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"Before God was a pale, thin man, people worshiped a robust, bountiful woman. This is the Venus of Willendorf." So says Myrtle's friend Margie at the beginning of this novel for young adult girls. Margie advocates self-affirmation and believes that "bountiful" women are to be celebrated, that each woman is to embrace the goddess within her. But Myrtle rejects Margie's friendship after an embarrass... More

"Before God was a pale, thin man, people worshiped a robust, bountiful woman. This is the Venus of Willendorf." So says Myrtle's friend Margie at the beginning of this novel for young adult girls. Margie advocates self-affirmation and believes that "bountiful" women are to be celebrated, that each woman is to embrace the goddess within her. But Myrtle rejects Margie's friendship after an embarrassing moment and regards Margie as a "kook." Throughout the book, Myrtle struggles with prescribed notions of beauty. An obese girl fighting a compulsive eating disorder, she is self-destructive and shunned by her peers. In college, her roommate, Jada, tries to draw her into a world of cosmetics and thinness, but Myrtle senses that Jada's way is not her own. She sets about discovering her own path through artistic expression and is eventually drawn back to the beginning of the story and to Margie as she gains insight about her own beauty. In the end, she is a successful artist on the brink of self-discovery.

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