Hungerpoint - Hardcover

Medoff, Jillian

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0060391898 ISBN 13: 9780060391898

Publisher: HarperCollins, 1997

Synopsis

Food has always been a pleasure and a curse for 26-year-old Frannie and the women of her family. Raised by a mother obsessed with the ritual of dieting, a woman seemingly more in love with food than with her daughters, Frannie and her younger sister, Shelly, have undergone a lifetime of fat camps and Weight Watchers programs and have experienced the sugar high of consuming a box of Girl Scout cookies, the illicit thrill of midnight binges, and the triumph of fitting into a pair of size 6 jeans. Frannie's family acts as if this fascination with food is normal, until Shelly takes dieting too seriously and descends into the nightmare of a life-threatening eating disorder.
With devastating insight, Jillian Medoff looks deep into the heart of an American family and emerges with a first novel that is at once heartbreakingly honest, wickedly funny, and wonderfully life-affirming: a warm, witty, and perceptive look at a tough yet tender young woman struggling to understand a younger sister battling anorexia and bulimia, bewildered parents who have grown apart, and her own despair at ever finding the right job, boyfriend, or place of her own.

About this title

Review:

"[Hunger Point] confronts the terrors of anorexia and other modern ills with empathy and understanding."--People

"Wonderfully obsessive...bitterly funny."--Vanity Fair

"Recklessly candid."--New York Times

"Memorable...Frannie [is an] appealing character whose story is engaging."--Publishers Weekly

"This fine first novel is so winning and funny, you'll laugh instead of cry."--Mademoiselle

From the Back Cover:

For the women in Frannie Hunter's family, food is sort of a religion. Frannie and her genius younger sister, Shelly, have felt that the sugar high of consuming a box of Girl Scout cookies, the illicit thrill of midnight binges and the triumph of fitting into a pair of size 6 jeans.

All of which seems perfectly normal until Shelly takes dieting a step too far and descends into a nightmare battle with anorexia and bulimia. When Shelly is sent to a psychiatric hospital, Frannie fells confused and angry. She wants to understand and help her sister, but she's already drowning in her own nowhere life. As Frannie struggles to keep her sanity, her wicked sense of humor and her family intact, she gradually begins to discover the awful truth -- that eating isn't the answer, and the only way up is out.

About this edition

• Publisher: HarperCollins
• Publication date: 1997
• ISBN 10: 0060391898
• ISBN 13: 9780060391898
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 288