Not Hungry – Kate Karyus Quinn
Soooo, I don’t usually tend to read much poetry, but requested this one purely from its summary in NetGalley – basically, a fat girl starving herself to lose weight but other people not realizing and just thinking she’s on a diet.
I’ve been that person, I’ve been the person who skips meals so that I can lose weight. I’m the person who doesn’t like eating in front of other people because in my head they’re thinking “look at the fat girl eating”. I’ve been the person at a size UK 12/14, I feel like I’m massively overweight and everyone must be laughing at me. I’ve been the girl that even though I know some of those thoughts are irrational, I have no control over them. So I completely understood June. June rarely eats, and on the occasions where she binges, she vomits after to purge herself. Admittedly, I was expecting this to be a novel when I first began reading it only to find it was poetry. Did that impact on the overall effectiveness? No. Would I read it again? No. Did I completely enjoy it? Kind of.
I probably would have enjoyed it more if it was a novel, but I do feel like the line breaks helped move the poem along and was used to create impact. It paused in just the right places and created silences for dramatic purposes. It touched on so many subjects, eating disorders, abusive relationships, first loves, you can kind of see how it’s suited to its young adult audience. In today’s society, unfortunately, these are things that our youths do go through. We are made to feel we can’t be anything but slim, we can’t look anything but perfect, no one will love us if we’re not perfect. It’s not until you get a little bit older that you start to understand that that really isn’t the case. I’m 29 now, am I comfortable in my own skin? Absolutely not. Do I love myself? No. But do I know I’m worth more than I thought I did as a teenager? Yes. This would probably be a useful read for a secondary school, it touches base on those subjects that are relevant to children of that age and therefore might be a great mental tool for the vulnerable ones that may need it.