The End of Overeating: Taking Control of the Insatiable American Appetite [Hardcover]

David Kessler has undertaken a personal odyssey to try and understand why he has had difficulty resisting processed foods and controlling his weight like so many in the Western World. He has done a great deal of delving into basic research and attended food industry conferences in his quest. I found the earlier chapters more interesting than the later ones as in the former he reveals just how heedless food manufacturers are of peoples' health: profit and volume sales being the only driving force in their strategies. The food industry seems little different from tobacco industry. Both pretty despicable. There's also a lot of interesting stuff about animal research indicating that junk food is not far short of drugs of addiction in the lengths that rodents will go to eat it.

The later chapters of the book deal more with how to resist the lure of high sugar, salt and fat foods that are the mainstay of evidently irresistible junk food. As someone who has been involved in researching food and physiological responses I felt that his analysis of the available research focused too heavily on the psychological motivations for over-eating and too little on the physiological links between the digestive system and the brain. There are receptors in the digestive system that detect nutrients and send signals to the brain to indicate that food has been consumed and the kind of food. Manufactured foods contain novel fats, for example, not found in natural foods and, as receptors are very specific to the shape of the molecules they monitor, the signal that a load of unnatural fat had arrived in the digestive system would not be registered and the eater may go on eating as the normal satiety signal has not kicked in. A parallel example is the unnatural trans fats created by hydrogenating cheap oils to make solid fats suitable for use in the baking industry instead of butter. These trans fats have led to unexpected damage to the linings of arteries and consequent arteriosclerosis. Never before has the human digestive system had to deal with a relatively huge amounts of sugars found in manufactured foods, especially soft drinks. I recall research done by Professor Garrard in London in which he was trying to load the diets of young men with calories to see what happened to their weight: they couldn't tolerate the extra calories as protein or fat. The only way he could load them with 1000s of extra calories was in the form of liquid sugar: soft drinks in other words.

It's an interesting and at times shocking book, but, sadly, I think the "genie is out of the bottle" in terms of cheap junk foods being so readily available everywhere one goes coupled with a generally more prosperous population such that I fear that obesity will increase and all the consequent morbidity. Maybe legislation is the only answer?

This is not a traditional diet or self help book and reading it properly requires some brain activity and concentration. The book is essentially divided into three parts. The first part explains why combinations of sugar, fat and salt can be addictive (high school level biology helps here). The second part explains how the food industry conspires to make us eat these addictive foods in ways our parents or grandparents never had to contend with (and I agree with the person who said don't read this when you are hungry as many of the descriptions sound absolutely lush). The third part brings together all of the latest scientific research and thinking on breaking addictions and changing behaviours. Most diet books focus on one of these methods for example many books use principles from CBT and some may use hypnotherapy. This book explains all of the current thinking so if you want help you can choose which method/s you think will work for you and redirect yourself to say an online CBT course.

David Kessler's book is an excellent and invaluable catalogue of thorough study of the subject. Kessler certainly knows his subject and the depth of information, written in an easily understandable way is remarkable. A lot of what he says is right out there in front of our eyes but we just don't see it until it's pointed out to us - Kessler does this well. It is a fascincating read which could change lives. However, the 'Treatment' sections of his book are weak by contrast. He leaves the reader in mid-air, wondering what to do from here. At best there's guidance, at worst he just advises to avoid food (impossible in a Western world) and in one stark sentence of the book prescribes a fairly low amount of calories as a one-size-fits-all remedy which I believe to be very unhelpful. Throw-away one-liners like that (and there are others) spoil an otherwise very credible book. A much better book which gives excellent treatment advice from start to finish whilst incorporating pretty much all the same information as Kessler's is 'Eating Less. Say Goodbye to Overeating' by Gillian Riley. Gillian treats overeating as an addiction which I believe is where Kessler fails in his treatment by skirting round this issue. I would recommend both books, but Gillian Riley's is the only one with treatment that works.