Encouraging core advice to balance one’s diet while still consuming favorite foods.
Sourour counsels consistency in this metabolism-focused food management guide.
The author, a real estate investor, shares the strategy that he developed to lose 134 pounds over 12 months between 2017 and 2018 (still off five years later) after tipping the scales at 364.4 pounds. “A fixed menu—of any food under the sun—into a fixed metabolic rate—that we all have under the sun—makes weight loss as easy and predictable as the Earth’s orbit around the sun,” proclaims the author. His system is focused on eating three “high-density meals” (35% carbs, 40% protein, 25% fat) in five- or six-hour blocks of time throughout the day to create a “steady stream” to maximize your own unique “metabolic burn rate.” Additionally, given “our circadian rhythms reconcile and reset weight loss...within a 24 hour time frame,” Sourour advises weighing yourself every morning before meals to evaluate your unique burn rate and then sizing meals accordingly to achieve weight-loss goals. The process is gradual; according to the author, one should expect losses of only up to a half-pound a day amid expected daily gains from slip-ups as well as from an intentional “formula cycle” implemented once a week to double typical food volume, ensuring your body is “routinely reminded it’s not in a permanent caloric deficit phase.” Some recipes are supplied. Sourour’s own successful weight management is, of course, a ringing endorsement for his system. The notion that favorite foods can and should be included in meals makes his plan very appealing. Sourour also offers realistic tweaks, including allowing for balanced snacks as part of the process of figuring out how to build a meal that satisfies for six hours. Some of Sourour’s points (e.g., eat fruits and vegetables for “the micronutrients and not the satiation”) may be confusing or misinterpreted. Overall, however, this book provides a sensible one-day-at-time approach to taming mindless overeating.
Encouraging core advice to balance one’s diet while still consuming favorite foods.Pub Date: Jan. 17, 2023
ISBN: 9781738791736
Page Count: 339
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: Feb. 8, 2023
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
The lessons to draw are obvious: Smoke more dope, eat less meat. Like-minded readers will dig it.
The chef, rapper, and TV host serves up a blustery memoir with lashings of self-help.
“I’ve always had a sick confidence,” writes Bronson, ne Ariyan Arslani. The confidence, he adds, comes from numerous sources: being a New Yorker, and more specifically a New Yorker from Queens; being “short and fucking husky” and still game for a standoff on the basketball court; having strength, stamina, and seemingly no fear. All these things serve him well in the rough-and-tumble youth he describes, all stickball and steroids. Yet another confidence-builder: In the big city, you’ve got to sink or swim. “No one is just accepted—you have to fucking show that you’re able to roll,” he writes. In a narrative steeped in language that would make Lenny Bruce blush, Bronson recounts his sentimental education, schooled by immigrant Italian and Albanian family members and the mean streets, building habits good and bad. The virtue of those habits will depend on your take on modern mores. Bronson writes, for example, of “getting my dick pierced” down in the West Village, then grabbing a pizza and smoking weed. “I always smoke weed freely, always have and always will,” he writes. “I’ll just light a blunt anywhere.” Though he’s gone through the classic experiences of the latter-day stoner, flunking out and getting arrested numerous times, Bronson is a hard charger who’s not afraid to face nearly any challenge—especially, given his physique and genes, the necessity of losing weight: “If you’re husky, you’re always dieting in your mind,” he writes. Though vulgar and boastful, Bronson serves up a model that has plenty of good points, including his growing interest in nature, creativity, and the desire to “leave a legacy for everybody.”
The lessons to draw are obvious: Smoke more dope, eat less meat. Like-minded readers will dig it.Pub Date: April 20, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-4197-4478-5
Page Count: 184
Publisher: Abrams
Review Posted Online: May 5, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2021
A sweet final word from an actor who leaves a legacy of compassion and kindness.
The late actor offers a gentle guide for living with more purpose, love, and joy.
Mixing poetry, prescriptive challenges, and elements of memoir, Heche (1969-2022) delivers a narrative that is more encouraging workbook than life story. The author wants to share what she has discovered over the course of a life filled with abuse, advocacy, and uncanny turning points. Her greatest discovery? Love. “Open yourself up to love and transform kindness from a feeling you extend to those around you to actions that you perform for them,” she writes. “Only by caring can we open ourselves up to the universe, and only by opening up to the universe can we fully experience all the wonders that it holds, the greatest of which is love.” Throughout the occasionally overwrought text, Heche is heavy on the concept of care. She wants us to experience joy as she does, and she provides a road map for how to get there. Instead of slinking away from Hollywood and the ridicule that she endured there, Heche found the good and hung on, with Alec Baldwin and Harrison Ford starring as particularly shining knights in her story. Some readers may dismiss this material as vapid Hollywood stuff, but Heche’s perspective is an empathetic blend of Buddhism (minimize suffering), dialectical behavioral therapy (tolerating distress), Christianity (do unto others), and pre-Socratic philosophy (sufficient reason). “You’re not out to change the whole world, but to increase the levels of love and kindness in the world, drop by drop,” she writes. “Over time, these actions wear away the coldness, hate, and indifference around us as surely as water slowly wearing away stone.” Readers grieving her loss will take solace knowing that she lived her love-filled life on her own terms. Heche’s business and podcast partner, Heather Duffy, writes the epilogue, closing the book on a life well lived.
A sweet final word from an actor who leaves a legacy of compassion and kindness.Pub Date: Jan. 24, 2023
ISBN: 9781627783316
Page Count: 176
Publisher: Viva Editions
Review Posted Online: Feb. 6, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2023
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
