Low-fat Love

by Patricia Leavy

Low-Fat Love unfolds over three seasons as Prilly Greene and Janice Goldwyn, adversarial editors at a New York press, experience personal change relating to the men (and absence of women) in their lives. Ultimately, each woman is pushed to confront her own image of herself, exploring her insecurities, the stagnation in her life and her reasons for having settled for low-fat love. Along with Prilly and Janice, a cast of offbeat characters’stories are interwoven throughout the book.

204 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2011

About the author

Patricia Leavy, Ph.D., is a bestselling author. She has published over fifty books, earning commercial and critical success in both fiction and nonfiction, and her work has been translated into many languages. Patricia has received over 100 book honors as well as career awards from the New England Sociological Association, the American Creativity Association, the American Educational Research Association, the International Congress of Qualitative Inquiry, and the National Art Education Association. In 2024 the London Arts-Based Research Centre established "The Patricia Leavy Award for Arts-Based Research." She lives in Maine with her family. Patricia loves writing, reading, watching films, and traveling. These days, she's focused on writing feel-good love stories.

Reviews

[Ebony · Rating 3 out of 5]

I sincerely love the idea of social fiction, and I actually started to like Prilly who was a hot mess, but I think that was the point. Unfortunately, this would be a difficult book for me to teach. A) Students don’t read assigned novels, like ever. B) Unless you’re white, it’s difficult to connect with the characters and the pop culture references in the text. C) The story’s devolution is so fast, you’re like, wait, what happened? D) For undergrads, the critiques of women’s representations in popular culture are so subtle, it would take a while for them to buy-in especially since the book can be difficult for a diverse student audience to connect to. That said, the writing was engaging and the relationship issues were familiar—definitely more universal than the characters and the references. If there were other books in the series, I would read them personally but I don’t think I’m teaching anything where I can get away with assigning them.

[Victoria · Rating 3 out of 5]

Huh.
I know it's a criticism but man. I hated Janice's and Prilly's characters.
Kyle was the only character whom I liked.

[Shalen Lowell · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic novel. Truly an inspiring, fun, one-of-a-kind feminist read.

[Janelle · Rating 3 out of 5]

an interesting read, but i'm not quite sure the social critique comes through as clearly as intended.

[Carly K · Rating 5 out of 5]

I couldn't put this down. I read it in just a few hours spread over a couple of commutes and a bit of time at home. Low-Fat Love reads like very sharp chick lit, but it is also reminiscent Tama Janowitz's "Slaves of New York" (which is great and everyone should also read). The story unfolds through multiple perspectives, snippets of two women's lives wound into and around each other. As someone who is in the earlier years of her career, I thought the book also spoke well to the generational tensions that often face women at work and that can make it difficult for women to connect well in professional networks. Low-Fat Love speaks to the work we have to do to be kind to ourselves and get out of our own ways, but it does so without being preachy or scolding. Popular culture and media are woven throughout, which anchors the novel in some ways to a particular moment in time (now 10 years after initial release, some of those examples date the book a bit, although not in a negative way), but also give a clear sense of the complicated and sometimes conflicting or even crushing messages women absorb from television, magazines, and other sources. It's a book well suited to a media studies, gender studies, or popular culture class at the college level, but it's also just such a fun read that manages to leave the reader with a lot to chew on.

[Jo Lampert · Rating 4 out of 5]

Been meaning to read this for a long time, esp of course because of patrician leavy. In some ways I didn't expect to like it as much as I did. It's just smart chick lit, and nicely written, and extra interesting because I know Leavy's other, scholarly work better. Very enjoyable.

[Nancy]

I could not believe all the "educated" raves about this novel. I was looking for a novel to use in my class for next Fall. It was highly recommended by the reviewers. I would NOT recomment this book.

[Margaret Robbins · Rating 5 out of 5]

I just loved this book and found it a fascinating read! :)

[A.F. Lewis · Rating 2 out of 5]

I read this for my Love and Communication class, and while I appreciated bringing together academic research with fiction and see the merit in this bridging of styles, I did not like the story.

[Joelyn · Rating 2 out of 5]

My first book in Patricia Leavy's Social Fictions series