to huff and puff. like. . .

After  seeing  Shuler Hensley  portray a 600-pound  man in  Samuel D.  Hunter's play The Whale earlier this season,  the  central character of Jami  Attenberg's     new novel, The Middlesteins.   is a  lightweight  at 300  pounds.  But  Attenberg's  portrait  is   bigger and  more  comprehensive.   As  New York Times book  reviewer,  Julie Oringer  describes  it  with  an  apt  simile,  we  see Edie  Middlestein develop  from chunky baby  into    a woman  who   "huffs and puffs up the stairs like someone’s gassy old uncle after a meal.”