Sarai Walker

Sarai Walker is an American writer whose book Dietland was identified as one of Entertainment Weeklys 10 Best books of 2015, and has subsequently been turned into a TV series. She has published articles in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Guardian, and Refinery29. Walker is a fat positive activist and her writings reflect an attempt to reclaim the word fat as a mere bodily description—like tall or short.

Life and education Walker grew up in California and Utah, and is now based in New Mexico. Walker received her M.F.A. in creative writing from Bennington College, and her Ph.D. in English from the University of London (2005).

Fat Acceptance Movement and activism Walker is an adamant supporter of rights and dignity for fat people. As such, she frequently speaks on the assumptions others make about her life because of her body. Ranging from assuming the types of exercises, or lack thereof, to the type of diet she eats, Walker is adamant that people can be healthy at any size and that the mistreatment of her body is a political issue. Dietland was thus an attempt to cover some of the missing elements in American literature that pertain to fat women. Plum, the main character in Dietland, is a 300-pound woman. She is also clear that she does not write characters that are "perfect women." As an act of feminism, in fact, she purposefully does not concern herself with likeability issues for her characters, and focuses instead on making characters that are accurately flawed. As such, she creates characters that do not fit into the conventions of likeable womanhood (i.e. skinny and kind), and instead writers characters that do not fit neatly into any category.

Works 2015 : Dietland, Atlantic Books 2021 : The Cherry Robbers, Harper Books