Jemima J by Jane Green

Rachael’s staff pick:
Over the past few years, novels about single women in their twenties and thirties looking for love and success have become steadily more plentiful. Green’s entry into the field is one of the best to come along. Jemima Jones is 100 pounds overweight and feels that her size is holding her back. Her boss at the Kilburn Herald doesn’t promote her, and the handsome deputy news editor, Ben Williams, whom she adores, thinks of her only as a friend. So Jemima turns to the Internet, where she meets Brad, a hunk who runs a gym in Los Angeles–if she can believe what he says. But when she sees Ben with another woman, Jemima decides she’s had enough. She joins a gym, starts dieting, and soon she’s losing weight rapidly, until she weighs only 121 pounds. She’s now a stunning beauty, but she’s still insecure about herself. However, with the encouragement of her friend Geraldine, she goes to L.A. to meet Brad. He turns out to be everything he promised, at least on the surface, but is he the man of Jemima’s dreams? The book has an almost fairy-tale quality as Jemima discovers that while being thin helps, it doesn’t automatically guarantee that one will find true love. Charming, witty, good-hearted fun.