I remember picking up Jemima J in a bookshop, reading the first line, and knowing this was a book for me. It didn't fail me then and it hasn't failed me on each re-read. I'm guessing it will hold true when I decide to pick up again. Yes, the book is dated (we are all pretty familiar with the internet now) and no, Jemima shouldn't need to change who she is. But this book gives hope for those out there who feel as Jemima does. It reminds you that even when you get what you think you want, the grass isn't always as green on the other side as you thought. But it also shows you that you can find a middle ground where the grass is just the right shade for you.

Note: Reading date is random. I have read this multiple times, but have no idea of the exact dates. ( )

Protag is overweight with a sad life, surrounded by girls who are skinny and manipulative. She then quits eating food and start exercising obsessively (but the narrator tells us this is somehow NOT an eating disorder???), becomes thin, and her life becomes perfect.

I generously gave this book 2 stars because I quite liked the characters. However I hated the authors descriptions of them.
At the start of the book Jemima is overweight, the language used, "thighs that rub together" "enormous breasts" "chubby fingers" every description is negative.
What annoys me most though is when she joins a gym and gets weighed she's 14 stone 8, which isn't a weight which would match up with the woman who has been described.
She then goes on a regime of barely eating and over exercising, and except for one line that the gym instructor is worried about her there's no mention of the fact that this extreme weight loss is unhealthy!
Once she loses the weight suddenly she's gorgeous and everyone adores her.
The characters do thankfully have some insight into their lives and realise appearance isn't everything, but the authors descriptions make it such an uncomfortable read that I very nearly gave up several times. I only continued in the hope it would get better.

I've read a Jane Green book before and found that as difficult a read. I hoped this might be better but I don't think I'll bother with this author again. ( )

So here's the thing. Before I purged all of my Amazon reviews I think most people would have realized that I used to be a huge fan of Jane Green. I loved Jemima J, Mr. Maybe, and even loved Bookends. Then I started to really not get many of Jane Green's later books and after a while just stopped making them my always have to buy books. However, I still re-read Jemima J, Mr. Maybe, and Bookends once every year or so. Jemima J holds a special place in my heart just because it was my first Jane Green book and though there are problems galore with the entire story-line and ending. I loved the character of Jemima so much that I always over look it. And up until now I would have probably have still given it 5 stars. However, I actually read this book with an offline friend of mine at the same time and we later on discussed it. And I didn't realize until she pointed some things out, how seriously messed up this entire story is. So I can say that this book is probably going to come out of my rotation for future use.

Told in the third person, we follow Jemima Jones. Overweight by 100 pounds (apparently she is obese), Jemima feels despair that her crush on coworker Ben is never going to realize how perfect for him she could be. Due to being sent off to a computer course with Ben and their colleague Geraldine, Jemima gets to know more about Ben and even becomes his confidant. However, due to the three of them talking on chatrooms on the internet, Jemima starts an online relationship with a guy named Brad in California. The only problem is that Jemima has lied about her job, her hobbies, and oh yeah about how she looks. Jemima uses this lie to push herself to being the thin woman that she has always wanted to be.

As I said above, I can't help liking Jemima. Maybe it's because part of me wanted to give her a hug and tell her that her weight isn't her problem, it is her crippling self esteem.

So below you will see my comments on the book and my friend's comments which seriously had me wondering if I just have really bad taste in books when I don't see some of the problems that she did.

Most of this book is following Jemima being treated horribly by people until her weight loss transformation. Jemima does start getting treated differently by people around her and she is still focused on being what she considers a "hardbody" and losing so much weight that someone will practically be able to see her ribs.

My friend thought this book was pointing out the wrong things to women and she got worried that if someone younger read it, they may try some of the same things that Jemima did to lose weight. For example, somehow Jemima loses almost all of her extra weight in 3 months. And I kid you not, I don't know how in the world I overlooked that detail all of the times that I read this book previously. It took my friend pointing it out to me that this was something that Jane Green had included in this book. I kept wondering as I re-read this how in the world did she not have any loose skin anywhere.

Second, Jemima has really bad self esteem. I think things would have been better in the book if Jemima acknowledge she had some issues to work through, and saw a therapist. I guess it doesn't make for a chick lit type of book though.

My friend loathed the character of Ben. Her exact words were and I quote:

For goodness sake! Every woman I know has some idiot like this in their past. You just become the guy's sounding board and you think to yourself if only I lost some weight, or were more funny, or something that he would be into you. The only problem is that Ben doesn't even start to think about Jemima until he realizes he doesn't have someone to listen to his shit! Ugh! I hate him!

Yeah...up until talking to her I always thought how romantic it was that Jemima was secretly in love with Ben.

The writing I always thought was quite good, though in parts I remember initially not understanding what a lot of terms means (British chick lit novel) and I thought the pacing was quite good.

My friend thought the writing was not as advanced as she would like it, and she thought the pacing was all over the place.

Apparently my friend booed the ending.


in the end she and Ben end up married



I stupidly said, well come on. I mean look at how in the end she realized that she needed to stop trying to force herself into being someone she was not. And she responded, that whole part where she went to California was awful and I wanted to scream throughout it.

So there you go. A book I used to keep on my comfort read list is now going on my shelf of shame. ( )

Cute read. ( )