It adds exceedingly little to the readers’ understanding of the continent. As the daughter of a dysfunctional, wealthy, white family – her parents are divorced and her mother is in a major mid-life crisis – the family’s financial status affords her the support and the individual opportunities she needs to help her overcome her problems and accept herself in a positive light.Īlthough this book may give hope and encouragement to many young adult readers, it does not provide or intend to provide insight into the broader South African society. Watson’s use of these artistic images is a bit overdone, and the reader begins to anticipate such references.īig Boned is, basically, a fairy tale, a “Cinderella” tale. She also describes her personal feelings and observations with apt references to color and movement, highlighting her artistic bent. Lori expresses her disgust with her physical image in very graphic terms. Watson’s command of teenage language and teen sensitivities gives this story heft and a sense of real autobiography.

Lori’s story could take place in many other countries a South African setting is not central to the focus of the book. A graduate of the arts and media school AFDA, Jo earned an honors degree in Live Performance and worked as a script writer, director, and producer. Lori suffers from low self-esteem, bullying and fear, which she learns to overcome through friends, therapy and artistic success. Jo Watson is the award-winning author of contemporary romances for both adults and teens, including The Destination Love series and her YA debut Big Boned, a Publisher’s Marketplace Buzz Book. These characteristics dictate her development as a teenage girl in a wealthy suburban enclave near Cape Town, South Africa. She is artistic, articulate, uneasy among others and fat. Big Boned is a young adult novel about Lori, a 17-year-old protagonist who narrates the text in the first person.

Jo watson big boned