Angry Fat Girls: 5 Women, 500 Pounds and a Year of Losing It...Again

A funny, painfully honest memoir about five women as they diet and eat, lose and gain, and struggle to find their individual definition of freedom along the way

Like so many women, Frances Kuffel wondered: how could this happen again? She'd transformed her life by losing 188 pounds — but, like the vast majority of dieters, she transformed it again by gaining over half those pounds back. After all the struggle and hard work she somehow lost control, once again forced to carry nearly unbearable physical and psychological weight.

But she also found new friends, in particular, four women in similar situations — and similar bad moods — whom she met online. Frances, Lindsay, Katie, Mimi, and Wendy dubbed themselves the Angry Fat Girlz and shared not just rage but embarrassment and fear, fragile hope, and a mutual obsession with shoes. They asked themselves — and each other — the difficult questions: Who am I inside all this weight? How much am I allowed to enjoy myself, and how much do I have to deny myself? What could I do if I was thin?

In Angry Fat Girls, Frances Kuffel shares their story and struggle to find their best selves along the way.

"Columnist, poet and short story writer Kuffel spent 42 years morbidly overweight before losing 188 pounds, which she chronicled in 2004's Passing for Thin: Losing Half My Weight and Finding My Self. In this follow-up, she recounts the story of gaining back half of that weight and beginning anew her struggle to find herself, this time with the help of an online 'Angry Fat Girls' club, including four other women who have each learned the same disheartening lesson: 'nobody who gets thin gets rid of their problems.' Kuffel's narrative of rededication is a skilled blend of insight (the psychology of being overweight, the 'literary paradigms of the chubby heroine') and emotion ('It is a lonely state, the fat woman and the food and her groaning, aching, widening body') that never flags in intimacy, honesty, or compassion. With keen humor and disarming skill, Kuffel introduces readers to the most private moments of the five women, whose addictive relationships with food make regular nourishment a constant nightmare of temptation. Though separated for most of the story, the members of the club eventually meet up in New York City for a conclusion that should prove unforgettable for anyone who has struggled with self esteem or addiction issues." Publishers Weekly (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)

"Kuffel's greatest gift is a blast of hopeful reality for any brave reader ready to take herself on and honestly face her own food and weight demons." Pamela Peeke, MD, MPH, FACP, Chief Medical Correspondent for Discovery Health Channel, and author of Fight Fat After Forty

"This is about 'serial relapsers' and why my cat knows how to eat ice cream off a spoon. This book is honest, true, and occasionally very funny." Cheryl Peck, author of Fat Girls and Lawn Chairs

This funny, painfully honest memoir follows five women — including the author — as they diet and eat, lose and gain weight, and struggle to find their individual definition of freedom along the way.

Frances Kuffel is a literary agent who has published poems and short stories in literary journals, such as Triquarterly, the Georgia Review, Glimmer Train, Prairie Schooner, and the Massachusetts Review. A native of Missoula, Montana, she has an M.F.A. from Cornell. She currently makes her home in Brooklyn, New York.