SUPERSIZED LIES

A nutritional guide debunks some misconceptions surrounding weight loss.

Weight-loss advice is everywhere, and yet it can often be contradictory. Is diet more important than exercise? Does fasting, avoiding carbs, or counting calories work? What about all the supplements and meal plans? With this book, Davis dives into the confusing and often false messaging surrounding weight loss. He demonstrates that the weight-loss industry has produced spurious solutions going back to its origins in the 19th century. The problem has only gotten more tangled with time. Ubiquitous junk food, social media echo chambers, shoddy research, lax journalistic standards, financial incentives, and a host of cognitive biases convince readers that the newest trend is proven to work when the evidence isn’t there or the results are only temporary. This landscape has made it more difficult than ever to get into a desirable shape while simultaneously creating unrealistic standards and making people feel ashamed for their inability to shed pounds. Chapter by chapter, the author confronts some of the most salient ideas about weight loss, exploring their history and dissecting them using the latest science. He even tackles what he says might be the biggest lie of all: that dieting and exercise reliably contribute to weight loss. The book is appropriately slim but packed with information. Davis, with a background in both journalism and public health, writes with authority and candor. “There’s no question that exercise is essential for good health,” he argues. “But it’s unrealistic to count on exercise to produce weight loss, and doing so can keep people from enjoying the many benefits of physical activity by causing them to become discouraged and give up when it doesn’t deliver as promised.” The manual is inherently intriguing, even for those lucky people not looking to lose weight. Diet is a foundational aspect of daily life, and learning how misunderstood certain aspects of it are makes for engaging reading. There are areas of the author’s argument that some might quibble with, but his ultimate weight-loss suggestions—yes, he does believe it is possible—are surprisingly simple and difficult to refute.

A reasonable and accessible treatise on why losing weight is often so hard.