Date: February 16, 2025
Author: Mecca Jamilah Sullivan
Title: Big Girl
I came across this book on my library app (where I request books) as I was perusing for new authors and this title happened to pop up. I am super digging it. I was up ‘til all hours of the night because I was just so sucked into it. I especially love that I am the exact same age as Malaya, (Ma-LIE-ya) the main character, so I could totally understand the culture of the times. (Especially in this era the supermodel ideal body shape was stick-thin and not in a healthy way either)
Although I’ve never been to NY City I did move to Chicago in 1998 when I was just a baby and was into the same music as Malaya when I first moved there and remember feeling wowed by the big city life. Brings back a lot of memories.
Why I am so extra enthusiastic about this book is because last Friday, 02/14/2025, Valentines Day, I created my first ever fund raiser for New York Cares, on my website. It was very exciting and not planned that way at all. Irony: the creation of the New York Cares fund raiser landed involuntarily on Valentines Day, I’m using their logo for the fund raiser and the logo contains a heart. Do you see the connections? New York Cares, Valentines Day, unplanned, hearts in logos and starting a book out of coincidence that is centered in Harlem, and I’m the same age as the main character? Feels like fate to me.
So, anyway, this was such a moving story. I can totally understand about loss of willpower as Mz. Sullivan described it and how susceptible one could be when an over whelming urge crashes into a person leaving little room to do anything but cave to the craving. I say this because as the title indicates the story is about a young girl suffering from morbid obesity. So much as to even make her a candidate at 16 for gastric bypass surgery. She was shame-eating and hiding empty cartons of food about her room, reminiscent of alcoholics hiding their bottles.
I would say that Malaya suffered from body dysmorphia. The google AI definition states this description; ‘Body dysmorphic disorder (BDD), or body dysmorphia, is a mental health condition where a person spends a lot of time worrying about flaws in their appearance. These flaws are often unnoticeable to others. People of any age can have BDD, but it’s most common in teenagers and young adults. It affects both men and women.’
I read this book almost straight through in one sitting (minus eating and sleeping and such) if you cannot tell I highly recommend this book and look forward to your comments.