 | Too Big to Miss: An Odelia Grey Mystery (Odelia Grey Mysteries) by Sue Ann Jaffarian
Buy new: £12.15 / Used from: £0.48 If a novel says something like 'he put his manly arms around her eleven-inch waist', do you feel something's amiss? I do. This list offers fiction with non-skinny heroines, and related non-fiction.
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 | Does My Bum Look Big in This? by Arabella Weir
Buy used from: £0.01 Fiction. Today, this might look like 'chick-lit'. But when it first came out, that genre had not yet been invented, and the title had not yet become part of our language. That's truthful writing.
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 | The No.1 Ladies' Detective Agency by Alexander McCall Smith
Buy new: £4.49 / Used from: £0.01 Fiction. This first book in the series is magnificently good. I'm not so sure about a couple of the sequels, though, so if you're going to read just one of these books, this is the one to choose.
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 | The Forbidden Body: Why Being Fat is Not a Sin by Shelley Bovey
Buy new: £6.84 / Used from: £0.98 Non-fiction. Shelley Bovey is perhaps the UK's foremost journalistic writer on size issues.
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 | A Matter of Fat by Sherry Ashworth
Buy used from: £0.01 Fiction. It's got a soap-ish quality, which makes it feel reminiscent of the TV series Fat Friends.
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 | Summer of the Dragon by Elizabeth Peters
Buy used from: £0.41 Fiction. A fun thriller-romance. The heroine is invited to a rich man's ranch in the Arizona desert, but villainy intrudes. I love the witty narration.
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 | Infatuations by Sarah Jane Szikora
Buy used from: £75.00 Visual art. The pics are like seaside-postcard cartoons, but what's special is that the artist understands us, cares and Knows. In here I find insecurity, joy, independence, and pride. A treasure.
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 | The World of Beryl Cook by Jess Wilder
Buy new: £13.49 / Used from: £5.00 Visual art. Beryl Cook has lately been likened to Lowry and Rubens. Actually she's unique, acutely combining social observation and psychological understanding.
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 | Zaftig: the Case for Curves: A Case for Curves by Edward St Paige
Buy used from: £23.35 Visual art. A coffee-table book with 100+ classic paintings of larger women. It's apparent that the larger female form has been adored by great artists throughout history (and by St. Paige).
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 | The Full Body Project: Photographs by Leonard Nimoy
Buy used from: £21.89 Visual art. It's nice to see a well-known plain-size actor endorsing real bodies.
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 | The Fat Black Woman's Poems (Virago Poets) by Grace Nichols
Buy new: £5.46 / Used from: £2.00 Excellent poetry. The Londoner author explores her roots in Guyana and West Africa. The spacious style and patient central character remind me of the No.1 Ladies' Detective Agency,but this came first.
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 | Zaftig: Well Rounded Erotica (Erotica Series)
Buy used from: £12.95 Fiction. Short stories, for adults only. The editor identifies herself as a Size Activist, so she's on our side.
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 | Such A Pretty Face: Tales of Power and Abundance by Gene Wolfe
Buy new: £11.99 / Used from: £2.79 Fiction. Anthology of short stories in the fantasy genre. Size Activist editor. Each tale has a plus-sized heroine or hero, ranging from a mermaid to a fairy-tale princess. First-rate fantasy.
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 | Fair Peril by Nancy Springer
Buy used from: £0.01 Fiction. An excellent novel in the fantasy genre--and a proper novel. A woman out jogging comes across a talking frog. Soon her teenage daughter is in deep danger.
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 | Fat (Gollancz S.F.) by Rob Grant
Buy new: £5.39 / Used from: £0.01 Related reading. Near-future fiction, with male central characters.
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 | Big Fat Lies: The Truth About Your Weight and Your Health
Buy new: £11.99 / Used from: £3.56 Related reading. Non-fiction. Readable. Excellent. Questioning, alert, and he checks up on references. (If you want further reading, try these: Kratina, Paul Ernsberger, Charles Roy Schroeder.)
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 | Diet Nation: Exposing the Obesity Crusade by John Luik
Buy used from: £8.50 UK politics. Whether you love politicians or hate them, it might be foolish to ignore them. (If you want further reading, try these: Maurer Sobal, fat and proud, Laura Fraser, Sondra Solovay.)
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 | Bodies Out of Bounds: Fatness and Transgression by JE Braziel
Buy new: £18.00 / Used from: £5.88 Related reading. Non-fiction academic anthology. This suffers from academic incomprehensible language ('imbricated'). But there's a lot of conceptual meat in here... and the phrase 'Fat Studies'.
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 | The Fat Studies Reader by Marilyn Wann
Buy new: £13.79 / Used from: £18.62 Academic non-fiction. New out.
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 | The Strange History of Suzanne Lafleshe: And Other Stories of Women and Fatness (Women's Stories Project)
Buy new: £13.05 / Used from: £5.19 Fiction anthology. The intro. is a marvellous fat-lib manifesto, but the diverse stories are sometimes not feelgood. This has literary weight, huge bibliography and lit-academic utility. Invaluable.
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 | Fat Studies in the UK
Academic non-fiction. New out.
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 | Fat
Buy new: £9.26 / Used from: £4.90 Related reading. Non-fiction. Articles about attitudes to fat and fatness in societies around the world, sometimes startlingly unlike those we're used to. Readable and eye-opening.
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 | Feeding Desire: Fatness and Beauty in the Sahara by Rebecca Popenoe
Buy new: £23.74 / Used from: £18.59 Related reading. Non-fiction. A look at one foreign society. Apparently aimed at an academic audience.
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 | Am I Thin Enough Yet?: The Cult of Thinness and the Commercialization of Identity by Sharlene Hesse-Biber
Buy new: £10.56 / Used from: £1.51 Related reading. Non-fiction. A look at one particular exotic society: our own. (If you want further reading, try Terry Poulton.)
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 | Big Girl Knits: 25 Big, Bold Projects Shaped for Real Women with Real Curves by Jillian Moreno
Buy new: £13.68 / Used from: £5.93 Plus-size knitting patterns. The best thing about amazon, I think, is that you can come across books on subjects that it hadn't occurred to you there'd be books about. Such as this one, perhaps.
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