A Five-Star Book Review
The Fastest Way to Fall
by Denise Williams
Do you have a positive relationship with your body? I’ll admit that I don’t. I’ve always felt like I take up too much space and have battled cycles disordered eating and low self esteem for decades. Right now I’m at a low point in that cycle, TBH.
I think that’s why The Fastest Way to Fall resonated with me so deeply. Britta dreams of being a writer at BestLife, and when she gets the opportunity to compete in a column challenge in the hopes of being promoted. Tasked with reviewing the FitMi app and sharing her journey to reach her goals: “to look and feel good naked” and “to meet the weight limit to jump out of a plane,” she signs up with the app, gets a trainer, and starts on a course that she didn’t know she needed.
Wes, her trainer, has his own hills to climb. He’s the restless CEO at FitMi, worries constantly about his addict mom and absent sister, and feels like something is missing.
What happens when the two pair up? This is a romance, so you can guess! But what I loved even more about the book:
- Britta is confident about herself before her health competition. She doesn’t know her full worth at the beginning of the book, but she knows who she is and embraces her life.
- I feel most romances I read ignore a lot of male characters’ backstories. This book didn’t! We is a flawed but human character with a huge heart and sense of responsibility.
- The workout scenes were precious and realistic. FitMi is a fictional brand that focuses on non-scale victories, and we need more of that in real-life. Britta’s claims of “I hate you” when Wes pushes her to try just a bit harder felt real, just like I would want in a personal trainer. (I’m married, so none of that romance spark, of course.)
In short, I loved this book and it as what I needed to read right now. Will I start a 5K training program tomorrow because of it? Who knows. But if a fictional story can make me think about personal changes, then it’s a great read.
Bookish Brain 