Size 12 Is Not Fat Book Review

I want to tell you something that you may or may not want to know but I am sweating like a pig right now because the air conditioning in our house is not working. But anyway, it is time for another book review!

Title: Size 12 Is Not Fat

Author: Meg Cabot

Publisher: William Morrow Paperbacks

Released: December 27, 2005

Pages: 345 (Paperback)

Heather Wells Rocks!
Or, at least, she did. That was before she left the pop-idol life behind after she gained a dress size or two — and lost a boyfriend, a recording contract, and her life savings (when Mom took the money and ran off to Argentina). Now that the glamour and glory days of endless mall appearances are in the past, Heather’s perfectly happy with her new size 12 shape (the average for the American woman!) and her new job as an assistant dorm director at one of New York’s top colleges. That is, until the dead body of a female student from Heather’s residence hall is discovered at the bottom of an elevator shaft.
The cops and the college president are ready to chalk the death off as an accident, the result of reckless youthful mischief. But Heather knows teenage girls . . . and girls do not elevator surf. Yet no one wants to listen — not the police, her colleagues, or the P.I. who owns the brownstone where she lives — even when more students start turning up dead in equally ordinary and subtly sinister ways. So Heather makes the decision to take on yet another new career: as spunky girl detective!
But her new job comes with few benefits, no cheering crowds, and lots of liabilities, some of them potentially fatal. And nothing ticks off a killer more than a portly ex-pop star who’s sticking her nose where it doesn’t belong . . .

About the Author: Meg Cabot was born on February 1, 1967, during the Chinese astrological year of the Fire Horse, a notoriously unlucky sign. Fortunately she grew up in Bloomington, Indiana, where few people were aware of the stigma of being a fire horse — at least until Meg became a teenager, when she flunked freshman Algebra twice, then decided to cut her own bangs. After six years as an undergrad at Indiana University, Meg moved to New York City (in the middle of a sanitation worker strike) to pursue a career as an illustrator, at which she failed miserably, forcing her to turn to her favorite hobby–writing novels–for emotional succor. She worked various jobs to pay the rent, including a decade-long stint as the assistant manager of a 700 bed freshmen dormitory at NYU, a position she still occasionally misses. She is now the author of nearly fifty books for both adults and teens, selling fifteen million copies worldwide, many of which have been #1 New York Times bestsellers, most notably The Princess Diaries series, which is currently being published in over 38 countries, and was made into two hit movies by Disney. In addition, Meg wrote the Mediator and 1-800-Where-R-You? series (on which the television series, Missing, was based), two All-American Girl books, Teen Idol, Avalon High, How to Be Popular, Pants on Fire, Jinx, a series of novels written entirely in email format (Boy Next Door, Boy Meets Girl, and Every Boy’s Got One), a mystery series (Size 12 Is Not Fat/ Size 14 Is Not Fat Either/Big Boned), and a chick-lit series called Queen of Babble. Meg is now writing a new children’s series called Allie Finkle’s Rules for Girls. Her new paranormal series, Abandon, debuts in Summer of 2011. Meg currently divides her time between Key West, Indiana, and New York City with a primary cat (one-eyed Henrietta), various back-up cats, and her husband, who doesn’t know he married a fire horse. Please don’t tell him.

The Characters:

• Heather Wells: A 28 year old assistant college dorm advisor for New York College who used to be a well known singer of the song Sugar Rush. Heather has a mad crush on her tenant, Cooper Cartwright – even though she dated his brother, boy band singer, Jordan Cartwright. Determined to find the murderer of both Elizabeth and Roberta, no matter what she is told. Doesn’t want any of the college students to recognize her as her old self.
• Cooper Cartwright: Brother of pop boy band singer Jordan Cartwright. Cooper is a Private Investigator who is placed on the task of finding the murderer of Elizabeth and Roberta at New York College. Cooper lives with Jordan’s ex-fiance, Heather.
• Jordan Cartwright: Pop boy band singer for the band Easy Street, brother to Jordan, ex fiance to Heather, and engaged to celebrity Tania Trace after about six months of dating. Caught kissing Heather by the public at Cooper’s place – with him telling her that he can’t get rid of Tania yet.
• Rachel: The new dorm advisor for the dorm rooms at New York College and Heather’s upper boss. Took the place of the last one who quit and she is always getting compared to her. To students and staff, she can be frazzled but nice at the same time.

Reason for Reading:

I actually read this book back in 7th grade, so that was about 3 years ago. I remember really enjoying it so when I got the book, I decided to reread it because I never finished the series. I was obsessed with the Allie Finkle Series that Meg Cabot wrote so I thought this would be a good one. I picked it up because I needed a good book to read and I knew this one would bring me the chick-flic novel that I wanted.

Genre:

This book is actually a mystery. The mystery is brought to the reader by the time they get to page 50, where the first girl at the college was killed elevator surfing. Then the second girl was killed the same way.
By now, some of you are asking what elevator surfing is and according to Wikipedia, Elevator surfing, also known as “liftsurfing”, “vator surfing” or “elevaroping”, is an activity involving riding on top of elevators. Rarely, the activity may also involve jumping between moving elevators, although most elevator surfers consider this to be unwise and needlessly dangerous.

While Cooper, Detective Canavan, and other police officers search for the murderer, Heather takes it upon herself to find the murderer of Roberta and Elizabeth. She finds out that they both were virgins and more than likely, it was the same guy – since they were on a date the night of their dates. Heather believes that the murderer is the president of the college – President Allington’s son, Christopher. Despite what she is told, Heather finds out that Christopher had no idea that neither of them were dead. Heather does more searching until she is a victim of someone trying to kill her. Sarah calls Heather saying that Rachel killed herself. Heather comes over to the college and she realizes that she tricked her into getting killed. Rachel is the murderer and wants to go after Heather. Mrs. Allington is the one that ends up killing Rachel when Rachel makes fun of anyone who is a size 12.

The Title:

The title, Size 12 Is Not Fat, does actually fit the book, unlike some of the books I have read. Heather is a size 12 and the one purpose of Rachel’s attack is because she believes size 12 is fat.

The book starts off with Heather shopping in a store for jeans. In walks a size 0 girl who needs pants. The owner of the store says that the reason that Heather is able to fit in a size 8 jean because they want to make the bigger women feel better about themselves. Heather starts the book off with saying “Size 12 Is Not Fat”.

My Opinion:

I would have to give this book a 4.3 out of 5 stars. Yes, I have read this book before but I still forgot how the book ended, and what happened in it. I really enjoyed the idea of the whole entire book. The book had great character development, a great writing technique, and a way to draw you into the book. But, there are a few things that I didn’t like:

• Heather’s love for Cooper even though Cooper doesn’t like her as much
• The flower pot hitting Jordan outside of the college

But, either way, I still enjoyed the book.

The Second Book:

Title: Size 14 Is Not Fat Either

Author: Meg Cabot

Publisher: William Morrow Paperbacks

Released: November 8, 2006

Pages: 344 (Paperback)

Former pop star Heather Wells has settled nicely into her new life as assistant dorm director at New York College—a career that does not require her to drape her size 12 body in embarrassingly skimpy outfits. She can even cope (sort of) with her rocker ex-boyfriend’s upcoming nuptials, which the press has dubbed The Celebrity Wedding of the Decade. But she’s definitely having a hard time dealing with the situation in the dormitory kitchen—where a cheerleader has lost her head on the first day of the semester. (Actually, her head is accounted for—it’s her torso that’s AWOL.)
Surrounded by hysterical students—with her ex-con father on her doorstep and her ex-love bombarding her with unwanted phone calls—Heather welcomes the opportunity to play detective . . . again. If it gets her mind off her personal problems—and teams her up again with the gorgeous P.I. who owns the brownstone where she lives—it’s all good. But the murder trail is leading the average-sized amateur investigator into a shadowy world. And if she doesn’t watch her step, Heather will soon be singing her swan song

Have you read this book? Do you like Meg Cabot books? Does this make you want to read this book? What book should I read next? Let me know your thoughts in the comments!

Happy Reading,

 ❤ Ann