An extra, added obstacle to getting medical care

I posted today on Body Impolitic, how prejudice derails doctor-patient communication Doctors Agree: No Fat Patients Need Apply

Murder in the California Wine Country -- A Ton of Trouble, now it's an ebook!

Sleuth of size, Josephine Fuller's fourth adventure A Ton of Trouble has just been released in paperback and ebook form for the first time by Pearlsong Press. The earlier edition only came out in hardcover.

We decided to take the Amazon Select option, so the ebook version will be exclusive to Amazon for 90 days, but the trade paperback is available from many Pearlsong, Barnes & Noble, Powells and the Book Depository.

The book was partly inspired by what was probably the most fun job I ever had.

For several years I worked in the word processing department of a law firm whose founding partner owned a winery in Sonoma County. Each 4th of July, he invited the staff to a picnic where we could spend a day rambling through the vineyards and admiring his winery, stables, small lake, politically important guests, etc. in between competitive, picnic-style events. Alas, the job and the picnics ended with major staff cuts.

Knowing that I was writing mysteries, some of my fellow laid-off co-workers asked me to murder a particular manager who enjoyed getting rid of workers. He wasn't shy about what pleasure he took in replacing even the most loyal long-term employees. He did it with some glee.

Oddly, A Ton of Trouble is not the book wherein a character similar to the manager met his fate. But my former co-worker enjoyed that book so much she asked me to kill him again. This I could not do, one murder request per customer. She did suggest an interesting place to conceal the body though, and a wonderful line to accompany the discovery. These are in A Ton of Trouble. ,p. The winery in the book may be similar but its owner could not be more different from the lawyer who hosted us so long ago. No actual humans are ever harmed or even accurately portrayed in any of my books. I enjoy my fictional characters much more. In A Ton of Trouble, Wolf Lambert is a legendary horror movie director who has retired to indulge in his hobby--making porn films with plus-sized leading ladies. The research for that aspect of the book was interest too--but I'll talk about it another time!

Brenda Oelbaum Goes National with the Goddess at Her Back

Feminist artist Brenda Oelbaum’s use of the Venus of Willendorf as the sculpture made from diet books strikes at the very heart of fear and prejudice toward larger bodies. Now she is bringing her work turning diet books into Venus of Willendorf sculptures onto the larger stage with “a national ad campaign to take down $66 BILLION Diet Industry.” I just posted about it on Body Impolitic. She calls her project “DUMP THE DIETS! a Fight for Freedom from self-loathing.” Brenda’s work shows bravery worthy of a goddess–I adore the picture of her, resolute, nude, surrounded by towering walls of diet books.

1984, 1954 and 2013....the more it changes, the more it stays the same--can we change it?

In a new Body Impolitic post, on hate speech as popular group activity, am I the first to quote George Orwell, Charlotte Cooper and a couple of FBI criminal profilers all in one place? I think so. Also there's a healing reimagining by Rebecca Weinberger of what Charlotte Cooper calls LIFE Magazine's 1954 "vintage fataphobia."

Turning the Princess Narrative Sideways

At Body Impolitic Debbie Notkin and I consider the marketing of Princesses and Girlz to little girls, where it came from, who profits, how it affects girls and some thoughts from mothers trying to keep daughters from getting swept away.

Who's Afraid of the Swedish Plus-Sized Mannequins?

From the country that brought us Ikea and The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, department store mannequins that look more like real women. And that's scary because....? At Body Impolitic, some thoughts on the controversy and the history and politics of mannequins from King Tut's tomb till now,The Meaning Behind the Mannequins.

Junk Food Addiction and Diet Deprivation: Two Sides of the Same Coin

Two different ways of manipulating people that both end in binge eating. I’ve recently come across articles about the seemingly unrelated topics of engineering food to be addictive and conditioning teenagers to be lifelong dieters. The first common element that struck me was disconnecting the body’s natural relationship with food and turning it into a marketable commodity. More at my Body Impolitic post.