The following version of this book was used to create the guide: Zgheib, Yara. The Girls at 17 Swann Street. St. Martins Press, Advanced Reader's Edition, 2019.

Yara Zgheib’s novel, The Girls at 17 Swann Street, oscillates between a first-person and third-person limited point of view, following the story of Anna Roux as she enters residential eating disorder treatment, for anorexia nervosa. After she moved to St. Louis, the narrator did not have opportunities to pursue ballet and felt increasingly purposeless and alone. She used eating disorder behaviors to cope with uncomfortable emotions and self soothe. At the outset of the narrative, Anna does not want to admit that she is sick and resists the clinal team’s advice, meal plan, and group therapy. In treatment, Anna continues to feel isolated, but the other patients welcome her into the milieu. Valerie writes her a note, on her first day, expressing her desire to be friends, and Emm tells her that it is important to consider the struggles of all of the patients. During a group therapy session, Anna feels more comfortable talking about her life and past struggles when the other patients ask questions and express interest in her. Each night during visiting hours, Matthias visits Anna and they talk about returning to Paris in the future.

As the narrative progresses, Anna begins to delineate the eating disorder voice from her soul-self voice. She recognizes that urges to restrict, hide food, and lie to her team are rooted in anorexia, not her personal identity and desires. During a difficult meal, Anna hides food and later runs away from the facility when she is asked to supplement. She is given a nasogastric feeding tube after returning to 17 Swann Street. Shortly after, Valerie is taken away in an ambulance. She could not cope with her feelings of failure and worthlessness and committed suicide to abet the pain. After Valerie’s death, Anna realizes that she can choose to continue using behaviors or she can choose to survive but she cannot have both. The narrator asks her therapist for a meal pass with Matthias. On the outing, Anna struggles to comply with her meal plan but is able to recognize that the urge is rooted in maladaptive coping.

On Family Day, Anna’s father visits her in treatment, and she is allowed to go out on another pass. Her family is supportive and encouraging of her progress in treatment and her father urges her to continue fighting for recovery. When she speaks with Katherine, the clinician suggests that Anna is ready for Stage 3, moving onto outpatient therapy where she would attend groups but live at home. Anna is afraid that she will relapse without constant supervision, but she is willing to take the next step in her recovery, if it means spending more time with her loved ones. Before she leaves 17 Swann Street, the narrator tells Emm that she wants to be friends with her outside of treatment. In the last chapter of the novel, Anna and Matthias visit Paris and she is resolved to continue fighting for recovery. She understands that reconnecting with her identity, having healthy relationships, and new experiences, is only possible if she makes concerted decisions to negate the eating disorder voice and practice adaptive coping.