“Which is the more expedient solution, the one that will produce greater happiness — becoming thin; or deciding, through rarefied cultural perspective, that being thin doesn’t matter? A dozen recent ruminations about human body weight — memoirs, science, self-help — trip grievously on this dilemma, stumbling between the options, getting lost even while pretending to reach certainty and, furthermore, victory. Whether viewed as an affliction of the body or the mind, fat is apparently an intractable problem.” — Virginia Heffernan (New York Times Book Review)