Ending up size two is not the reward for suffering, or the inevitable goal. In Her Shoes also insists that fat women 'may be punchlines in the movies or on TV, but in real life we have jobs and babies, and lovers and husbands'. Good in Bed was written during the Clinton-Lewinsky scandal, and its mordant view of the diet industry and women's self-hating desperation to be thin bears the marks of that cultural moment of fat jokes and media cruelty. The city in which her heroines live has homelessness, illness, poverty, and madness as well as sex and shopping. But Weiner, a graduate of Princeton herself, contrasts feminine wish- fulfilment with penetrating analyses of familial and romantic neurosis and a pervasive sense of urban tragedy, shaped by her experience as a writer for the Philadelphia Inquirer. Like Helen Fielding, Weiner balances romantic formula with fresh humour, deft characterisations, and literary sensibility. But ultimately, Weiner's determination to provide fairytale endings for her heroines means that this novel too will conclude with both Rose and Maggie prospering in love and work.ĭoes American chicklit differ from its British or Irish sisters? Perhaps it's more politically-aware or politically-correct. It turns out that Rose wants (temporarily) to be walking dogs Weiner adores dogs and both novels feature long digressions on the unconditional love and mental-health protection provided by cutely-named pets. Cannie asks a depressed Rose Feller, a plus-size Princeton-educated lawyer who has just discovered her lover in bed with her gorgeous unstable sister Maggie, what she really likes to do and what makes her happy. Enough women readers shared Weiner's fantasies to make Good in Bed an international bestseller, and to launch Weiner as 'Jen', a celebrity author with her own weblog.Ĭannie Shapiro makes a magical reappearance in Weiner's second novel In Her Shoes, planning her dream wedding to a Jewish doctor at which she will be attended by precocious daughter Joy and skittish rat-terrier Nifkin. The circumstances are new, but in fiction, feminine daydreams (the perfect room, the guilty prince, the magic make-over, the professional coup) have changed very little since the 1890s, when writers like Mona Caird and Sarah Grand began to explore them.

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