Fat Angie by e.E.
Charlton-Trujillo is another moving young adult lit. novel that rotates on the
axis of acceptance. Angie, who is
struggling to survive in the wake of her sister’s disappearance, can barely find
the strength to exist. She is brutally bullied
by her peers, her brother, and even her own mother. She refuses to accept the reality that her
sister is dead. And, she has allowed her
self-talk to eat away at the person she wants to be, the person she can
be. She sees only Fat Angie. Until…she meets K.C. Romance. Beautiful, strong, tattoo-laden, gay-girl-gay
K.C. notices her and sees, really sees Angie.
Buoyed by her relationship with the fragile, yet durable, K.C., Angie
finds the strength to pick herself up and live again.
The story is moving.
The characters are strong. The
writing style is both beautiful and painful at the same time. I hurt for Angie, K.C., and even Wang. I wanted to hurt for Angie’s mom, but I just
couldn’t because I could not forgive her for what she did to her
daughter(s). I was actually even a
little angry with e.E. because the narrator called Angie Fat Angie for a good part of the book. I hated that.
I wanted it to stop. Of course,
the brilliance is that is does begin to stop as Angie begins to see herself as
more than Fat Angie. I was so thankful
for the hopeful ending. No, it’s not
rainbows and lollipops, but “she was happy” (p. 264). That is what we want in life, right? We want to be happy amid the chaos, the pain,
and the uncertainty. After taking the
reader on a roller-coaster of emotional ups and downs, e.E. grants this small
kernel of hope…happiness.
This is definitely a book for teens who are struggling. The book is packed full of the gamut of
struggles: body image, rejection, bullying, cutting, sexual identity, fitting
in, being an individual, abusive parents, uncaring adults (who are supposed to
care)… The struggles are real. e.E. does not hide it; however, the book
gives kids a safe place to explore the pain of the struggles and see that
glimmer of hope at the end. What a great
book for classroom conversations as well; even for the bully, the bigot,
etc. As Stacy Ann showed us in the book,
they are struggling too. Books like
these, as I have said many times before, make us better people; readers cannot
walk away without a new understanding of how others feel when they are bound by
the chains of the struggle. Books like
these cause us to think twice about what we say to people who are being strangled
by the struggle. Too bad Connie did not
have a book like this to read (read the book; it will make sense then).
Fat Angie by e.E.
Charlton-Trujillo, 264 pages from Candlewick Press (2013). ISBN # 978-0-7636-6119-9
Ideal for young adult readers (and especially parents of
teens who are struggling)
