PositiveLos Angeles Review of BooksFollowing girls who purposely starve themselves into a stupor could easily become grating, but it never does in Oligarchy. We stick with the girls—through various diets, when their weight swings up and down and back up again—because Thomas laces the lowest of lows with the enduring allure of not eating, taunting the reader with the hopes that keep the girls shaving off calories ... Thomas’s girls remain compelling because they so badly want whatever thinness offers that the origin or soundness of the impulse is beside the point ... They don’t always know what they want, or why they want it. But Thomas doesn’t ignore or justify their desires, which is why the girls’ desperation—e.g., subsisting only on pineapple—isn’t irritating or pitiable.
