BIG SUMMER - Jennifer Weiner

4 stars

Jennifer Weiner's latest is full of surprises and a deep dive into the world of influencers, body image, and acceptance.

Characters: ★★★★
Body Image Discussions: ★★★
Plot/Arc: ★★★★

Daphne is a plus-size influencer in our modern world of Instagram, hashtags, and body acceptance. But she's still at the "accepting" part when it comes to her own body—and the life she leads on Instagram is a constant push and pull with her internal monologue.

Drue Cavanaugh used to be Daphne's best friend, but when she burned Daphne and made their last epic fight about Daphne's weight, Daphne escaped and never looked back. Drue was rich, thin, blonde, and perfect—it's time for Daphne to cut her losses and be the average girl she was meant to be.

Years later, out of the blue, Drue contacts Daphne and asks her to be in her wedding. She even offers to pay her. Turns out Drue's mean girl self hasn't done her any favors, and her influencer lifestyle needs to look perfect. Daphne knows she's been coerced and bribed, but she says yes anyway. She's never been able to say no to Drue for very long.

Big Summer is mostly about Daphne's experience at the Cape with Drue's wedding, but it's also series of past memories of Daphne's childhood. And, more specifically, a journey through Daphne's mind as she glitches on every single moment with thoughts on her body and body size.

Also, there was a huge twist about halfway through Big Summer that I was NOT expecting. I'm so glad the description didn't allude to it. I thought it made this novel so much better, and really enjoyed where it took Daphne.

If I had to pick a negative to highlight, I'd say that this novel is the most "fat-focused" of any Jennifer Weiner that I've read so far. That feels weird to say as a negative, but hear me out--as someone who is plus-sized herself, I found it really disheartening that literally every single moment, every single thought, and every single plot point focused or mentioned something explicitly related to Daphne's weight. At the beginning, I was like "Yes! Someone gets it!" but towards the first half...and the middle...and the end...I felt myself wishing, desperately, for more balance in the main character. In a way, by focusing on this aspect of Daphne so much, we went past highlighting her "acceptance" to reducing her to that one characteristic...which I feel was a problem, as we're trying to make plus-size women feel seen and normalized. Not reduced to their weight, or distilled down to one trait of self body-hate.

However, overall I thoroughly enjoyed this one, and am thrilled to see where Jennifer Weiner takes us next--don't miss this one this summer!

Thank you to Simon & Schuster for an ARC of this title in exchange for an honest review.