Girl, Ultra-Processed : A bold, body-positive YA about friendship, dating and self-love.

Author: Sage, Amara

Interest age: from c 14 years

Published on 16 January 2025 by FABER & FABER in the United Kingdom.

A searing look at diet culture and all its ugly consequences, from the talented writer of Influential.

New year, new me!That's what Saffron Saldana tells herself as the clock strikes midnight on New Year's Eve.

Her resolution is the same every year: lose weight.

Because Saffron has it hard-wired that weight loss equals happiness. It's what she's been told her whole life - online, in magazines, especially by her own diet-obsessed mother. But dietingis hard.

So to escape her own reality, Saffron creates Sydney, a super-slim, AI-generated 'perfect'version of herself. Boys online love Sydney, and for Saffron, it's just a bit of harmless fun.

Until the boundaries of her life online and offline begin to blur . . . And one boy in particular makes her question her desire to be someone she's not.

Can Saffron find a way back to herself, and learn to love who she actually is?Girl: Ultra-Processed explores what it is like to be a teenage girl in our current body-obsessed world while juggling family drama, friend dynamics, dating, betrayals and major life changes.