Susan Orlean, staff writer for the New Yorker and author of The Orchid Thief (which later became the movie Adaptation, starring Meryl Streep and Nicholas Cage), also wrote a little-known diet book under her married name, Susan Sistrom.

People don't seem to know what to make of it; was it written in jest, bad taste, or good sense? Is it ironic or funny or just despicable?

I've ordered a copy, because I like Susan Orlean too much to believe she could've written something as banal as a diet book without something more substantial in mind--cultural commentary, sarcasm...something. Petite Amanda Hesser, whose size raises eyebrows despite the fact that she can eat like a bear, sat in on a 'skinny dinner' at a steakhouse with Sistrom and girlfriends and sounds skeptical.