Home :: Books :: Health, Mind & Body  

Arts & Photography
Audio CDs
Audiocassettes
Biographies & Memoirs
Business & Investing
Children's Books
Christianity
Comics & Graphic Novels
Computers & Internet
Cooking, Food & Wine
Entertainment
Gay & Lesbian
Health, Mind & Body

History
Home & Garden
Horror
Literature & Fiction
Mystery & Thrillers
Nonfiction
Outdoors & Nature
Parenting & Families
Professional & Technical
Reference
Religion & Spirituality
Romance
Science
Science Fiction & Fantasy
Sports
Teens
Travel
Women's Fiction
Homesick : A Memoir of Family, Food, and Finding Hope

Homesick : A Memoir of Family, Food, and Finding Hope

List Price: $24.00
Your Price: $16.32
Product Info Reviews

<< 1 >>

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: What a whiner!
Review: All Jenny Lauren does is whine, complain, and talk about how beautiful she is. She refers to "my beauty" about a dozen times and I only read half the book. This is a terrible book written by a self-obsessed spoiled brat. I'm so glad I checked this out from the library and didn't waste my money on this whine fest. Skip this book!

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: A book you will devour!
Review: I came to this site to recommend Jenny Lauren's book and was side-tracked by some of the "reviews" that were filled with such hatred and resentment. Ironically, the fact that these disdainful people took the time to read the book and then were moved enough to write their scathing reviews, only highlights what an interesting read the book actually is.

Jenny Lauren's candid and emotionally provocative writing draws the reader into her world in a way that the best books do. Once you start the book, you (appropriately) want to devour it! Jenny Lauren's tactful use of humor helps make some difficult details palatable to her reader. To be able to describe such heart-wrenching personal events while at the same time make the reader smile (and often laugh out loud!) is a talent that so many writers unsuccessfully try to attain; kudos to Jenny Lauren for achieving this seemingly effortlessly.

Most importantly, Jenny Lauren's book will be extremely helpful to the many girls and women suffering from negative self-image and eating disorders, as well as to the many men and women who are frequently discouraged and frustrated by western medicine. Her story is not a fairytale, and thus does not end up nice and neat. Although this might be disappointing to those in need of their own quick-fix, the majority of readers will be comforted by the fact that they are not alone in their struggles and they will be encouraged by Jenny Lauren's quest for health.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: A well written powerful and candid memoir
Review: I really enjoyed this memoir because it was written very creatively and candidly, not just as a boring linear account. Ms Lauren really dug into her own life and memories to write a book that makes you feel like you are experiencing her life and recovery with her. Sometimes it hurts because it is incredibly painful and dark,(I had an eating disorder as a teen that I wasted too many years on myself) and some times it is hard not too laugh with her because of her biting wit. I became nostalgic at times for my own childhood and how many occasions I think I could have done something differently too. As I read I felt I could relate to many of her experiences searching to find a sense of well-being, for hope and answers. I really recommend this memoir because it is not only a fascinating read but a sensitive book. Graphic at times, but thats what makes it so real and powerful. I was the most impressed by the choices she made to reveal things about her family, as well as her "fashion family" but to remain entirely loyal and show her strong love and eventual acceptance of what she grew up with.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Self-indulgent memoir, little redeeming value
Review: I was bitterly disappointed in this book. I was expecting to find an engrossing memoir of Ralph Lauren's niece, to travel through her world of food obession and bulimia along with its attendant medical problems. Instead, the entire thing reads like a succession of whiny entries into a teenager's diary. Jenny travels from conventional medicine to acupuncture, astrology and new age herbalists in her efforts to find answers to her difficulties, with the reader being led to believe she funded all this with a bottomless checkbook. Coupled with an unsatisfactory resolution, this was a waste of my time.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: A must read
Review: The author provides a harrowing insightful look from within of an individual suffering from the food disorder bulimia. When Jenny was ten she went to camp where she decided that she was to fat in comparison to her peers; she stopped eating until she was tossed from camp and her loving caring parents took her home. In ninth grade, Jenny, weighing under a hundred pounds, received advice on how to eat and lose weight: use ipecac. Over the next decade or so, she would continue her pattern of eating and puking until she wrecked her digestive system, something her doctors failed to understand.

Though gripping and incredibly discerning, this is not an easy biography to digest as .the author literally punished her body to remain ultra unhealthily thin. Still, Ms. Lauren furbishes warning signs that frustrated and non-understanding family members often miss and the medical community ignores with the typical solution being the chemical fix. The scary part is that it is obvious that her family, especially her parents truly love and care for Jenny, but though highly educated, they rationalize her troubles. Difficult to continue reading about someone in real life destroying themselves (this reviewer almost shut down after 25 pages because the horror of self-flagellation is so graphically real yet tough to swallow), HOMESICK should be prime reading for doctors, students, and families who are in denial or rationalize away the food disorder.

Harriet Klausner


<< 1 >>

© 2004, ReviewFocus or its affiliates