Dumplin'

I've been meaning to read Julie Murphy's "Dumplin'" for awhile, it seemed like it was right up my alley, and it was! Willowdean (her mother calls her "Dumplin'", her friends call her "Will") is an overweight teenager in a small south Texas town. The town cares about two things: high school football and beauty pageants. Will's mom was a winner of the Clover City Miss Blue Bonnet pageant back in 1997, and she's become the official MC of the event, so Will is used to the pageant taking over their lives. Will works at a fast food place with a hot guy name Bo she has a mad crush on. They spend the summer before their junior year sneaking in make out sessions during and after work, but when Will finds out he's transferring to her school in the fall and didn't tell her, she's upset at him trying to keep her a secret from his family and friends. Of course Will didn't tell *her* best friend, Ellen, about Bo, but...(pot, kettle, kettle, pot). Will decides she's going to compete in the beauty pageant, throwing everyone she knows for a loop. Will doesn't want to end up like her Aunt Lucy, who was 500 pounds and died young of a heart attack, never leaving the house because she was so embarrassed about her size. At first Will convinces herself she's doing it for Lucy, but it ends up becoming something she does for herself. It was a fun book, I enjoyed it, but I did have to suspend my disbelief over the hot Bo actually wanting to be in a real relationship with Will. Murphy doesn't say how big she is, but it seems very unlikely. I somehow doubt high school boys have improved *that* much since I was a teenager.