Flawless Skin of Ugly People Book

Thanks to Ugly Betty, America is finally ready to read a love story about a couple who isn’t sleek, slick, tucked, pulled, or plastic.

Do we have to be beautiful to be loved? Hobbie—this novel’s darkly romantic hero—has been banished to homely man exile in the North Georgia Mountains, where his enemies are mirrors and bears. Things are not going well for Hobbie. His skin? Pizza Face, super-sized, with extra pepperoni and pitted olives. Job status? Former bank teller. Love life? His common-law wife Kari has gone AWOL at a weight-loss clinic in North Carolina.

But just as it seems Hobbie is doomed to go through life as a sweet, self-pitying “anonymous joke,” he jumps out of his skin and becomes downright heroic.

Can Hobbie rescue Kari from the weight-loss clinic? Can he pull his fractured family together? Plastic surgery—will he or won’t he? Will love endure if Hobbie’s skin clears up, Kari drops pounds, and ugly people become flawless? Readers won’t be able to put the book down until they find out.

Publishers Weekly

Hobbie, the narrator of this endearing debut novel, prefers the company of his beloved mutt, Terry, to the companionship of most humans. Hobbie, who has a blistering case of chronic acne, and Kari, his obese girlfriend of 20 years, continually aggravate their situations: Hobbie picks at and further inflames his bad skin while Kari eats in response to a shared tragedy from their youth. When the novel opens, Kari's ensconced at a weight-loss clinic hundreds of miles from their temporary north Georgia home, and Hobbie lives like a hermit until he's attacked by a bear. While recovering, he's sucked into the messy world of Kari's father, Roth, and slowly, clumsily becomes part of Roth's family once Kari goes missing from the clinic. Crandell has an exquisite eye for small details-Kari's letters home are written on "lined paper, the same kind we wrote love notes on"-that lend a tender feel to what could easily be overwrought. Though the novel turns on some unconvincing plot twists (particularly in the concluding section), the characters and situations are so simultaneously moving and unique that a bit of contrivance doesn't sink this tale of misfit love. (Sept.)