The Fat Woman's Joke

by Fay Weldon

Book Overview

In flashback and from the depths of her basement apartment in Earls Court, Esther describes the history of her marital disaster--in between her consumption of chocolate cake, tinned fruit, sweet... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0897332369
• ISBN13: 9780897332361
• Release Date: August 2005
• Publisher: Academy Chicago Publishers
• Length: 336 Pages
• Weight: 0.50 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.5" x 5.0" x 8.0"

Customer Reviews

The Funniest Book I've Ever Read

I picked up this book quite randomly about 25 years ago, and ended up reading it a half-dozen times (now I'm reading it yet again). It's a mean little book - Evelyn Waugh would have been proud - and almost every line in it makes me laugh out loud. Yet I always find it oddly moving by the end. It has the quality of a nasty little fairy tale - Weldon's writing has this hilariously Dr. Seuss-like declarativeness - but everything in it is recognizably human -- shockingly so, since Weldon's characters admit to the horrible motives that most of us successfully hide from our loved ones and ourselves. I don't feel like I'm getting across how enjoyable this book really is, but it's the one that got me hooked on her writing, and the one I always come back to. An incredible mix of human pain and comedy, I recommend reading it slowly to really savour the writing - each time I read it again, I find new comedy just in the way she puts things.