I just received in the mail yesterday the wackiest weight-loss book I have ever seen: Our Lady of Weight Loss: Miraculous and Motivational Musings from the Patron Saint of Permanent Fat Removal by Janice Taylor. She had a weight problem all her life until one day she was sitting in a weight loss class thinking, “I’m never going to make it.” That’s when she heard The Voice. She said, “If you think you’re never going to make it, you never will.” From what I gather, this was a rather unusual experience for Janice. It did not seem from the way she had written this passage that she was in the habit of hearing voices. But she decided later that night to ask The Voice what she could do about her weight problem. The Voice said, “You’re an artist. Make weight loss an art project.” So that is what Janice did. Instead of eating cake, she made art out of it, and she lost weight. The Voice became Our Lady of Weight Loss. The book is illustrated with wacky images of the art she made while she lost the weight. There are also projects that the reader can do. The first is an altar to Our Lady of Weight Loss made out of a macaroni box and decorated with macaroni and glitter glue. There are Motivational Musings, Tasty Tidbits, Righteous Recipes, Weighty Confessions, and Prickly Prayers. Janice’s inspired ideas have the potential for making weight loss a lot of fun. The book is certainly visually appealing. It also includes sound dietary advice. If one is going to be obsessed with food, then making art out of it would certainly be better than eating it.