Review: Big Girl Panties

Reviewed by Carrie
 

Holly Brennan is a grieving widow who has used food to cope with the untimely death of her husband. Trudging back from Toronto, she is seated next to Logan Montgomery, a hot shot personal trainer to pro athletes. As a karmic payment for judging a book by its cover, Logan offers to train Holly to help her “get her life back on track,” not even knowing why or how she got herself into her current state. Holly decides three years of mourning and junk food is enough and grasps at the opportunity to try to move past her depression and grief. As the sessions progress, they become friends. As Holly’s new form begins to emerge, Logan starts to notice more than her snarky retorts. Meanwhile, Holly nurses her crush on Logan, but he still can’t get over his image issues.

Much of the book is centered around weight issues, both from Logan and Holly’s point of view. I totally sympathized with Holly. She has never been the thin girl. She had crappy parents. She was a loner until in college, a man paid attention to her and she married him. He was her way out of a sad life. So as she watched him, and her life, slowly destroyed by cancer, she turned to the one thing in her life that she could count on – food.

On the other hand, there is Logan, who believes that everyone can achieve anything they want if they just put their mind to it. Logan reminded me of a guy I knew in high school that everyone liked. He was gorgeous, popular and nice to everyone, but lacked any real kind of depth or emotion. I felt taken back to that time when Holly secretly crushes on Logan as he makes it plain that he couldn’t even fathom having someone looking like her on his arm. In short, Logan is an ass. By the time he pulls his head out, I’m not sure that many readers will say he is redeemed.

The book is well written and the words flow well except the author tried to cram in a novella’s worth about Logan’s friends Chase and Amanda. that was completely unnecessary. I found myself skipping over their scenes as they had nothing to do with Logan or Holly.

Honestly, I’m not quite sure how I feel about this book. Anyone who has ever struggled with their weight will immediately identify with Holly and her pain. On the other hand, Logan’s behavior really cut me to the quick and I’m not sure if I really forgave him. Readers will feel strongly about this book one way or another.

Rating: C+

*ARC Provided by William Morrow

Click to purchase: Amazon

Big Girl Panties

by Stephanie Evanovich

Original Release Date: July 9, 2013

Publisher: William Morrow