Diet and Health; with Key to the Calories

This is the book that taught America to count calories. Published in 1918, Lulu Hunt Peters wrote it after shedding sixty pounds and decided the world needed to know her secret: food is fuel, and numbers don't lie. What makes this slim volume remarkable is not just its pioneering nutrition science, but its voice. Peters is funny, sharp, and unapologetic. She refuses to coddle readers, offering instead a clear-eyed formula for weight management based on height, activity level, and a simple arithmetic every woman could learn. The book covers both losing and gaining weight, treating the body as an equation to be solved rather than a mystery to be mystical about. Reading it feels like chatting with a witty doctor who happens to be right about everything. A century before the wellness industry exploded, Peters was already dismantling the nonsense and giving readers tools that still work. For anyone curious about where modern diet culture began, or anyone who wants sensible, no-nonsense health advice that happens to be over a hundred years old, this is the origin story.