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Wasted
- A Memoir of Anorexia and Bulimia
- Narrated by: Marya Hornbacher
- Length: 5 hrs and 25 mins
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Wasted
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Summary
Precociously intelligent, imaginative, energetic, and ambitious, Marya Hornbacher grew up in a comfortable middle-class American home. At the age of 5, she returned home from ballet class one day, put on an enormous sweater, curled up on her bed, and cried because she thought she was fat. By age 9, she was secretly bulimic, throwing up at home after school, while watching Brady Bunch reruns on television and munching Fritos. She added anorexia to her repertoire a few years later and took great pride in her ability to starve.
Marya's story gathers intensity with each passing year. By the time she is in college and working for a wire news service in Washington D.C., she is in the grip of a bout of anorexia so horrifying that it will forever put to rest the romance of wasting away. Down to 52 pounds and counting, Marya becomes a battlefield: her powerful death instinct at war with the will to live.
Why would a talented young girl go through the looking glass and slip into a netherworld where up is down, food is greed, and death is honor? Why enter into a love affair with hunger, drugs, sex, and death? Marya Hornbacher sustained both anorexia and bulimia through five lengthy hospitalizations, endless therapy, the loss of family, friends, jobs, and ultimately, any sense of what it means to be "normal."
In this vivid, emotionally wrenching memoir, she recreates the experience and illuminates the tangle of personal, family, and cultural causes underlying eating disorders. Wasted is the story of one woman's travels to the darker side of reality, and her decision to find her way back again - on her own terms.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
- Josephine
- 30-05-11
Close to my heart
Such a heart-rending memoir, but such a favourite of mine. It has all the poetic beauty of Plath and the gritty realism of Irivine Welsh. Thank you, Marya, for sharing your story and letting us know we're not alone.
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2 people found this helpful
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance4 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Maddie Stone
- 02-02-23
Well written and vulnerable
Aside from poor audio quality (which you get used to quickly) I really enjoyed this. I can’t believe the author was only 23 when she wrote it!
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Overall4 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Anonymous User
- 25-01-23
Would have loved the unabridged version
I love this book, as a person living with a longtime ed myself, it is so relatable. Well written and well told. I just wish it was not abridged, since I have not read this before and would have muchly preferred the full version.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Alice LUshington
- 19-12-20
Difficult, sad, profound
Jesus. This spoke to me. In a lonely ,un-lonely kind of way. I can't explain it. But what I will say is be careful if you have an eating disorder. I found this both immensely helpful and triggering all at once. It gets sadder and sadder and sadder.
Gosh.
What a talent though.
Read with caution fellow suffers, this book can be helpful or dangerous, whichever you let it be.
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Overall4 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story4 out of 5 stars
- Emma Jones
- 13-06-17
Why abridged?
This is a great story for angst-ridden teens and twenty-somethings. Unglamorous and honest. But why abridged? I always feel cheated by these short stories.
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6 people found this helpful
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- maria
- 28-03-22
honest story
This is such a beautifully honest book, with no over fantasised parts, that are very common when come to anything about eating disorders, despite to book being written over 20 years ago its still very relatable in the description or existence
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Louise & Matty
- 09-05-18
loved it as much this time as the 1st time & after
A brutally honest, untinted reflection on one life with ED and the mania that comes with it. Beautiful writer.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Ricky
- 09-10-24
Wow. Unbelievably beautifully written and insightful.
She has a deft and exacting way with words that cuts beautifully between recollection and theory. She is able to shine a light on the power and ridiculousness of her disorders. What she leaves out is as intriguing as what she’s left in.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Joshua
- 29-10-15
Fascinating Story, Beautifully Read by the Author
Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?
The book offers a unmatched look inside the mind of a person with an eating disorder, and the consequences that follow.
What was one of the most memorable moments of Wasted?
There are moments where you can see right into the mind of the author, and you can feel the full range of her emotions, her pain, her desire to live. You will understand her and not understand her at the very same time.
What about Marya Hornbacher’s performance did you like?
Read with character and conviction, so full of life. Only the author could give such a convincing performance/
Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?
Yes
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
- Chlay
- 23-12-12
Raw, damaged and beautiful autobiography
This is my favourite of the year.I listen to it3x a week.
It's brutally honest,raw&was clearly painful to write about yet is so eye opening,it draws you in and shows how poetic destruction can be.
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