Dumplin' by Julie Murphy

I'm the fat girl.  I'm probably the fittest fat person you know (or follow as the case may be).  I do power yoga twice a week, Zumba twice a week, and jog 3 miles or more on Fridays (Saturdays if we have a home game).  No, I'm not a Crossfitter or organic health food nut.  I like pasta too much for my own good.  But even my doctor says my weight should mean high blood pressure or diabetes or some other disease attributed to being fat.  Nope.  My blood pressure is actually low (even more surprising since I was once a smoker).  My cholesterol is below normal.  My sugar and insulin are normal.  Yet, here I am.  Size 14/16 on the bottom and 18/20 on the top.

Dumplin' attracted me by the tag line "go big or go home".  Kinda my own mantra, though for different reasons.  My parents were dead at 56 and 53 (cancer took my mother, a heart attack from his own stubborness about smoking took my father), so I really shout YOLO, literally and figuratively.

Willowdean is one of the fat girls.  As if this isn't enough to make high school tough, her mother is the chairwoman of the local beauty pageant.  Will is of course never expected to enter.  One summer though, everything starts to change.  Not one but two boys show interest in her.  They don't seem to be off-put by her figure.  In a chain of events I won't spoil here, Will and 3 other "fat" girls enter the contest.  With the help of two drag queens and Dolly Parton, they are going to take the Clover City pageant by storm.

Running my first competitive 5K was probably my Dumplin' moment.  I did not finish last.  Will doesn't win the pageant, but she wins in other ways.

Definitely a recommend and now available in the WHHS LMC.

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