The F Word - Liza Palmer

Olivia Morten is perfect. Maybe her high-flying publicist job has taken over her life, but her clients are Los Angeles' hottest celebrities. Maybe her husband is never around, but he is a drop-dead-gorgeous, successful doctor. Maybe her friends are dumb, but they know how to look glamorous at a cocktail party. And maybe her past harbors an incredibly embarrassing secret, but no one remembers high school…right?

When Ben Dunn, Olivia’s high school arch nemesis and onetime crush, suddenly resurfaces, Olivia realizes how precarious all of her perfection is. As she finds herself dredging up long-suppressed memories from her past, she is forced to confront the most painful truth of all: maybe she used to be the fat girl, but she used to be happy, too.

 

How fun this book was! And it had a great message of self discovery and self love also.

 

This wasn't comedic enough for me to really call it a chick flick, but it was a light women's fiction read that, though fairly simple and a little predictable, was very pleasurable leisure reading and brought me a lot of enjoyment.

 

Olivia's relationship with herself is something that a lot of us can relate to. She's been suppressing "Fat Liv" for many years and seeing how this interacts with "New Liv" is intriguing. She's putting on a facade for so many people, even her husband, and her realisations about how she treats other people are intriguing.

 

I would have liked to have seen more of how she lost her weight. She talks about having surgery scars, but she also puts a lot of effort into her diet and into going to the gym, so she made some lifestyle changes too. It's interesting to see how this doesn't affect her life terribly much. I did adore her commentary about noticing people on first dates because the girls would eat a lot to show they were low maintenance.

 

I also appreciated how she had anxiety and suffers from a severe panic attack--this is something I'd like to see more of in books. It fit in with Olivia's character and gave her more merit for being as strong as she is.

 

I adored Caroline Lang, the celebrity of the book whose life is falling apart in a way that greatly parallels Olivia's. Seeing Olivia do her publicity magic was really interesting; she and her assistant had a great grasp of how the public viewed events and how they could effectively turn this around.

 

This was a fabulous light read and I highly recommend it.

 

I received a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.