Fat Cat

Fat Cat by Robin Brande (NY: Knopf, 2009).

Cat Locke is fat and knows it, but she has a lot of other concerns heading into the school year, chief among them her science research class, where she's determined to have the best project and beat all competition, including her former best friend and now enemy, Matthew McKinney. She's still mad at him for being a sore loser when she won a science fair four years before....

Then her science project turns into a personal improvement project, focusing on the benefits of a prehistoric diet regime and foregoing modern amenities, such as television, cell phones, makeup, and cars. The science project evolves in other ways, too, and Cat learns a lot about herself and others in the process.

Grades 7&up. Sexual situations, language.