Helen Redfern's weekly column on the fictional females she loves...
Jemima J is a controversial heroine. The book by Jane Green is either loved or hated here on Trashionista with the Yay or Nay Wednesday post (amongst others) showing some strong yays and some equally strong nays. Some find it inspiring, others dislike the disjointed style of writing, the flitting between first and third person, lack of endearing characters other than Jemima and the romantic interest being, shall we say, shallow.
I have stated on this site myself that Jemima J is one of my favourite chick lit books of all time. In my twenties I read it through often, inspired by her determination and complete change in her life. It has to be said though that on reading it through again today, with eyes that have been opened somewhat with experience I can understand the reasons behind the dislikes. I even agree with some of them. My opinion of Jemima the character though has not changed.
Jemima Jones is a large girl. Her first words on opening the book are ‘God, I wish I were thin’. She wishes this to occur instantaneously, perhaps with a mild case of gastroenteritis, not life threatening but enough to make the stones melt away quickly, as she still likes her food. Lots of it.
Even though Jemima herself defines herself by her size, I won’t. She is a journalist, she’s a fantastic writer but somehow can’t get past the Top Tips column for the Kilburn Herald. She has a great sense of humour, a pretty face and is a good friend. She is also lonely, has no confidence but I feel allows her size to get in the way of promotion. She feels hefty in her own head and therefore thinks everyone else is thinking it. Each time she goes to the editor to ask for a promotion to feature writer he says maybe but nothing ever happens. Yet when her more confident thin friend goes for it she is promoted, even though she can’t write for toffee. I don’t think that her size was the issue. It was Jemima's lack of confidence and self esteem (‘why would Geraldine want to befriend someone like me’) and as we read on this becomes more and more apparent. She turns to food for comfort whilst looking at thin models in magazines.
Her editor sends Jemima and Ben (her secret crush) on an internet course and soon Jemima is cruising the internet, immersing herself in it. So much so that she joins a chat room and starts to chat to a man from LA called Brad. He sends her a photograph and she is smitten. Thanks to Photoshop she sends one back of her looking seven stone less. Seeing that photo shows Jemima how beautiful she is underneath the layers of fat and she joins a gym, eats less, if anything at all, and begins a drastic makeover of herself.
On going to LA, she eventually finds out Brad is not all he seems and through looking at some pictures of overweight women who are proud of their body she realises a few things. She still has low self esteem even though she has lost weight. She should have been proud of how she looked before. Being thin has not made her happy. If anything she is less happy than when she was fat. She states, ‘I haven’t felt myself since I lost weight.’
It isn’t the weight loss that I found so inspiring about Jemima though that is in fact amazing (and in three months dangerous and surely not to be advised). The weight loss started a chain of events. Her determination and strong willpower is one of the reasons I am featuring her today. It gave her confidence, after all it takes guts to fly to L.A when you’re secure in a routine and panic about anything outside of it. Gradually though, she starts to learn about herself, piecing things together until she realises it wasn’t her body that needed to change, but the way she perceived herself.
