Fat by Rob Grant
Apr. 16th, 2010 08:20 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
quippeThe Blurb On The Back:
”It’s unclear precisely when it became illegal to be fat.
Of course, technically, it’s not, even in this day and age. Even with the blatant persecution of all the tubbies, there’s no official legislation on any statute book that comes right out and says fatness is against the law.
But it is.”
Rob Grant’s new novel is both an hilarious satire on our readiness to devour “facts” and dodgy science along with our doughnuts and an unexpectedly moving story of the true cost of our obsession with how we look.
Grenville Roberts is an overweight television chef with anger management problems. After he develops a crush on a production assistant he resolves to do something about his weight. However the culmination of a string of humiliations – all revolving around his weight - sees him wreck his car in a gym’s car park. When he’s arrested, his production company drops him from his show. His only chance of rehabilitation is to enter a new government-sponsored health farm aimed at tackling obesity by helping people lose weight through the application of a very strict regime.
Jeremy Slank is a slick, sex-obsessed PR man tasked by the government with packaging the new farms and making them palatable to the public. During a tour of the first farm due to be opened he meets Jemma, an academic assigned to ascertain the health implications of the initiative who begins to make him question his life and everything he thought he knew about good diet.
Hayleigh is a teenage girl convinced that she’s a fat pig. Obsessed with her weight and refusing to eat, she’s developing health problems that she refuses to acknowledge and which her parents don’t know how to deal with.
Their stories intertwine in a satire on Britain’s obsession with weight, diet and obesity. It’s not perfect – some of the humour is predictable and the characters are there to service the plot. However it does have a point to make about the “facts” and “scientific evidence” used by diet advocates to support their cause and will definitely make you question the next newspaper report you see on food that’s supposed to be bad for you.
Of the three storylines, it’s Hayleigh’s that’s the most sensitively portrayed. Although some of the cultural references she cites (notably her familiarity with the show MONK) don’t quite ring true, her obsession with the boy band Boyz Don’t Cry is surprisingly believable as is her obsession with her looks and her failure to acknowledge that she has a problem. Jeremy is more of a cipher to explore Grant’s political points and his inevitable romance with Jemma is a shallow plot device. Grenville is oddly sympathetic despite his rages and impotent cruelty to those who get in his way.
It’s an entertaining read that made me laugh out loud on a number of occasions and it makes you think but don’t expect anything too deep and meaningful.
The Verdict:
It’s a fun read that made me laugh and does make you think about the obsession with obesity and diet.
Of course, technically, it’s not, even in this day and age. Even with the blatant persecution of all the tubbies, there’s no official legislation on any statute book that comes right out and says fatness is against the law.
But it is.”
Rob Grant’s new novel is both an hilarious satire on our readiness to devour “facts” and dodgy science along with our doughnuts and an unexpectedly moving story of the true cost of our obsession with how we look.
Grenville Roberts is an overweight television chef with anger management problems. After he develops a crush on a production assistant he resolves to do something about his weight. However the culmination of a string of humiliations – all revolving around his weight - sees him wreck his car in a gym’s car park. When he’s arrested, his production company drops him from his show. His only chance of rehabilitation is to enter a new government-sponsored health farm aimed at tackling obesity by helping people lose weight through the application of a very strict regime.
Jeremy Slank is a slick, sex-obsessed PR man tasked by the government with packaging the new farms and making them palatable to the public. During a tour of the first farm due to be opened he meets Jemma, an academic assigned to ascertain the health implications of the initiative who begins to make him question his life and everything he thought he knew about good diet.
Hayleigh is a teenage girl convinced that she’s a fat pig. Obsessed with her weight and refusing to eat, she’s developing health problems that she refuses to acknowledge and which her parents don’t know how to deal with.
Their stories intertwine in a satire on Britain’s obsession with weight, diet and obesity. It’s not perfect – some of the humour is predictable and the characters are there to service the plot. However it does have a point to make about the “facts” and “scientific evidence” used by diet advocates to support their cause and will definitely make you question the next newspaper report you see on food that’s supposed to be bad for you.
Of the three storylines, it’s Hayleigh’s that’s the most sensitively portrayed. Although some of the cultural references she cites (notably her familiarity with the show MONK) don’t quite ring true, her obsession with the boy band Boyz Don’t Cry is surprisingly believable as is her obsession with her looks and her failure to acknowledge that she has a problem. Jeremy is more of a cipher to explore Grant’s political points and his inevitable romance with Jemma is a shallow plot device. Grenville is oddly sympathetic despite his rages and impotent cruelty to those who get in his way.
It’s an entertaining read that made me laugh out loud on a number of occasions and it makes you think but don’t expect anything too deep and meaningful.
The Verdict:
It’s a fun read that made me laugh and does make you think about the obsession with obesity and diet.
