Starfish

Starfish by Lisa Fipps is a 2021 middle-grade realistic novel-in-verse. Written through a series of poems, the novel follows 12-year-old Ellie Montgomery-Hofstein and her struggles against bullying, from both family and peers, because of her weight. Through Ellie’s journey, the novel explores themes of self-acceptance, social support, bullying, and standing up for yourself.

Ellie teaches herself to live by self-imposed “Fat Girl Rules,” metaphorically shrinking herself to avoid drawing attention to herself. She is bullied at school by her classmates, and at home by her mother, who disregards Ellie’s feelings and sees her weight as a problem to be relentlessly attacked. With the help of her new friend, Catalina, and her therapist Dr. Wood, Ellie learns to embrace her own worth as a person and use her words to stand up to bullies without becoming one herself.

This guide is based on the Penguin Random House 2021 edition.

Content Warning: Starfish discusses emotional and food-related abuse as well as fat-shaming. It includes an instance of racism.

Plot Summary

Twelve-year-old Ellie Montgomery-Hofstein has endured bullying about her weight ever since she was five, when she canon-balled into her family’s backyard pool and splashed the other swimmers, earning her the nickname “Splash.