The Complete Book of Fitness: Mind, Body, Spirit

From the expert editors of Fitness magazine, here is everything you need to know about exercise, nutrition, and well-being in one comprehensive volume, The Complete Book of Fitness. Hundreds of entries are organized alphabetically in four sections:

Strength Training offers effective, illustrated workouts for every muscle group.
Cardiovascular Training includes invaluable information on fat-burning and metabolism.
Diet and Nutrition demystifies eating for health, strength, and athletic performance.
Wellness provides an introduction to alternative therapies and healing, rounding out your total fitness package of mind, body, and spirit.

So whether you want to flatten your abs or firm your thighs, you're looking for a stretching routine or cross-training ideas, you want to carbo-load or unload a few pounds, or if you wish to increase your energy or reduce your stress, finding the answers is literally as easy as A-B-C. Clearly written for the layperson, The Complete Book of Fitness serves as a primer on fitness basics, from biceps to water aerobics, from antioxidants to yoga. Packed with easy-to-access information, it is also a gym bible and can be used to customize a detailed fitness regimen to suit any lifestyle and body type.

This first-of-its-kind fitness encyclopedia is a must-have for every health-conscious household.

Can reading the newspaper be hazardous to your health? No studies have proven so, but anecdotal evidence indicates that when the health-conscious individual reads too many conflicting articles about what foods should and shouldn't be consumed and which exercises are mandatory or else fraught with risk, that already harassed, overly stressed fitness neophyte may throw in the towel (thereby burning an insufficiently few calories), plop down on the couch, and reach for the remote.

Grabbing The Complete Book of Fitness would be a more rewarding choice. The Editors of Fitness Magazine have done an elegant job of explaining all the terms and conditions related to fitness, summarizing current research, and advising the most healthful paths. The book is divided into four sections: Strength Training, Cardiovascular Training, Diet and Nutrition, and Wellness. Within each chapter, the pertinent topics are arranged in alphabetical order, so Wellness runs from acupressure to yoga, Diet goes from alcohol to weight, and Strength Training covers everything from abdominals to "Weights and Aerobics: Which to Do First." Explaining how consumption of alcohol leads to weight gain (answer: calories from alcohol get burned first, so calories stored as fat are less likely to be needed), which exercises work the buttock muscles (and how to perform them), why eggs make a healthier meal than people have been led to believe, and how to avoid or overcome fatigue and stress, this is a great resource when fitness becomes too complicated to figure. --Stephanie Gold