Size 14 Is Not Fat Either
by Meg CabotBook 2 of Heather Wells series
~ Goodreads ~
Rating: 4.0 Stars
See Also: First Impression @ 3 Chapters
Confession: In spite of what I thought of Heather Wells in the first book of this series, I found myself loving her strange charm in this second book. While there were still a lot of things I found frustrating about her, I felt like the circumstances of the murder mystery in Size 14 really brought out the best of Heather Wells.
I definitely enjoyed Size 14 Is Not Fat Either and found Heather and the book itself a fun, entertaining read--something you don’t have to think about too hard either.
And I also confess, the murder mystery really DID manage to have me stumped. While I had a feeling that I knew there was something going on with certain characters (Kimberly, Coach Andrews, etc….), I wasn’t entirely certain what it was and my suspicions about the killer had been flaky at best--too many characters to lay suspicion on, really.
Official Blurb:
Former pop star Heather Wells has settled nicely into her new life as assistant dorm director at New York College—a career that does NOT require her to drape her size 12 body in embarrassingly skimpy outfits. She can even cope (sort of) with her rocker ex-boyfriend's upcoming nuptials, which the press has dubbed THE Celebrity Wedding of the Decade. But she's definitely having a hard time dealing with the situation in the dormitory kitchen—where a cheerleader has lost her head on the first day of the semester. (Actually, her head is accounted for—it's her torso that's AWOL.)
Surrounded by hysterical students—with her ex-con father on her doorstep and her ex-love bombarding her with unwanted phone calls—Heather welcomes the opportunity to play detective . . . again. If it gets her mind off her personal problems—and teams her up again with the gorgeous P.I. who owns the brownstone where she lives—it's all good. But the murder trail is leading the average-sized amateur investigator into a shadowy world. And if she doesn't watch her step, Heather will soon be singing her swan song!
Surrounded by hysterical students—with her ex-con father on her doorstep and her ex-love bombarding her with unwanted phone calls—Heather welcomes the opportunity to play detective . . . again. If it gets her mind off her personal problems—and teams her up again with the gorgeous P.I. who owns the brownstone where she lives—it's all good. But the murder trail is leading the average-sized amateur investigator into a shadowy world. And if she doesn't watch her step, Heather will soon be singing her swan song!
My Thoughts:
Much like the first book, this cozy mystery is actually not so much cozy mystery as it is chick lit about Heather Wells and how her life is going. Then again, it could also be said that the genres in this book were bouncing all over the place: chick lit, cozy mystery, contemporary romance, humorous something or other… etc. But whatever it was that this book ended up being, I thoroughly enjoyed it.
The tacky, untactful jokes Heather makes are still kind of tacky, but she’s toned down her penchant for over dramatisation as compared to the first book. There was a lot less of her focusing on her size and her weight, and more of her just telling the facts as they are--which made the self-deprecating fat jokes a little bit more readily received by yours truly. After all, I make fat jokes about myself as well, and the ones in this book were quite aligned with how I usually joke around.
Jokes aside, Heather is quite charming and amusing to follow, especially in this second book wherein she spends a little bit of time at the beginning of the book trying her darndest not to interfere in the murder investigation. But to be totally honest, either she’s just way too curious for her own good, way too impatient to see things getting done, or the detectives in this book are just plain incompetent. It DID kind of feel like the cops weren’t really investigating the case of our decapitated student very seriously, and then whenever Heather offers some viable information she has come across, they treat her like she’s some sort of comedian.
I might be mistaken, but no matter that you don’t want your civilians investigating a murder on their own, if said civilian DOES come up with something suspicious or a clue that might help the investigation along, shouldn’t the cops at least look into it or treat the matter a bit more seriously? Just sayin’. This is what hotlines are for, isn’t it?
Anyway, the romance in this book is still a backseat event, and I’m kind of glad that Heather’s ex, Jordan, is getting hitched--maybe he’ll stop pestering her finally. Secondly, for a woman nearing her thirties, I still find it a little bit disconcerting that Heather still acts like a teenager most times--and that everyone else around her also treats her like a child and feel the need to get into her business and tell her how best to run her romantic life.
Otherwise, Size 14 was an entirely, very enjoyable book and I definitely plan on finishing the rest of the series.
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2016 Reading Challenges:
• Goodreads Reading Challenge
• BookLikes Reading Challenge
• Bookish Resolutions Challenge -- My TBR List - April Winner
