At 25% I had to DNF. The tone deaf narrative around race and weight was impossible to get past. I wanted to enjoy this book and tried to push through but couldn’t.

Alice and Daphne, two successful working mothers who share the self-loathing that has come with weight gain, meet at Privation. They along with five other women, have signed on for a seemingly incredible opportunity to lose the weight that rules their life. In exchange, they agree to leave their family and friends and have no contact with the outside world. Oh and they also are being filmed. 24 hours a day. The footage will be turned into a documentary of their journey called "Waisted."

This book is a good commentary on what it is like to be a woman in today's society. For so long, we have been told that not only CAN we do it all, we SHOULD be doing it all - and we should look perfect while doing it. Alice thinks if she doesn't lose weight, her husband will leave her. Daphne is a victim of her mother's constant barbs about her weight. Both women are smart and successful but don't feel that way because, in their mind, they don't fit into the societal or familial mold of how they should look.

There are some uncomfortable moments in this book. For me personally, I felt sick every time the women were degraded and belittled. There are also some triumphant moments in this book - situations which had me cheering on and then cheering because of these women. It is the mark of good writing for me to be this invested in the characters of a book. Kudos to Meyers for writing such a book.

I found myself wishing I had the audiobook so I could listen whenever my hands were busy. While the plot was entertaining, it was the relationships that gripped me. I found myself rereading the passages between mothers and daughters, female friends, and spouses. I particularly enjoyed the relationship between Alice and her mother, as my own life mimics their dynamic.

This book comes at the perfect time as Shrill debuts on Netflix and the body accetance movement finally gains the traction it deserves.

I came for the entertaining reality TV plot and fell and love with the powerful dynamics between characters.

Waisted, the latest release by Randy Susan Meyers, this book looks into obsession of losing weight. This book represents strong woman, our society's obsession to lose weight, and how our perception of ourselves can severely effect our families.

Daphne, Alice and host of colorful characters share one thing in common: being overweight in a society obsessed with the concept of being thin. The women are successful with families they are raising but their obsession with their weight impacts nearly every facet of their life and decision making. The woman are then giving an opportunity to lose weight while being filmed. When reading this part of the book, it gives a harsh reality of how much people in general will go through to look "thin".

The second half of the book describes more of how the aftermaths of being on a t.v. show and what the woman truly thought of their experience. The second half was a little bit more slower for me at time, but still kept me hooked to find out if the woman would confront the filmmakers.

Thank you to NetGalley for providing me this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Randy Susan Meyers has written an amazing book about women, weight issues, and the extremes we will go to to look perfect. I loved this book and the message it gives women about our self worth and loving ourselves.
Alice and Daphne, both successful and accomplished working mothers, harbor the same secret: obsession with their weight overshadows concerns about their children, husbands, work—and everything else of importance in their lives. Scales terrify them. Daphne, plump in a family of model-thin women, learned only slimness earns admiration at her mother’s knee. Alice, break-up skinny when she met her husband, risks losing her marriage if she keeps gaining weight. The two women meet at Waisted. Located in a remote Vermont mansion, the program promises fast, dramatic weight loss, and Alice, Daphne, and five other women are desperate enough to leave behind their families for this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. The catch? They must agree to always be on camera; afterward, the world will see Waisted: The Documentary. The women soon discover that the filmmakers have trapped them in a cruel experiment. With each pound lost, they edge deeper into obsession and instability...until they decide to take matters into their own hands. Thank you to Netgalley and Atria Books for my honest review

This book had great characters and a unique and interesting premise. I think the topic of how far women would go to lose weight and the overwhelming impact weight and body image have on women is deep and important to tackle in fiction.

I felt like the first half of this book was more enjoyable and lived up to the book description. However, I found the second half, after the women returned to their lives after their experience at the weight loss retreat seemed to drag and become a bit repetitive and preachy. Yet, I can see how other readers would enjoy this book even more than I did.

I liked this book and I recommend it to readers who enjoy realistic women's fiction that tackles modern emotional issues. Be aware that how women's weight affects not only self-image but marriages and other family relationships is a large theme.

This book wrestles with the complexities that women deal with when it comes to body image. Alice, Daphne, Hania, and four other women embark on a weight loss journey that ends up being a nightmare. The trouble is though the experiment they participated in crossed many ethical boundaries, it also worked. They lost weight, but they then were left to cope with the emotional and physical fallout the shook their relationships and selves.

Randy Susan Meyers pushes to extremes with this book, but it highlights the pervasive negative self-talk and destructive self-doubt that many wrestle with when it comes to weight. While this could be triggering for those with disordered eating histories or other body image issues, most will find themselves reflected in some way in the journey of these women and find some catharsis.

Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for an unbiased review.

This is wonderfully written. It is about how far women will go to lose weight. Women ate looked at on their appearance, not their character, how smart or intelligent they are. Sometimes women forget that their self worth is more than a number on a scale or the size of clothes you wear. This is about a group of women going to Privation a place that is supposed to help you lose weight in a healthy way. What they discover is a place that will starve, humiliate, taunt and even distribute illegal drugs to make them lose weight. Their only recourse is to fight back and fight for themselves. Being overweight, fat or obese doesn't make you less of a human being. Each women will have to face the weight issue with the understanding of who they are, and who they are trying to please.
Great read!

Oh! I loved this book. Full disclosure: I read it prior to reading Liane Moriarty's "Nine Perfect Strangers" and thought the setting was unique. Having read the other book, I am doubling down on my original impression that "Waisted" is fantastic and worth the read. The characters' backstories are interesting and the action moves at an even pace.

Alice has struggled with her weight throughout the years. She struggles to find her place in the world where she feels she has a lot of things to over come. While her father is black, her mother is white and she raised Alice to understand her culture, to give her a piece of who she was because she wasn't able to. While she didn't feel the pressure from her parents about her weight, she did feel smothered. After a horrible breakup, she was at her lowest weight. Skinnier than ever she met her husband Clancy and he has let her know he doesn't find her attractive with all the extra weight. I'm not sure how I feel about Clancy, because to me, he treats Alice poorly. He doesn't really help her in her weight loss goals, and he's a bit controlling.


Then we have Daphne. Her husband Sam loves her for who she is and to everyone that meets him, he's pretty close to sainthood. Daphne's mother is the source for a lot of her angst. Daphne could never be thin enough for her, and the constant jabs are more hurtful than anything. Daphne's daughter especially doesn't treat her the greatest. But Daphne's desire to raise her daughter the opposite of how her mother raised her, might be causing more harm than good.

These two women meet when they sign up for a program called Waisted. They know they're going to be filmed for a documentary, and they signed away their rights to being recorded. But things go from bad to worse. They are humiliated and verbally abused. They are being given pills that they have no idea what is in them. While they are losing weight, it's not in a healthy way, despite the fact there is a doctor in the building. As Daphne and Alice's friendship grows, they decide to find out what is going on with their trainers.

I liked Alice and Daphne and I felt bad for their struggles. There were some great supporting characters such as Daphne's mom because she made a really good bad mother. Hania, another woman in the program, was a good character though I would have loved to see her developed more before she teamed up with our two main characters.

Overall, Waisted was a fun read, there were moments where your heart broke for the characters and then other moments where you were cheering the women on. Their struggles with weight were portrayed well and I think accurately. Anyone that struggles with their weight has a constant internal dialogue, and I think that Meyers did a great job in portraying this in the characters. I liked Alice's fighting spirit and I think she was a great character to carry the book. Nicely done.

Waisted, the latest release by Randy Susan Meyers, examines the American woman's experience with weight loss, the cultural obsession around the industry and reality tv and the impact on family life. While a slight departure from Meyer's other novels Waisted still contains great character development, strong women with everyday flaws and some difficult truths-all hallmarks of Meyer's writing.

Daphne, Alice and host of colorful characters share one thing in common: being overweight in a society obsessed with the concept of being thin. The women are successful with families they are raising but their obsession with their weight impacts nearly every facet of their life and decision making. Given an opportunity to lose weight at a remote "resort" where filmmakers are documenting their every move the women are pushed beyond limits and tested day in and day out. While some of this may be uncomfortable to read it is an accurate reflection on women today and the lengths we will go to achieve society's ideal frame.

Daphne and Alice's families provide a colorful, albeit sometimes frustrating backdrop, and provide insight into the women's obsession with weight and body image and how it impacts their families. While much of the book seemingly focuses on weight and appearances there are underlying themes explored including growing up multiracial in American society and how we define success. The first half of the story explored the documentary the women participated in willingly and provided backdrop for the second half which delves into the aftermath of an experiment gone wrong. I was hooked and invested in finding out if the women flip the script on the filmmakers. Highly recommend!

Thank you to NetGalley for providing me this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I definitely enjoyed the concept of this book but still felt almost disconnected from it. I found the characters to be ones that I could relate to by in a very vague way. This isn't my favorite book I've read but I do respect where the author was going. For that purpose, I think I ended the book feeling positively about it even though I felt removed.

This was a smart, entertaining book and I felt entertained from start to finish. It wasn't as deep as I had hoped it could be, but all the same well done!

This book revolved around Daphne and Alice, two overweight women who agree to participate in a reality show in order to shed pounds. But although the show itself is a deceptive nightmare, they still uncover much of the emotional baggage that is holding them back in life. Cultural constraints, family dynamics, shame, and eating disorders are overcome with the unfolding of new friendships and difficult examinations of the most important relationships women share.

This book and its main theme is as complicated as its characters. Change is never easy, and it always comes with the loss of something else. Results aren't always long-term or even the end result people think they are looking for. What really drives this story home is the characters realness, but it's that honesty that keeps the author from ending the book with unrealistic, sappy conclusions.

I identify with both Daphne and Alice in more ways than one, but especially as a woman who has always had body issues and been overweight. This book began a little slow, but once the characters were at the mansion, the pace picked up a bit. I love the bond that formed between the two ladies and the mother/daughter dynamics in the book. I am not fond of Clancy at all. The book was a good read that took about a week to read. I'd recommend for anyone looking for a story that might tug at your heartstrings.

I was really looking forward to reading this book. I fell in love with some of the characters. Yet, the author fell flat when the women escaped the "waisted" facility. I thought that after the interviews and their own documentary, the author would have described in more detail how the women came to love their own bodies. That did NOT happen. Instead, the women still relied upon speed, restrictive dieting, and shaming themselves.
The author left me wanting to throw away the book in disgust.
I would say read this book for some of the female characters, not for the issues that its supposed to tackle.

I really liked this book a lot. The characters were strong and interesting and the plot was definitely not what I was expecting in a good way!

The book tells the story of 7 women who meet at Waisted, a weight loss retreat located in a house in Vermont. All the women have interesting and different backstories for why they are overweight and how they ended up there. When they arrive, they find it's not a weight loss retreat at all but a filmed reality show designed to find out how much they want to lose weight and what exactly they'll do to achieve their goal.

There are some interesting messages conveyed in how the women are treated and how they respond. I think this book is going to be very popular!

Thanks to Atria Books and NetGalley for the ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Waisted follows the complicated story of two middle-aged women, mothers, that are willing to do just about anything to lose “the weight.” They agree to participate in a filmed-reality style show documenting their time at a retreat. The show will document what women are willing to do, just to lose the weight. Daphne and Alice are relatable adults, both with complicated family histories, jobs and friends. Despite their obvious successes in life, they both cannot seem to find the happiness that they desire and attribute to their size.
Their time at the retreat is at times a painful read, clearly each character is struggling with serious body image issues. Frustrated by years of belittlement, failure and a quest for control, Alice and Daphne experience the ride of lifetime while at the retreat and following their return home. The underlying issues of friendship, self-love and dignity are excellent themes that I clung to throughout this novel. While I had a difficult time engaging with the characters, I rooted for their success all along the way!
A sincere thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Yeah, there was no way I was going to sit through this whole book.

For one thing, I found this to be very problematic on multiple levels. The main character, Alice, is mixed race and obese. But from what I could tell from my own research, the author is neither of those things. OWN VOICES REPRESENTATION IS SO IMPORTANT. I felt so uncomfortable reading this knowing that the author is a relatively thin white woman. UGH. Also, I found some of the language in this book to be very fatphobic!! YIKES

I probably would have kept reading if the author had pulled me into the story, but she didn’t. The premise sounded so interesting, but I was just kind of bored reading this.

I did not enjoy this book. Writing seemed to be all over the place and choppy. Felt like there were a lot of characters that just added to the mix but didn’t help the story. I truly love Randy Susan Meyers, this was just a miss for you. Also, exactly the same height and having been the weight of one of the characters, the sizes and clothes/dresses were, I felt, extremely exaggerated. I’m sorry :(