Ahead of the US publication of The Ministry of Thin we just received this beautiful review from the prestigious Booklist/American Library Association...
The Ministry of Thin: How the Pursuit of Perfection Got Out of Control.
Woolf, Emma (Author)
Jun 2014. 304 p. Soft Skull, paperback, $15.95
Woolf (An Apple a Day: A Memoir of Love and Recovery from Anorexia, 2013), a British newspaper columnist and the great-niece of Virginia Woolf, continues her chronicle of anorexia, moving from the personal to the societal. Her chapter headings here include “The Ministry of Fashion and Beauty” (“fabric hangs well on frames which are straight up-and-down”), “The Ministry of Detox” (“surely irrigation is for fields, not human beings!”), “The Ministry of Sex” (one survey found that 51-percent of women would give up sex for a year if it meant they could be skinny), and “The Ministry of Surgery” (worldwide, more than 17-million cosmetic surgery procedures take place every year). Much of the information she shares is disheartening. One study reported that one in six women would choose to be blind rather than obese. Yet Woolf uses her distinctively conversational voice and nimble sense of humor to keep her arresting insights into our obsession with thinness as well as modern-day feminism and fertility from getting too downbeat. Candid, revealing, and invaluable.
The Ministry of Thin: How the Pursuit of Perfection Got Out of Control.
Woolf, Emma (Author)
Jun 2014. 304 p. Soft Skull, paperback, $15.95
Woolf (An Apple a Day: A Memoir of Love and Recovery from Anorexia, 2013), a British newspaper columnist and the great-niece of Virginia Woolf, continues her chronicle of anorexia, moving from the personal to the societal. Her chapter headings here include “The Ministry of Fashion and Beauty” (“fabric hangs well on frames which are straight up-and-down”), “The Ministry of Detox” (“surely irrigation is for fields, not human beings!”), “The Ministry of Sex” (one survey found that 51-percent of women would give up sex for a year if it meant they could be skinny), and “The Ministry of Surgery” (worldwide, more than 17-million cosmetic surgery procedures take place every year). Much of the information she shares is disheartening. One study reported that one in six women would choose to be blind rather than obese. Yet Woolf uses her distinctively conversational voice and nimble sense of humor to keep her arresting insights into our obsession with thinness as well as modern-day feminism and fertility from getting too downbeat. Candid, revealing, and invaluable.
— Karen Springen
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