Weightless audiobook

Weightless has the potential to be my favorite book of 2022 and I've read 108 books so far this year so that's saying something. This book is so important and everyone should read it.The Celebrities, Weight Loss, and Us chapter spoke to me so deeply. About 10 years ago I lost a noticeable amount of weight before due to illness from stress and earlier this year I watched the same thing happen to my mom. In both instances, I was overwhelmed by the amount of compliments that we received for losing weight. Little did these commenters know, it was due to sickness. From being unable to eat and being nauseous nonstop. It was sickening to me to see that we were being complimented on weight that we were losing due to bad situations. As someone who was incredibly skinny in elementary and middle school, I often had the inverse effect of adults commenting on my body about how I needed to get some meat on my bones. I've learned that there will always be comments, no matter your body type or situation.A HUGE thank you to BiblioLifestyle and Ecco Books for the gifted copy of this book!

This book was extremely validating to read. Highly recommend.

What a refreshing memoir! I don’t think that I’ve read anything like this in a while. The closest (and I don’t even think that it’s that close) would be Hunger by Roxane Gay. I think that Dionne dives so well into discussions of fatphobia and race, especially when she’s the one being fatphobic to her peers. That take is always extremely interesting to me. Some chapters didn’t hash out anything new to me, including viewpoint, and some I wish dove in deeper. However, would I recommend this book? Absolutely. It’s so damn great.

“Weightless,” is a provocative work about the harsh realities of a fat-phobic world. It is an inside look about the mistreatment and judgements of those who aren’t thin. Many people can relate to the book, and I highly recommend it. My only critique is the book is repetitive during certain segments, but it isn’t a deal breaker because they were important points to be revisited. This book is one that deserves a read by anyone who has felt less than.

Thank you Ecco Books for the advanced copy I won here through a giveaway on goodreads. As a woman who has been labeled obese by healthcare providers my whole life, so much of this resonated for me. There was also so much to be learned in the gaps I have in that my experience is as a cis/white woman. If you want to learn about many of the pervasive angles in which fatphobia exists in our world through the lens of a Black woman, this is a great read. All that to say: I have more to unpack. I am also a healthcare provider myself and much of my career has been in fitness and sport so there were a number of things in this book that gave me pause.Some themes felt a bit repetitive, but I don’t think it was overwhelming. A good read, especially if you are willing to be a bit uncomfortable with the topics and intersectionality of racism, sexism, ableism, and fat phobia.

It’s hard navigating a world where you feel like you don’t belong. You yearn to make yourself smaller to fit society’s standard of what you are supposed to look like. This woman’s courage is astonishing. Her words were so very relatable and heartbreaking. It took me right back to childhood and lifelong trauma. She leaves the book on the note of inclusion being part of the answer to all these problems. I very confidently believe she is a pioneer for a more inclusive future. But a saddened heart because why in 2023 are we still in this place.

As a large girl, I resonated with a lot of the points mentioned in this book. I especially felt called out when she discussed the internalized fatphobia that some fat people have, especially when watching reality TV such as My 600-lb Life.When she touched on her personal life, it was always done honestly and emotionally. However, when I wanted her to spend more time on the studies and connecting them to how they played out in pop culture, I didn't get that as much. Despite that, I enjoyed this read.

This isn't my first book on this particular topic but it joins the ranks as one my favorites. Evette Dionne brings a different point of view to the conversations around body positivity and the experiences persons with size go through. This book is thoughtful and insightful but also gives you insight into the person that Evette is. I really enjoyed this book definitely would recommend.

Special thanks to the author, Ecco books, & netgalley for my advanced readers copy!!!!This memoir was such a thought-provoking experience. The author covered a multitude of situations and topics that overweight individuals including herself have faced. If you’ve ever struggled with your weight or felt insecure about it this book has an optimistic view on fat phobia and the culture surrounding it. The author gives us her own personal experiences intertwined with statistical research making the book both relatable and informative. Her journey like many others was rough from dealing with chronic illness, depression, humiliation, sexual encounters, even childhood bullying.The emotional vulnerability shown while letting us in on her personal life was so compelling. I know it probably took a lot for her to discuss her childhood and her dating experiences. We don’t realize the degree of pain fat shaming can cause a person.Her touching on childhood obesity and the way medical professionals treat individuals who are overweight was an eye opener. I agree with her and think it’s sad that health professionals equate the cause of a person’s illness to their weight rather than focusing on the symptoms they’re experiencing. So, many obese individuals have been misdiagnosed simply because the physician failed to listen. Overall I really enjoyed this book. I just wish the author had explored certain topics more in depth. I commend her for bringing more awareness to such a touchy subject. But I would’ve loved this book even more had she given us the steps that could be taken now to create a change.

so good!!! evette is wonderful reading the audiobook!!

Such an eye-opening memoir. Well researched and beautifully told story of what it’s like to be “of size”.

I was lucky to get an advanced copy of this forthcoming book by journalist Evette Dionne. The collection of essays, which all weave in memoir, is a compelling and educational exploration of fat Black womanhood. But this book is even more than that: it’s an exploration of pop culture, chronic illness, racism, and living with the everpresent threat of sudden death. Dionne’s resilience and grace — in the face of heart failure and bullying from peers and doctors alike — is inspiring.

I first started following Evette Dionne on social media when she was named the editor of BITCH magazine, a publication devoted to feminist critiques of pop culture (sadly now shuttered). She also wrote an award-winning history for young readers about Black women’s struggles for voting rights. But only recently have I become aware of her role as an activist for fat people’s rights, a long-overdue movement aiming to combat one of the last socially acceptable forms of discrimination.In WEIGHTLESS, Dionne provides plenty of personal history as context for her activism. She opens by discussing her diagnosis, while she was still in her 20s, of pulmonary hypertension and heart failure. These conditions were likely caused, or at least exacerbated, by medical professionals’ repeated inability or refusal to see her as anything more than a fat body that needed to lose weight. Dionne’s chronic conditions are not a consequence of her fatness. Rather, they were most likely caused by earlier doctors’ failures to address a different (non-weight-related) condition until their only choice was to use a powerful medication with toxic side effects --- again, because her size blinded them to the need for any action beyond weight loss.Indictment of the medical profession is a theme that runs throughout several of Dionne’s chapters, which include considerations of celebrity weight loss and the public portrayals of fat celebrities, the challenges of online dating as a fat person, and the dearth of serious roles for fat actors. Her chapters --- which for the most part could exist as stand-alone essays --- also delve into more personal topics, such as the shame she experienced as a young girl publicly humiliated by a (supposedly) well-meaning gym teacher, and the anxiety she felt when disrobing for sex or donning a form-fitting bathing suit on a cruise.Dionne addresses complicated and perhaps controversial topics when she admits to tension between herself and her mother (a fellow fat person, but one keen to adopt every new diet or weight loss technique). She also acknowledges the extent to which even she has internalized society’s fatphobia, such as when she relates feeling uncomfortable while dating an equally fat man or when she admits to relishing shows like “My 600-Pound Life” with a feeling of superiority: “Fatness is intertwined in my very being; I don’t know who I am if I’m not fat. But I’ve also prided myself on not being that fat.”WEIGHTLESS both opens and closes with some very positive action items that readers can take. These include techniques for finding doctors who won’t default to weight loss as the first (or only) solution and, later, ideas for how to combat discrimination against fat people via legal and political actions. At times, given the book’s relatively narrow focus and its mixture of the personal and the political, it can begin to seem slightly repetitious. But Dionne’s brilliance and candor will carry readers along with her.Reviewed by Norah Piehl