Tara, a young teen, is a regular girl in a regular family (parents, older sister, granny, dog), doing regular things fourteen-year-olds do – school, friends, movies, parties, sleepovers, Facebook, an unrequited passion for the neighbourhood golden boy … and like many young girls, she is not happy with the way her body looks: she thinks she is too fat. She convinces herself that if she becomes thin, her hero Karan will immediately fall in love with her and they will live happily ever after. The deadline she sets herself is their school’s Prom Night, where Karan is to be the chief guest.
There isn’t much time – Tara turns to Google to do her ‘research’ and after checking out a few weight-loss plans, decides that the quickest way to lose those kilos is to combine them in one crash diet: of eating virtually nothing. After a few days, nature rears its head and poor Tara succumbs to the tempation of samosas in the school canteen. Reaction sets in – her diet will go to pot. She won’t lose those crucial pounds. Her solution? Puke it out. Eat whatever you please, and then get rid of it. This seems a brilliant idea – and Tara starts down the road to full-blown bulimia to its inevitable destination: near death, in a hospital bed.
However, she is rescued in time, and moves on. To writing in the school newsletter, being there for friends in their troubles, sex education workshops, stunning revelations about the secret lives of people she thought she knew, a Facebook relationship where both parties turn out to be … erm … not quite as presented. (Her Facebook avatar is a glamorous girl, Isabella; her FB boyfriend calls himself Rocko, who looks like a cool dude…
There’s lots of humour and funny situations in this book, lavishly illustrated (by the author), written in Tara’s voice and seen from her eyes. There is a happy ending – she learns to accept herself as she is and to make the most of her strengths. And she comes out with flying colours.