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Passing for Thin: Losing Half My Weight and Finding My Self ReviewI thought I was going to like both this memoir and its author, but I came away feeling ambivalent about both. (I read about Frances Kuffel in a magazine, and got the impression that her book would be well worth reading, but I did not find that to be the case.)
What put me off the most about Passing for Thin was that, despite having once been fat herself, Kuffel seems devoid of empathy for those who are still fat. She refers to a woman in her OA program as a "fatty" and to her lover's obese son as "Dudley Dursley". (Harry Potter's cousin.) This might be an apt comparison in that Dudley Dursley is indeed obese, but he is also mean, petty and spoiled rotten, so it seems more than a little unkind of Kuffel to mention this particular fictional character when writing about her lover's son.
Having lost half her weight, Kuffel now seems as contemptuous of the obese as the people who used to give her "appalled second glances" when she herself was obese.
I was also put off by Kuffel's relentless narcissism. It's very peculiar that she would choose Janeane Garofalo as a role model, because as far as I can tell, these women have very little in common. Garofalo has been quoted as saying (about a time in her life when she lost a lot of weight in the hope that it would help her land more parts) she hates the vanity that goes with being thin. Kuffel, on the other hand, seems to embrace this kind of vanity, going on and on about various aspects of her appearance. (I watch What Not to Wear and buy fashion magazines from time to time, so the fact that even I was bored by the endless descriptions of Kuffel's various outfits is saying a lot.) It also doesn't seem to occur to Kuffel that, having been supported and encouraged by various OA members for quite some time, she ought to start thinking about supporting other members in return. It is only after her sponsor gently suggests that she should "pay attention to something besides what you look like" and recommends that she volunteers to sponsor someone, that she even considers doing so. And the woman Kuffel ends up sponsoring is chosen because she is "prettier" than all the other OA members in need of a sponsor. Where is it written that if you are the proud owner of a pretty face, you are by definition a fascinating creature and deserving of all the help you can get, whereas if you look like what Kuffel calls a "Drab", then you must surely be drab on the inside as well and not really worth helping? (Or at least, you can't expect someone who is "pretty" to help you.)
I am also mystified as to why the book description compares Passing for Thin to Lucy Grealy's Autobiography of a Face. I read Autobiography of a Face several years ago, and it was, as I recall, a far better memoir than Passing for Thin. For starters, Grealy is nowhere near as self-absorbed as Kuffel, and her writing also flows better. Kuffel's writing style is not as consistent. Sometimes it is ornate to the point of becoming stilted, while other parts of her book read more like the kind of simplistic article you might find in a magazine like Cosmopolitan than like a memoir. (One example is the Planet of Fat/Planet of Girls metaphor, which becomes more tiresome with each passing chapter.) I really don't like book descriptions that try to attract potential readers by comparing the book in question to an already published and greatly acclaimed book. (It's like those annoying movie ads that say: "If you liked that movie, you'll love this movie!" By allowing whoever wrote the book description to compare Passing for Thin to Autobiography of a Face, Kuffel is in effect saying: "Hey, MY book is that great, too!")
While I found Passing for Thin disappointing, I do admire Frances Kuffel for managing to lose weight without the aid of gastric bypass surgery, and despite having been obese for most of her life, and I find it touching and heartening that she was brave enough to put herself out there in terms of dating and romance, despite her insecurity and lack of experience.
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