The Last Email like this I'll Send
And what I've been up to, in the run-up to the publication of UNSHRINKING
It’s now just three days until my next book, Unshrinking, will be out, on Tuesday January 9 (a bit more about it here, if you haven’t heard about it already). Always an anxious time in the life cycle of an author, I’m trying to enjoy the nice moments and not get too depressed by being predictably belittled and dragged in the right-wing British tabloids (I’m not going to give them the clicks by linking). And, as well as begging for your help in getting the good word out to a more receptive audience, this is a nice opportunity to say hello to those new subscribers who are here—welcome!— thanks to some pieces of mine that have been running. And, to those who’ve been around for a while, here’s what I’ve been up to, in case you are interested.
I wrote for The New York Times on the concept of “food noise,” and my strong suspicion that normal human drives—hunger, appetite, craving—are now being touted as pathological, thanks to the advent of the new and much-hyped class of weight loss drugs, such as Ozempic and Wegovy, with their powerful appetite-suppressive effects. I didn’t get to say this in the piece in the end, but this would hardly be the first time we’ve seen an inflation or even invention of problems when new treatments become available: testosterone deficiency, hypoactive sexual desire disorder, idiopathic short stature, halitosis. A “treatment” becomes available, through the advent of new technologies, and then we find previous annoyances or bodily inevitabilities reconceptualized as pressing medical or psychological problems. We should be circumspect, in such cases, about whether the problem is a genuine one, or whether the concern owes to bodily norms and values that themselves should be challenged—in this case, the sense that our bodies should be as thin as possible, and that our hunger and appetite are mere impediments to leanness.
Then, yesterday, I published a piece in The Cut that’s my most personal piece of writing to date. Since I started writing about misogyny, I’ve been asked many times how I got interested in the subject. This is my story, which I’ve been grateful and gutted and deeply unsurprised to hear is, with minor variations, the story of so many girls and women. I use it to make the argument that we can’t understand or address misogyny without facing fatphobia—an idea on which Unshrinking is premised.
Anyway. I’m grateful for these opportunities, but promoting a book like this in this culture remains, well, tough-going, an uphill battle. I’d be so grateful if any of you would be willing to help it along in these ways:
Pre-order, if you have the time and means and inclination (and haven’t already, obviously). You can do so from your local independent bookseller (my recommendation) or, if that’s what’s accessible to you, the bad place too of course (where it happens to be an Amazon best non-fiction pick for January, and is 15% off today). You can also get the audiobook at Audible or Libro.FM. (And I narrate it!) Pre-orders are essential to the fates of a trade book, and ensuring it doesn’t sink before it’s even published. Here’s the UK and the Australian version for my international (and hometown) readers.
Leave a goodreads review (as soon as possible) and/or an amazon review (no matter where you buy it from, after it’s been published). This is SO incredibly helpful. Ratings without reviews are great too, if that’s what you have the bandwidth for. Finally, marking the book as “want to read” on goodreads is also super-helpful. (I am sure this one is going to be subject to a lot of fatphobic trolling—and may even be brigaded.)
Tell your friends, family members, students, or book clubs if you think they might be interested. And if you’re interested in getting me to zoom into a class or a book club or similar, let me know, and I’ll try my very best to make it happen.
Post about the book on social media, if you’d like to. You can tag me too, and I will be forever grateful!
No pressure, of course—but I am giving thanks in advance for those of you willing to help me, or to attend my little book tour—full details of which are now available on my website.
Friends, any questions about Unshrinking that I might be able to answer? And how are you feeling about the inevitable buzz of diet culture in January to which I hope this book is something of an antidote?
I appreciate your work so much. Just so you know, I've taught *Down Girl* in my Feminist Theory course three times now, and students have almost universally adored the book. I'm actually using your NYT piece on food noise in my intro class on the first day (as a sample to get them working on reading philosophy, and also as part of my side hustle as one of your hype women).
One thing the CUT piece make me reflect on is how all my body shame stuff came directly from women. Yes, women who were receiving that misogyny from men but women no less, especially my mother but also other women in the family and around me. This made me fearful of talking about the issues with women well into my forties. That meant that while I was in therapy for All Kinds of Things, the body stuff never really got processed because with my women therapists I could never broach the subject, I never felt safe and they never helped me get there.