Miss Popularity
Good in Bed set up the smart-vs.-popular formula that the rest of Weiner’s books follow: A smart, sarcastic woman — the reader surrogate — is pitted, in one way or another, against a woman or set of women who are better-looking, thinner, or more admired, but are in the end either vapid or fundamentally unhappy — like Cameron Diaz’s toned-but-tragic Maggie in In Her Shoes. Imperfect, in Weiner’s world, is healthier than perfect.
The heroines of Weiner’s novels are frequently plus-size and always unapologetically "real" — "hyper-real" says her brother, Jake Weiner, an L.A.-based film producer who handles Weiner’s Hollywood deals, and who regards his little sister with a kind of awe. Weiner uses self-revealing anecdotes and autobiographical details as often as most writers use adjectives. Her protagonists have trouble fitting into their pants, their babies spit up and cry at inopportune moments, they may find a hunk of Play-Doh caught in their pubic hair while showering. Still, Weiner always rewards them with a happy ending. Her readers love her for it. And they feel like they know her.
"Women come up to Jen at signings and, like, lose their shit," says Joanna Pulcini, Weiner’s baby-voiced fairy godmother of an agent. "There was this woman from South America who didn’t speak English. She saw the cover and thought it was something she would like, and she read the book with an English dictionary next to her. She said something like, ‘I was told all my life that I was overweight, and your book changed my life.’" There are many of these stories, of Weiner the Messiah, surrounded by chubby angels — scratch that — by angels of all shapes and sizes.
"I, like, love you?" blurts the hostess at Pasión as we leave the restaurant. A tiny, tanned 20-something wrapped in a pink t-shirt, the hostess is practically trembling. "I have all of your books."
"Oh my gosh, thank you," Weiner says graciously, looking just the tiniest bit uncomfortable. "Thank you very much." Later, she adds: "It’s very gratifying — and the tiniest bit bizarre — when women say things like that."
Ah, popularity. It is bizarre, and such a double-edged sword — there’s the adulation, and, to quote the wise sage Mary J. Blige, the hateration. This duality is something that Jennifer Weiner is learning about now, at age 35. Sure, these days she’s going to red-carpet movie premieres and being hugged by Cameron Diaz, while her former co-workers back at the Inky might be "sticking pins into, like, busty little voodoo dolls," she says. "But it still surprises me when I get these e-mails saying, ‘I feel like I know you! I feel like you’re my friend!’ It’s so weird, because I had no friends in high school, and I’m like, really? You want to be my friend?"
