Rachel Wiley is most commonly know for her spoken word " The Fat Joke". Her spoken word is eloquent and powerful, and punches you straight to her heart.
I was a little apprehensive to hear this book because hearing poetry and reading poetry are two different experience. But, Rachel Wiley does not disappointment in Fat Girl Finishing School. This collection of poems are so beautiful and lyrical. This collection about radical self-acceptance all of you. Your sexuality, your ethic background, your identity as a woman and expectations placed upon us. This collection of poems really resonated with me.

I love how this collection of poems challenge many preconceived biased notions about body, gender, race, faith and the complicated experiences of being human. They are emotionally impactful, hard hitting and seething with a quiet rage against a world which would rather worship at the altar of stereotypes than love humans for who they really are. Rachel Wiley is a force to be reckoned with in the world of slam poetry/spoken word poetry and on paper her words burn as brightly too!

These are poems that actually spoke out to me and was like a tight hug out of the pages . Brass Knuckles, The Circus Fat Lady Eulogizes Mary the Elephant are a couple of my favourite poems.

However, I feel the title of this book and the cover do not do this collection of poems justice. Because it is so much more!

Poetry is so difficult to review because each poem is so different, there were some poems I couldn’t relate to but there were others that struck an enormous chord.

These poems are powerful and so vivid I can almost hear them being spoken aloud.

My favourites were the poems that felt like battle cries, that make you want to shout along as your heart pounds and your blood boils.

This poetry anthology spoke to me as a fat girl. I felt seen on every page and Wiley managed to speak of a shared experience I didn’t know existed. I would thoroughly recommend this collection - Wiley’s voice shines through.

Personally, I'm not one for poetry. It was never a strength of mine when at school, as it was hard to decipher what could be seen as being metaphorical to the literal meaning. But I really wanted to try something new on this occasion.

I fell in love with this cover and when I looked at the description of body positivity and feminism, I was entranced into this new world I never have really wanted to step into before.

Fat Girl Finishing School is composed of several poems talking all about the fear of being in a public place and being ridiculed for your weight, to the idols that Wiley has come to love even from the beginning of her childhood, where there was not as much positivity for women of certain bodies. It is also a very personal piece allowing for us all to get to know what really is most important to Wiley and how she has the opinions that she does and how they have come to formulate together. Which is quite fascinating to see.

There is one particular poem that I have come to love quite a lot: 10 Honest Thoughts on Being Loved by a Skinny Boy. This particular piece feels as though it is more personal than most of the poems in this book - raw and vulnerable. Very similar to many people who have familiar thoughts of the same capacity. Even I felt something in this piece that is even relatable to myself, even though I am a person who likes to keep these types of feelings under lock and key. But society doesn't have to do this to us. Put us down, shove us to the floor like we are nothing because we aren't a model on the front cover of Vogue (as much as it feels like we should). We all have to come to terms, that no matter our sizes there is always someone out there who would love you. But first you have to look at yourself and see that you matter and you are loveable.

The only main upset that I have from this book is it would have been lovely to see these poems being performed. So, I guess that it is not really much of a negative. When reading the poems they do give some impact, there were many times where I just audibly said out loud "wow" and completely in awe how Wiley is able to compose the English language in a way that works for her narrative. There may be some times, although I am not always willing to admit, is how she speaks very close to home. Especially to myself, as someone who is seen to not be as traditional a person in society that people hope. This is what makes these poems special, as it speaks to more than one person, no matter the form in which it has been received by the audience.

My rating today is four stars.

I received a copy of this book via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

So. I’m not much of a poetry reader, and I’m trying to change that, so when I saw this book and its themes and its author I went all “yassss my kind of read, I gotta”.

Poetry is a hella weapon for speaking up and this book DOES THAT. Racism, fatphobia, misogyny, gender roles, social expectations. Womanhood. Abuse. It touches everything, and it does it beautifully.

(It even mentions KFC chicken. And like.. maybe I need to read more poetry to understand why there’s a poem about that. Or why the vegans are terrorist (I’m vegan, so maybe that’s why if a place runs out of chicken I may only tweet about it, but go off and write a poem, I guess)).

Anyway, the poems that more resonated with me were those about LIVING IN YOUR BODY like, GOD YES, GIRL. I felt lifted up after reading this work. I kinda felt validated which is sad because I know I don’t need permission to eat a bar of chocolate but… the chocolate I ate while reading this tested sweeter than ever. Thanks for that, Rachel <3

I was given a copy of this book in exchange of an honest review.

It's very hard to correctly review a book of poetry, but if I had to give this a review it would range from 1 3.5-4.
Wiley is a popular poet in the smash scene, so it makes sense to me how some of these poems are better heard, not read. Regardless, many of these poems are written with a brutal honesty and transparency. The themes can range from love, to sex, body image, feminism, hope and the lack thereof of hope.

In her poem, "Demeter," Wiley accurately depicts America's fascination with labeling its female icons to fit its image:

America,
I birthed you a daughter once.
You did not let me name her.

The poem accurately demonstrates the female labor that goes into building the country, with Wiley doing the work of handing America a daughter only to not be allowed a role in her destiny.

Other poems bring light-hearted humor to the collection, highlighting even the most trivial as a source of commonplace annoyance and creativity,

I will forgo the how's and whys
and simply remind you that when KFC
runs out of chicken, the terrorists win.
And by terrorists, I of course mean vegans, Tammi.

Overall this collection is very solid, but do leave you looking for more. Can't wait for the poet's next collection (this was a reissue of sorts, if I'm correct). Thank you again for the publisher, poet and NetGalley for the free copy.

I received an arc of this title from NetGalley for an honest review. I liked that this was written in verse and a nice read overall.

As with most poety anthologies, some poems fall flat, or don't resonate. But my GOODNESS when one of Wiley's poems resonates, it's RESONATES.

This was a super vibrant collection of poems. Its intimate and memoiric--capturing the multiple selves through time and interaction and experience. Wiley is a fierce and tender voice that has such a high frequency of kinetic pulsatio. It was a reclamation declarative of sound and language and the way to disrupt how people talk about fat bodies and the layering of fatphobia that stems too from racism and misogyny. It was dope is all I gotta say.

I don’t normally read poetry but was intrigued enough by the cover and title of this collection to want to explore and I’m really glad I did. If all poetry was like this, I’d read a lot more of it.

The depth and the imagery speaks to me. The poems are no holds barred and I appreciate that. As a reflection on gender, colour, size and many other social issues it’s not an easy read at times, but in that regard it’s reflective of a time and place and has many things that need to be said.

The collection is very accessible even if you don’t normally read poetry so I’d encourage anyone to give this a try.

If you want to read poetry with a strong and different use of metaphors, this is your collection! Also, if you are interested in body-positivity, poems written from the perspective of a fat person, and some poems on unusual topics!

Best things about this poetry collection (and what I have learnt from it):
-Rachel Wiley has very different and unique poems on topics I usually don't read about, there's situations that inspire her poems that we usually don't see that often (like a poem for Amy Whinehouse, or a poem about the murder of an elephant, or a poem inspired by a blogger). She has inspired me to try new things in my own poetry and not be scared to go to different and unusual topics.
-Metaphors, metaphors, metaphors as adjectives, strings of metaphors, everything is metaphors.

Things that made me give this book only 3 stars:
-Too many metaphors. I get it, it's part of her unique style, but many times it made reading the poems super tedious, and sometimes I felt the metaphors didn't enhance the poem or nouns she was using/describing, but rather it was just something she felt she had to do. At first the metaphors were really powerful for me, later on in the collection I felt they weren't even real.
-Don't tell me you are an activist and then write a poem low-key trashing vegans. It's not cute. If you want respect how come you are disrespecting others? (Honestly, it would've been way more interesting to see a poem talking about the real issues of veganism, or some problematic things vegan influencers promote, not a poem about how annoying vegans are complaining about fast-food chains).

This is one of those poetry collections that make me go: certain poems are fucking awesome, the rest of the poems...not so much. So I'll probably keep an eye for her performances, but I don't think I'll actively try to read another poetry collection by her.

Thoughtful and well done. I especially liked the poems titled Love Letters to My Body. Rachel Wiley covers a wide range of themes, involving self love, race, body positivity, love, and feminism. Overall a good book of poetry.

Fat Girl Finishing School is a fantastic poetry collection. I think it embodies everything good about modern femininity: it questions traditional female roles, sexuality, relationships, faith, and encourages body positivity. I felt that the most powerful poems were those that regarded relationships and body positivity directly. In my personal opinion, the least effective poems were the ones trying to be funny (but that is almost certainly a personal preference thing). I loved the way that Wiley spoke to her body with honesty and promise. I loved that she reflected on past effects with clarity and vulnerability. There were many things about this collection that I really, really enjoyed.

Wow! This was simply amazing👌
I absolutely related to this. I never thought that poetry would make me feel so much emotionally, but it did.
This was so empowering, something I really needed to read.
It touches on topics such as
fatphobia, racism, misogyny, and shame. Each poem chooses self love, despite society’s expectations of conformity!
A must read. This is a definite 5 star recommendation from me.

#LGBTIA #poetry #fatphobia #racism #misogyny #shame #selflove #mustread #empowering #inspirational

Oh, man, I loved this. Poetry is always a hit-or-miss for me, but lately I've been having a lot of trouble finding collections I really connect with, and this one was just what I needed.

In Fat Girl Finishing School, Rachel Wiley speaks about her experiences as a biracial, queer, fat woman. The collection focuses on self-love and self-acceptance, body positivity, the struggles and privileges of being a white-passing biracial person, queerness and relationships.

I love that most of it sort of read like slam. Which makes a lot of sense, considering that the author performs her poems a lot (check out the Button Poetry channel on YouTube, she's amazing. I haven't made my way through all of them yet, but "The Fat Joke" and "For Nicolas Who Is So 'Concerned'" are some of my favorites I've seen so far). I didn't think it made them any less powerful on page, per se, but there's something about them that screams that they'd be a joy to see performed. Her writing is lovely and biting and fresh, and the collection was very solid overall. I'll definitely be checking out Wiley's other collection and continuing to watch her perfomances online.

Beautifully empowering written poems. I wish this book was written when I was younger and at the same time was exactly what I needed to read at this point of my life. Love and self love at that should be at every size. I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

It was a joy to pour over this poetry collection. Wiley has so many engaging and unexpected images and turns of phrases. I want more! I cant wait for what she does next.

I love this poet. Her work is extremely poignant and deeply personal while also feeling universal. She touches on so many different topics that women, especially fat women, can relate to. Highly recommend this collection!

I typically try to take poetry volumes a poem at a time, picking and choosing which I want to read, and often skipping entire poems altogether (this is, after all, I suspect the way most people familiar with poetry read poetry collections).

This collection, though, I read virtually uninterrupted. I did take a few moments to pause after several poems to digest what I've just read, but the poems here are truly raw and honest. Wiley discusses her experiences as a fat, biracial queer woman in America with moving words and frank emotion.

I've seen a few of Wiley's poems passed around in both text and video form, and I'm very glad to have had the opportunity to read this collection.