are there heroines, in any time period, who are totally accepting of their size? Are there well-adjusted women of size in romance?
*Note: *I* for God’s sake do not think any amount of weight up or down is an imperfection. (My post partum ass, let me show you it. Next week.) I am referring to the standard of perfect imposed upon contemporary women, which currently seems to follow a “you should look as bony and square as a 10 year old boy” visual style. So when I say “Visually imperfect” it’s not from my perspective that I’m labeling imperfection. You look marvelous just the way you are. Really.
I was a 6 for all of three weeks in fifth grade. Then I grew hips and 3 more inches of leg, and was in an 8. I wore a 14 through high school and a 16 through college. And I defy anyone to tell me a 16 is fat on me.
Pictoral proof.
I’d rather be a 16 than a 26. But after 4 babies, I doubt even my skeleton is a size 6.
Ev, we haven’t sold the one with our limping shot gunslinger yet. But we’re hoping.
SonomaLass, I write a lot of m/m. My guys aren’t adonises. They come in all shapes and sizes. Some of them aren’t even well-hung. (And some of them are just plain scary in that department) I get tired of perfect bodies.
[[Does the plus-size heroine feed YOUR fantasy? I guess it does. So go for it! Read, write, and live the “plus size†romance.]]
Why does it have to be plus size romance? Does the sexing get bigger? The books longer? The font thicker?
Hmmmmm
I don’t know if anyone’s mentioned it—I may have missed in the comments, but Susan Vaught’s BIG FAT MANIFESTO has the most irreverent heroine who is extremely “plus sized.” It’s YA, but it’s one of the best books I’ve read. It’s funny, sassy, yet has its serious side, too. Hard to explain. (And I call myself a writer. Sheesh)
The Amazon link—
http://www.amazon.com/Big-Fat-Manifesto-Susan-Vaught/dp/1599902060/ref=sr_1_11?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1217134252&sr=1-11
Susan Vaught’s site:
http://susanvaught.com/
Jamie has the kind of sass and attitude I wish I’d had at her age. Maybe even now.
Sue Ann Jaffarian has a plus-size heroine, Odelia Grey, who’s also over 40. Though they are mysteries there is some romance. Her heroine is not whiny about her weight and is described as attractive and is pursued by various men. She even gets married in book 2, Thugs and Kisses.
http://www.sueannjaffarian.com/
I think WandaSue and Stephanie are onto something with the question, what do readers want in their romance? Do they want fantasy? Or do they want to see themselves? Or some combination of the two? Judging from e-publishers, there’s room for everything. Judging from what New York puts out, there’s a preferred look at the moment that brings in most of the money. But have you been to NYC? All the girls there ARE thin and awesomely dressed.
I was kind of disappointed to find out that that’s a myth:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1385806
Dress sizes have changed so much over time that people get confused about what equals what, I guess. And I remember getting steaming mad at Elizabeth Hurley commenting on how if she were as fat as Marilyn Monroe, she’d kill herself (paraphrased.) Ugh! No matter her dress size, that attitude is ridiculous, and totally unattractive.
Ah, The Raven Prince! I LOVED how the heroine was truly plain, and so was the hero—and no magical beautification took place during the story to change that, either! Except perhaps for the beautification of love and attraction, maybe. Love it.
Min annoyed the crap out of me in Bet Me, but that was a refreshing book in the heroine’s size department.
Okay, before I go to bed, just want to amend my Marilyn Monroe statement: Snopes says MM’s weight was in the range of 118-140, so at the 140 end, the size 12 seems reasonable (right?).
http://www.snopes.com/movies/actors/mmdress.asp
Yay! And goodnight.
romantic suspense rather than straight romance, but I enjoyed Meg Cabot’s ‘Size Twelve is not Fat’ and ‘Size Fourteen is not Fat Either’ books with a plus-sized heroine (Heather Wells).
Plus of course Crusie’s ‘Bet Me’ which others have mentioned.
What Snopes says about Marilyn is:
“A woman of Marilyn’s height, at the extreme of Marilyn’s weight range (140lbs), would probably wear a size 12 dress today (which is the same dress size listed for Marilyn in the the book The Unabridged Marily. Perhaps at one time she did wear dresses that might have been considered size 16 or even 18 back in the 1950’s, but she almost certainly did not wear dresses equivalent to today’s size 16.”
They go on to note that a dress of hers was actioned in ‘94 and was found to be a British size 16, which is an American size 12.
Probably more relevant is the info on US standard clothing sizes from Wikpedia, which notes that current US sizes are SIX SIZES larger than the standards originally set from statistical data in the 40s and 50s. In other words, size 6 in the old standard is what is now a size 0, and a size 12 in the 1950s would be a size 6 today. British sizes are, on average 4 sizes larger.
So maybe Marilyn was a size 16 at some point (tho’ what I read was size 14), but that’s a size 10 today. For a point of reference (and because she called Marilyn fat): according to celebsrate.com Elizabeth Hurley wears a size 6—or a size 12 in Marilyn’s day. Drew Barrymore wears an 8 (i.e., the same as Marilyn’s 14).
Which makes my size 16/18…a reason to cut back on carbs.
It’s interesting, because a couple of weeks ago someone I’d met for the first time at a conference described me as blonde and curvy in her blog…and then retracted it the next day, because she didn’t want people to think I was fat. Curvy has become a euphemism for fat…which makes it hard to describe yourself when you’re a girl with a waist and breasts—curves, in fact—but not actually fat.
Everyone has a different idea of what fat is, and I agree with the people who’ve said that putting a number on it doesn’t help. Saying someone weighing 200lbs is fat doesn’t help in the slightest—especially if you have no idea how tall that person is. I was irritated when the Bridget Jones movies were made, that so much emphasis was put on her being overweight. I read the books well before the films came out, and I never once got the idea she was fat. If anything, looking at her recorded weights throughout the book, I thought she must be either fairly slim or very short.
Has anyone mentioned Size 12 Is Not Fat by Meg Cabot? A title that had both me and my best friend in stitches, because in the UK, a size 12 is definitely not fat—it’s equivalent to a US 8. The heroine there was a little too defensive about her weight for me to believe she was happy with it.
I’m not generally a fan of the plus-sized heroine, because quite often it just seems to be a shorthand for saying it’s okay to be fat. Well…again this depends on your definition of fat, but hands up who actually thinks it’s a good idea? Any doctor will tell you it’s unhealthy. Unhealthy and sexy are really unmixy things.
I know Bet Me has been mentioned many times. What was wonderful about Cal and Min’s relationship was what he gave her—acceptance of her size and shape. Was she fat, or was she just bigger than her skinny sister? Min hates her body and punishes it, but once she starts dressing for her figure and enjoying food, she’s a lot happier, and it’s Cal who facilitates this.
Jude Deveraux has an overweight heroine in Wishes, who is magically made thinner (literally: her fairy godmother does it) but it doesn’t make her happier. The godmother is the one who is made to realise that thinness doesn’t equate happiness. It’s also a historical—late C19th, I think—during which the fashionable shape for a woman was larger than today (but not to the degree of actual fatness!). Historically speaking, a thin person couldn’t afford proper meals, worked off all their calories, or was consumptive. Not sexy.
Oh yes. Yes yes yes. More lazy shorthand—thin and beautiful equals evil. It actually reveals more about the psyche of the overweight character…and not in a nice way. Have you noticed how it’s so often the heroine who trumpets that she’s a real shape who spouts this viewpoint? Well, if she’s so happy about that, then why does she hate the thin person?
I agree with Cat: Thin = evil (if it’s from the plump perspective)and curves = fat (I think this comes from personal ads).
I can’t recall a single plus-size heroine who doesn’t lose the weight in the end. Nor can I recall a hero who wants more than a handful… How sad!
I like my protagonists to be flawed – it only adds to the tension in the story and the obstacles they overcome to HEA.
I found a list of books here:
http://www.romantictimes.com/books_themes.php?theme=126
Jessa Slade, that is exactly the point. Obviously I can only speak for myself, but I do want a great big whopping escapist fantasy. BUT I find it easier to get carried away if I can really identify with the heroine. And in my case, this is way easier with a fat heroine than with a skinny one. Also, it always cheers me up to see the fat girl get the man. Which brings me to another thing – I agree with one the earlier posts (sorry, can’t find you name to quote you) who said that “as long as the heroine finds him knicker-dampening sexy, that is good enough for me.” If that means scars, pock marks and limping from being shot – bring it on
I am perfectly willing to spend a lot of money on books, and I fully expect the publishing industry to service me. Erm. I don’t quite mean that the way it sounds, but you know what I mean.
I was going to mention Terry Pratchett and Sibyl Ramkin Vimes as well, but someone beat me to it. Pratchett’s done an excellent job creating a variety of protagonists with different body types, and making the reader care about them for who they are.
Many years ago I read a mystery called The Thin Woman in which the heroine was to inherit a fortune on the condition that she lose weight. The gigolo she’d hired to pose as her boyfriend for a family gathering turned out to be a gourmet chef who helped get her on a healthy (but tasty and satisfying) weight loss plan. I thought it was a pretty funny premise at the time, but it sounds as if it’s become somewhat of a cliche now.
(And FWIW, the heroine of my Work In Progress has a plus-sized roommate who gets laid far more often than she does.)
You know, I love books with good plus size heroines. Not heroines who lose weight through stress (Good in Bed—even if it doesn’t last), heroines who lose weight “for health”—(He loves Lucy—because the science is frankly contradictory on whether or not the actual weight loss is helpful, as opposed to eating habits and exercise) or women who bitch about their weight (plus size or not).
I just want a hero who loves the woman for who she is, whatever size. That’s why I liked Night Play so much, and even Bet Me, because the heroes loved their BBW women and the women finally realized that being a particular size means nothing—happiness is not a size. Confidence is not a size.
Cindy Myers “Learning Curves” is also a good one, as long as you don’t read her alternate ending, which is one of those “loses weight for health reasons” endings—god, I hate those. Can’t you just leave it with “he loves her no matter what” and be done with it?
By the way, lest publishers thing that only BBW are into BBW novels, it’s totally not true—I don’t really qualify, and I love the subgenre. I just get so sick of reading books (or talking to women) who obsess over food and weight. Haven’t we realized yet this is marketing to keep us unhappy and buying diet products?
By the way, if you’ve never seen the hilarious video on Yogurt, the wolmen’s diet food, you’ve missed out.
Meredith (who thinks women should channel all this crap about food and weight into something more useful—revolution, anyone?)
BET ME is one of my favourite romances, and I appreciated that Jennifer Crusie tried to leave out all mention of Min’s actual size- never mentioning how tall she is, or her exact weight. I read a comment of hers once where she said that she wanted people to come up with their own version of what “overweight” was and then impose it on Min, which I thought was very clever.
Except on my millionth re-read, I realized that when Min is at the dressmaker’s trying on the corset for her sister’s wedding, it mentions that her size 8 corset is way too small. But they strap her into it anyway, causing great discomfort. (They don’t go with this size corset in the end, obviously.)
This bothers me because if you can squeeze into a size 8 corset, even in discomfort, I don’t consider you to be overweight. It depends on the lacing in the back, obviously, but I highly doubt Min is bigger than a size 12 or 14. Which to me, is not nearly large enough to herald Min as an overweight-and-accepting-it heroine, but that’s just my own take on it.
I have a confession—I work near a church attended by a lot of African Americans. When there is an event, usually a wedding, I love to watch the congregation arrive. No one is model thin and a lot are quite overweight, but the style the ladies show is amazing. Like big beautiful birds of paradise they come in on the arms of dapper men who seem very happy to be seen with them.
I stand and watch, muttering to a friend like Cinderella’s ugly stepsister—- WHERE do they get those clothes? And the hats! Turbans in jewel tones and lovely flat saucer hats with exotic trimmings.
So where are the heroines with confidence and style equal to that I see in those ladies? If not at the beginning, then at the end of the story?
Meredith, I think I love you. 🙂
Regarding my aforementioned Edith Layton odd-looking hero, I thought it was the Earl of Drummond (Drum) from The Conquest, but he seems to be described as “striking” in the book blurb, so who knows.
this has been an interesting discussion so far
I enjoy reading for escapism, but I also enjoy reading books with overweight women. I’m Asian and a size 12/14. Usually you’ll never find an Asian female character who is overweight. I think I’m overweight, so I don’t care what everyone else thinks of me. Please don’t try and argue with me here, but I do have a gut and I don’t find it flattering. Sometimes reading that gorgeous men find size 18 women beautiful is comforting. It relieves the little voice in my head that tells me that men will not find my body unattractive. (Granted I’m married and my husband adores me, and plenty of men have told me they think I’m hot). Sometimes, I want to live a fantasy and read about tiny, independent, feisty, genius women because I want to live out a fantasy. I’ll take both.
Thanks for this topic! I think most women obsess about their weight no matter what size they are. My friend is a 4 and she’s always pitching this bone at her hip and calling it “fat.” *rolling eyes* I’ve had babies and have fluxuated between single-digit and double-digit sizes. Although my self esteem isn’t tied to the scale, I can always relate to a heroine who feels self-conscious or less than perfect.
I don’t think anyone’s mentioned Bella Andre’s TAKE ME. It features a real plus-sized woman, and it’s an erotic romance.
and obviously you missed my post: I think a little deeper reading of my opinions would have given you the answer … Scroll back up and read my posts in their entirety. Perhaps it was too late at night for you to get the gist of them all.
Or read on ….
I spend my hard-earned money feeding my romance fantasy—and that doesn’t include a fat heroine with whom I CANNOT identify any longer.
When I was a Size 16, there existed inside of me a very wistful and hopeful Size 6 … but if anybody asked me, I’d deny it til I was blue with indignation. I told myself—and anybody patient enough to care—that I was “happy” and “content” and “secure” being fat. (Deep inside, I wasn’t).
So I’d read the “Plus size” heroine romances to feed that sentiment, and searched high and low for a heroine with whom I could identify—and who could validate my fatness. It fed the fantasy OF THAT TIME IN MY LIFE. It made me feel secure that, even heavy, I could find and keep a hottie for a mate… though I knew too well, from working in a mostly male environment (US Navy), that the REALITY is something else entirely.
(Fortunately, I am married to a great guy who never seemed to notice that I’d gained 50 pounds from the time we’d first begun dating.)
So … the point:
Do we prefer to read romances that feed our fantasy (of being slim, trim, and with awesome clothes?) … or that validate our “reality” (not so slim, not so fashion-based)?
Pick your preference.
I’m sure there are enough writers out there to feed whatever floats your boat.
I think this is a brilliant topic and as an author, appreciate all the comments made here. I’ve been writing with plus-sized heroines for my entire career (a whole seven years). I’ve tried very hard to write my books with the idea that the women involved are happy with their size, though showing some minor doubt here and there, as all women have about their bodies. I wanted to appeal to all types of readers, showing how “imperfections” at any size can be an issue for the heroine. In the majority of my books, my heroine’s “plus size” is a description, not a plot device. I wrote my books because it was a category of women I could identify with, but couldn’t find in the industry.
After writing my first book, I found a whole community of women who wanted to read (and write) books with plus-sized heroines, some of whom have since been published, and some who have not. When I realized how much interest there was for this kind of book, I started a publishing company with a line that specializes in plus-sized heroines, called Dangerous Curves. Some of the books do have women who focus on their weight as part of the story, other books (like mine) have women who are overweight, but don’t whine about it through the whole book. None of the books have the women losing weight to get their man and their HEA. We have several different genres, including mysteries, romances, erotica, paranormals, anthologies, series books.
I’ve enjoyed a lot of other books with plus-sized heroines, but have also found a lot of wall-bangers that did nothing but make me angry. A plus-sized woman does not have to lose weight to find her man (hello!), nor to be happy. Do I have some body issues? Sometimes. Do I live a normal and happy life with my fab husband who loves every hill and valley on my bod? You bet yer ever lovin’ life I do.
DS thanks for the book title! OMG Barbara Cartland, my mom read everything of hers, I bet they’re all still in a box in the house somewhere.
Wanda Sue, your point about not feeding your fantasy is well-taken, but your wording regarding sizes was awfully impolite.
The Wry Hag managed to say pretty much what you said (“Most [not all, but most] readers don’t want to encounter heroines beyond a size 12 . . . “) without insulting people personally; she blamed it on a general flaw in society. (”. . . any more than they want to encounter heroes and heroines beyond the age of 40.”)
You, on the other hand, made it personal. (”[L]et’s be honest here: given the choice, how many of YOU would honestly chose to be a size 16 over a size 6?”) I understand that for you, it’s a personal issue (because you used to be a size 16 and now you’re a size 6) but you do come across as lacking in sympathy for those who are not a size 6.
Feeding one’s fantasy of being thin and hot, or reflecting one’s reality of neither, are not the only two reasons to read romance novels. It’s an oversimplified dichotomy. I am not plus-sized, and yet I enjoy reading novels with plus-sized heroines. I enjoy diversity in my heroines; I’m always happy to find one who was raised in India, who is over six feet tall, or who loves physics (in 19th-century England), for example. I enjoy reading romance novels for various reasons, but one of those is simply the fantasy of being someone else—someone who will get a HEA at the end, no matter what. Or, perhaps, someone who lives in a different time and a different place.
My reading comprehension is just fine, thank you very much, at any hour of day or night. I never objected to your point (other people had continued discussing it without me), but your wording.
Sorry for the thread derailment, SB Sarah and Candy.
I don’t know if it qualifies as a romance, but it’s very romance-y, and I’m sure many of you have already read Circle of Friends by Maeve Binchy. Bennie is a great heroine, bigger than all her friends. I really enjoyed it.
Given that in the world we live in, anything over a size 0 is now considered fatty McFatFat moocow, I don’t care about this arguing over whether or not size 8 or 10 or 22 is considered fat. Hell, anyone who isn’t obviously anorexic-ish in a romance novel and has put food into her face at any point in time works for me.
I thought of another great heroine who has size issues, though she’s not the main character: Kevin’s mother Lilly in This Heart of Mine by Susan Elizabeth Phillips. Lilly was a sex symbol in her youth, but now her body has thickened and spread and she no longer sees herself as sexually attractive, until an artist convinces her otherwise.
It was also refreshing to see a woman Of A Certain Age (and corresponding physique) have a hot affair.
Thanks, Cat Marsters, I read this book long ago but couldn’t remember details. One of the phrases that stuck with me, though, was about the fairy godmother who had “a thin woman’s horror of fat.” I thought that captured the character’s attitude (and society’s) without any sugar-coating.
I am 5’4” and a size 20 (22 in some clothes). Tomorrow I go to weight watchers (again!) and try to get something off of this 41 yr old body (which is really, really difficult now) because I want to see my kids grow up. I have only been fat for 10 yrs, but I always thought I was, so I am well-acquainted with some of the icky psychological aspects of being heavy (feeling invisible, unimportant, unattractive, dismissed). I don’t mind seeing them in a story with a fat heroine. I think that, along with health concerns and crappy clothes, it’s normal. Of course, you always have to shrug it off and live your life, but I expect most fat women have those moments. While I think it’s fine to have a character lose weight (because any bit will help you be healthier), I don’t like it when she has to do so to get her HEA. And I don’t like it when she counts some calories, goes to a gym and it “just falls off.” It doesn’t, and weight loss is frustratingly hard work. And if the author wants her heroine to be heavy and ignore the weight issue altogether, then that’s fine, too—and it could really be encouraging to someone. I dated my now-husband once when I was young and thin, and again when I was in my 30’s and fat….he liked me better the second time because I was emotionally and physically confident.
As far as less-than-perfct heroes goes, more power to them! I’ve dated all sizes of men, and their bodies weren’t reliable indicators of how good they were as indivuduals, as partners, or as well,….In fact, after a certain age, you have to really work to keep a certain physique—which can require a level of vanity and time commitments that can hurt a relationship.
I may be thin, but I’m not an idiot about weight. One book that seriously made me WTF—the character spent the entire book watching her weight, commenting on how she’d need to run a few extra miles to work off the fat when the hero brings her some take-out chicken for dinner, things like that . . .
And it was specified at the start that she weighed 98 pounds.
No, I didn’t leave a 1 off the start of that. That’s NINETY-EIGHT pounds.
I’m naturally skinny. Scrawny, really—can’t even build muscle mass when I try. Awesome metabolisim or whatever shit you want to call it, the few times that I have hit 98 in my life, I have gone into a dead panic and made a point to switch to a more high-calorie diet.
I have a soapbox that I just want to get on for a moment, and it has a title: Health at Every Size. Google that and you will find an excellent site by a man named Jon Robison that describes a holistic way of coming to health without dieting (which has a 95% failure rate over 5 years and leads to yo-yoing). His basic idea is to find your way to acceptance and love of your body as it is, eating intuitively (that is listening and learning those hunger signals), and finding exercis that is pleasurable and sustainable. This last seems the most revolutionary since most of us think of exercise as involving nothing fun.
The further part of my soapbox…it’s frustrating as hell that we equate fat with unhealth, but if you are skinny we don’t look too closely at your habits to see if you are eating those fresh foods, getting 8 hours of sleep a night, and drinking only moderately (we do look at smoking, though), and getting regular exercise…all those things are more related to mortality rate than almost anything else. Off soapbox.
I am all for everyone reading for their fantasies and I realize that fantasies change, but there really does need to be readily available reading materials for those of us that want to read about plus-sized women. I think about the lack of books by and for African American women in the 80s and 90s and what a market they now have. It gives me great hope.
One last piece for those who are really struggling with your image and with moving in the world at your weight…go now to YouTube and look up Joy Nash’s Fat Rant. It is wonderful and affirming…and Joy is a really nice person on top of it.
I’m a BBW and my debut novel, Messalina – Devourer of Men, is about a BBW who believes her size and race has intimidated men so she does her own thing to get her rocks off and lives her life. For the most part she’s OK with herself, but she does have her moments. But sometimes it takes a jolt from the outside to REALLY make an impression and say “Hey, there’s nothing wrong with you. Others may not appreciate you, but that’s their problem. Not yours.”
I’m tired of seeing the Lula’s of the world (from the Stephanie Plum series) always being used for comic relief. There’s more to it than that.
Then again, I don’t want to read about women who whinge on every page about their appearance. Give me characters of substance…and size, if you have ‘em 🙂
This is a great thread! Thanks, Anne, for telling me.
And if any one is interested, come check out my blog, The Full-Bodied Book Blog for similar discussion(s).
I hate coming this late into a discussion, because I feel like everything I want to say has already been said—and in some cases, said better—but I’m going to comment anyway. I whole-heartedly agree with those who have said that while yes, reading is a form of escapism, I also like being able to relate to the heroine in some way. As a woman who is much bigger than I used to be (don’t you hate it when Mom’s “Someday your metabolism is going to catch up with you” lectures turn out to be true?) that means yes, I love nothing more than to read about someone who doesn’t necessarily meet today’s standards of beauty—whether in size or looks or whatever—but is happy with herself anyway (at least most of the time) and still manages to achieve her HEA without making drastic changes. That said, I also don’t have a problem with a main character who does meet the Barbie standard. Several others have already said it, but so long as the heorine is well-written and someone I can like and care about, I could give two $@#*! about her size. As far as the imperfect hero goes, I’m with the as long as the heroine is hot for him, that works for me crowd. Because if you are seeing him through the rose-colored, I’m-madly-in-love/lust glasses of the heroine—and if the author’s any good, you should be—then you should feel the same way about him she does. Or at least be able to look beyond the fact that he may not meet your personal ideal. Okay, I’m going to shut up now. Oh! on the books with “larger” heroines thread: I have the memory of an 80-year-old woman, so I can’t remember character names, title or author—if anyone can, I’d be highly grateful, because I would LOVE to add it to my collection—but the hero is the Scottish grandson of an ailing British duke/earl/whatever dragged to England to assume the title and marry etc. He has a couple of girls in particular tossed at him, but prefers the heroine, who lives with two aunts not far from his grandfather. Dammit! Wish I could remember a title or at least the author, because this description is not doing the story justice at all—I know I liked it enough that I read it more than once, then leant it to an old friend and never saw it again … Anyway, if anyone can figure out what the hell I’m talking about, I recommend it.
Ha! I’ve found it. I think. Johanna Lindsey’s The Heir with Duncan and Sabrina. Not positive, but I think that’s it. Happy reading 🙂
I just finished reading Isabel Sharpe’s Indulge Me, a recent Harlequin Blaze novel. It’s about a woman who decides to seduce the first man she sees, plus do a whole host of other sexual things she’s never done before. There was a toss off line about half way through that referenced her size being between a 10 and 12. I was stunned – and pleased. 10/12 isn’t huge, of course, but it is larger than is usually found in a romance, plus there was no other mention of her weight. He didn’t pay attention to her curves or bemoan a lack – it was just another fact about her. Neat.
Her best friend’s husband was also in the process of joining a gym to lose weight and be sexier for his wife, which was interesting. Of course, said wife freaked out at first and thought the worst, but they also demonstrated an ability to communicate not often found in romance novels, either.
Back to the original subject, which I believe was
The first book that came to mine was Lori Foster’s Too Much Temptation. I also remember enjoying an old Harlequin, Alpenrose by Madeline Charlton.
There have been others, but these are the two I can remember titles for 😉
To clarify: I enjoyed both of the books.
Eve Byron “Only in my dreams” has a heroine who is large (though no specific size is specified), and has major issues with it. It takes her a whole book to get over it, with a hero who is instantly attracted to her. I loved this book, though I have to add a disclaimer: I haven’t re-read this book in at least 4 years, so it has definitely fallen off my “comfort” list. When I read it, I had major body issues myself (never been overweight, but I don’t fit a standard definition of beautiful). I could very much identify with her, and loved how the hero accepted her. A reviewer at “The Romance Reader” thought that she was whiny, and unreasonably obsessed with her body. I don’t know – she reminded me of myself very much, and I don’t like to think of myself as whiny. Now my body issues are, if not gone, at least under control – I can say I look pretty and believe it 😉 I wonder if this is why I stopped re-reading it – I don’t identify with the heroine so much anymore? I have worked out my issues enough so that I don’t need a fantasy that a hero will help me solve them? Hard to say.
Mostly in the African-American romances. Which is too bad. On the other hand,were I to wear those same clothes, they just wouldn’t look right. Which sucks. I do take my cues though from the Big, Gorgeous Black women I see and carry myself with the same pride and confidence. That is what the men react to, not the size. And why they are usually walking on the arms of some of the hottest guys around.
We have a couple dress stores here that sell those lovely hats. I wish I could pull them off.
IMHO, Hispanic women are much the same. Yesterday at Six Flags, there were many women who were showing far more than I would even dare to show in public, and who were larger than I am. (Ok, I will admit that I am a well proportioned size 16/18. I am balanced- finally. I have a waist again. Long time no see). And these women just didn’t give a fuck who thought what about them- and again, they were with some hot looking guys. Go figure. Hot white men sometimes, to me, seem only to see what is physically visiable- looks, figure. Men of other races and cultures seem to look beyond that far more frequently.
On the other hand, Lula is very confident in herself, size not withstanding. Yes, she does try to diet and immediately heads to Cluck in a Bucket. She doesn’t let her size stop her from doing what she wants (or who she wants). I love Lula, comic relief not withstanding.
>>There are also some younger romances and fantasies and so on with wonderful plus-sized heroines. “Princess Ben†by Catherine Gilbert Murdock is a wonderful example, but it is mostly a fantasy/magic/adventure with a little romance thrown in at the end.<<
No, no, no! Princess Ben loses weight at the end and goes around lecturing the reader on healthy eating habits.
Thanks Tracy! I enjoy reading about larger women, but often feel the authors should have researched their characters better. I am 6’, weigh 230 lbs, and wear a size 12/14. A woman who is 5’10” and weighs a 175 pounds stands a good chance of falling into the “average” range of sizes, not plus size! But it is this range of women often described as overweight/fat/etc.