Home | Diet Books | Dietitians | Diet Pills | Family Weight Loss | Fasting Programs | Health Club Diets

Meal Replacements | Pregnancy and Weight Gain | Guidelines For Choosing The Best & Safest Diet Programs

2006 New Years resolutions have come and gone, along with a flurry of new fad diets and diet books. Will you get your diet advice and tips from a new diet book hot off the presses, or one of the "classic" diet bestsellers?  If you're a do-it-yourself dieter, as many are, you will probably buy one, two, maybe three diet books by popular celebrities and newly minted diet doctors this year. But will they help you? Is this a plan you can stick with and is it the right diet for you?

Diet market analysts such as Marketdata Enterprises, Tampa, FL, predicted early this year that more celebrities (and diet doctors) would jump on the weight loss bandwagon in 2006, and we'd see a flood of new diet books published. They were right. Recent hot-selling diet books, some of which have made the bestseller list, include those below. There are no doubt many more that don't get as much press.

Body Intelligence:  Lose Weight, Keep It Off, and Feel Great About Your Body Without Dieting!, (Edward Abramson, PhD,)

Ultra-metabolism (Mark Hyman, MD)

The Flavor Point Diet  (David L. Katz, MD)

French Women Don’t Get Fat  (Mireille Guilano)

The 3-Hour Diet  (Jorge Cruise, fitness expert)

Volumetrics  (Dr. Barbara Rolls) 

The Perricone Weight Loss Diet  (Nicholas Perricone, MD)

The Mars & Venus Diet & Exercise Solution  (by relationship expert John Gray).

Eat Carbs, Lose Weight  (by fitness guru Denise Austin - her first diet book)

Curves: Permanent Results Without Permanent Dieting (Gary Heavin & Carol Colman, Curves Intl. Pres.) 

Naturally, most of us don't have time to read all these diet books. So how does one compare the top 60 diet programs to find out if it's a healthy diet or one right for you? Many popular weight loss programs start out as a diet book first. If they catch on, the publishers create a website and a full-blown diet plan. Some are related to specific medical condition or body part--a diabetes diet book, a glycemic index diet, the Mediterranean diet, the blood type diet, etc. Take your pick.

Publishers must be careful with diet books, and they take a hard look at the author's credentials. They ask around in the medical community, among other checks. Publishers and agents know that the "flash" and hype are everything, yet they want solid information in the books.  Many of today's popular diet books fall into a "middle ground"--they are not dangerous, but they're just not as good as they should be. The problem is that the word "diet" means one thing to the public and another to nutritionists.

One publisher that seems to have taken the lead lately in the number of diet books it has released is Rodale Press, the publisher of Prevention magazine. Consumers see lots of emails coming from Rodale and their online marketing company, Waterfront Media, touting the latest fad diet. Are you confused about all the diet books and their often conflicting claims? You're not alone. Happily, there IS a way to obtain a truly unbiased diet needs analysis that evaluates diet books, medical and commercial weight loss plans.

Evaluating a diet book involves checking the number of calories it allows, making sure it won't put a person into nutritional deficiency, and seeing that it includes behavior modification and exercise. But, will a book that meets such criteria sell? Too often, publishers go with the potential quick weight-loss blockbusters, despite their failings. The fact is, quick weight loss and good nutrition are mutually exclusive.

Home | Diet Books | Dietitians | Diet Pills | Family Weight Loss | Fasting Programs | Health Club Diets

Meal Replacements | Pregnancy and Weight Gain | Guidelines For Choosing The Best & Safest Diet Programs