The Lightning Thief (by Rick Riordan)

This is the beginning of the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series, which Mina has been really enjoying and begged me to read. Overall I had fun reading this book; I'm a huge fan of Greek mythology and this take on it is extremely clever. However, the novel is very fatphobic and it bummed me out.  Here are some examples of how three characters, all villains, are described:

“Gabe had put on weight. He looked like a tuskless walrus in thrift store clothes.” 

“[Clarisse] wore a size XXXL” “She had three other girls behind her, all big and ugly and mean looking like her…” “Her ugly pig eyes glared” 

“We got shoehorned into the car with this big fat lady… she looked like a blue jean blimp”

I found this blog post, which talks about problems with race in the series too (spoilers at that link) and indeed it is also a very white world. I want to read more of the series because of how much Mina likes it, but now I'm too depressed to do it. 

If someone knows Rick Riordan can you tell him that fat people are not, like, grotesque creatures? And also maybe diversify your world and hire a sensitivity reader next time. Thanks.