Phat Acceptance

About this book

Some might say that 14-year-old Brandon Williams is an over-privileged white kid. He lives in a million-dollar house overlooking the ocean in Santa Cruz, California, gets a weekly allowance equal to the take-home pay of many service industry workers, and has gone to a private, all-white school from Kindergarten through eighth grade. While health-nazis would call him “overweight," Brandon is only slightly chubby, and handsome by American Caucasian standards, though his looks are nothing special in a sunny, seaside environment of blond and blue-eyed surfer dudes. Brandon should be happy -- or at least think he is -- but he’s not. Like many young teens he’s sure there must be a better world somewhere, and he's tried to escape to it in cyberspace and fantasy games, and has even created a website world with his best friend, 12-year-old Tommy Turner, a cheerful fat boy who lives next door. He's also tried to dull his angst in various chemical ways, and has wasted a year of his youth staying high. But, Brandon hopes to be a writer and use pen and PC to right some of the wrongs of this world. Being who he is and living where he does, he’s never experienced discrimination or hate based on appearance or race. Despite the protests of his liberal-minded and loving, but career-oriented and somewhat distant parents, Brandon decides to attend public high school. He isn’t completely naive, thanks to his older brother, Chad, who also attends public high school and is now a senior; but Brandon’s first day is a reality-check as he discovers what public education in the U.S. is all about... po…

Themes & subjects

About the author

Jess Mowry

1960