Summary

Chris Crutcher's Staying Fat for Sarah Byrnes is about a girl whose face is scarred and a boy that is overweight. Sarah Byrnes' scars from a "childhood accident" and Eric Calhoune's hereditary obesity cause them both to become outcasts that end up finding each other early on in life. Unwilling to allow reconstructive surgery for Sarah's face, her father believes the scars will make her tough. True to his wishes, Sarah Byrnes is one of the toughest girls you will ever meet. Eric, on the other hand, is on the other side of the courage spectrum and is incredibly soft (in more ways then one!) When Eric finds the tough-as-nails Sarah Byrnes sitting silently in the mental ward of the local hospital, he knows something is seriously wrong, however Sarah Byrnes' real problem is more than skin deep...