This book was hard to read but opened my eyes and led to a fantastic book club discussion. At age 8, Malaya is tipping the scale at 170 lbs. It doesn't take long to realize she's dealing with the comorbid conditions of severe obesity and extreme fat shaming. Yet nobody talks to this LITTLE girl to figure out what is causing her to eat her feelings. All they do is talk AT her and inform her that she is too big and eating wrong every damn moment of her life. It's psychological abuse and succinctly demonstrates how socially acceptable it is to condemn people for their weight, and how toxic and permeating skinny culture truly is. I thought about situations where older women are passive aggressive in the way they set a "good example" for younger women and just cringed. Malaya goes through quite a journey of self-discovery before she's observing her mother and grandmother discussing female beauty and realizes:

"She watched thinking how like a game it was and so unwinnable. Even your own face could turn on you, and your body already had. The best a woman could hope for was to be on her own side."

This is a thought-provoking and important read.