"In Latin, suffering and passion come from the same root," observes Alice Forrester, the wry heroine of this poignant and sardonically witty debut. And who would know better than twenty-five-year-old Alice, passionately committed to her own suffering--an all-consuming addiction to food deprivation--as a divine form of self-knowledge?

After an episode of heart failure, Alice arrives in the eating disorder clinic of Seaview Hospital, where she detachedly watches a circus unfold . . . starring her perfectionist mother, Syd ("she'd been a synchronized swimmer in college"), her...