Eight Weeks to Optimum Health

Andrew Weil's week-by-week, step-by-step program for improving and maintaining health draws on both conventional and alternative medicine. The plan covers diet, exercise, lifestyle, stress and environment, the parts of daily living that affect well-being, and shows how to tailor it for groups such as people at risk for cancer, overweight people, senior citizens and pregnant women. An expanded and updated edition adds newer findings on cholesterol, antioxidants, trans fats, soy, toxic residues in the food supply, and vitamins and supplements, along with a larger list of sources for information and supplies. Weil presents the program as preventive in the broadest sense, aimed at making the most of the body's own healing power.

Digg co-founder Kevin Rose said he probably rereads it every couple of years, pointing to its exercises for lowering stress and raising energy and to how good he feels after the eight weeks.