According to an updated report from the American Heart Association in 2012, 149 million Americans ages 20 and up are overweight or obese. Yet, nearly everyone knows that you can drop extra pounds and treat common health problems with easy changes in diet. With such a large scale epidemic, finding a way to decrease this number seems impossible.

But, Dr. Timothy Harlan realized he had a solution when his overweight patients complained that they were sick of hearing confusing information about what not to eat; they wanted to be told what to eat. The former chef combined his passion for cooking and his desire to help people get healthy to create “Just Tell Me What to Eat!: The Delicious 6-Week Weight-Loss Plan for the Real World” (Lifelong Books, $15) that tells people exactly what to ingest, day by day.

“For decades now, diet books have been written that have stolen food from us,” said Harlan. “First it was carbohydrates, then cholesterol, and later, fat. None of these fad diets were based in sound science, however, and they only resulted in nutrients being demonized. Part of this was because the research in the 1970s, ’80s and even into the ’90s wasn’t the quality it is now. Consequently, many physicians created diets based on pseudoscience or faulty science. The great thing is that we now have a much better understanding of what works for long-term health — and that’s not low-carb or low-fat or a diet that takes food groups away from us, but one with real food that gives us clear evidence about what to do.”

Harlan has counseled thousands of people searching for weight-loss answers and is well aware that there are times when you simply won’t want to think about cooking, so he accompanies each of his daily recipes with two quick alternatives: a convenience meal and a restaurant meal recommendation.

“One challenge is that people have left the work of cooking to others, and they don’t have a good understanding of what they’re eating,” said Harlan. “This ranges from high-calorie boxed and frozen meals, to fast food, to chain restaurant dinners that often have more calories and salt than one might need for a whole day on a single plate. By helping people plan, store and cook their own food, ‘Just Tell Me What To Eat!’ gets people back into the kitchen with quick, easy to cook recipes that are delicious, filling and satisfying, but not overloaded with calories.”

Harlan cuts through all the confusing diet trends and gets straight to the bottom line, while arming you with the knowledge you need to achieve a slimmer, healthier and happier lifestyle for good.

Contact staff writer Bobbi Booker at (215) 893-5749 or This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .

Several years ago, during a third trip to England, I was urged to visit outside London, convinced I had seen all — or most — of what the city had to offer.

And so off I went to Manchester, a lovely walking city with local shops that sit alongside stores the likes of Louis Vuitton, Hermes, Armani and DKNY.

True enough, this is a very interesting city, since many firsts happened in Manchester, including the first professional football league. It was also the birthplace of various pop groups, like Herman’s Hermits and the Bee Gees.

I made sure to visit Shakespeare’s birthplace at Stratford-Upon-Avon, and experienced a play at the Royal Shakespeare Company Theater.

Then I traveled to Warwick Castle, originally constructed in 1068 on the order of William the Conqueror. I took a tour of Britain’s capital of china, including a trip to the famed Wedgwood pottery center, where I not only saw how Wedgwood was made, I even got a chance to “throw” my own pot, later colored with the famous blue Wedgwood glaze and shipped to me at home.

But after several days of seeing the countryside, admittedly a beautiful part of the world, I simply had to head back to London. I missed it terribly and, as noted writer Samuel Johnson once said, “When a man is tired of London, he is tired of life, for there is in London, all that life can offer.”

Well, I certainly wasn’t tired of life or London, and that is especially true now, during two major events: the queen’s Diamond Jubilee, and the 2012 Olympics.

Queen Elizabeth, who ascended the throne in 1952, celebrated her Silver Jubilee (25 years) in 1977, and her Golden Jubilee (50 years) in 2002. And just last week, the whole nation geared up to help celebrate the queen’s Diamond Jubilee (60 years). The only other British monarch to celebrate such an event was Queen Victoria in 1897.

Millions came to London for the Jubilee and took part in dozens of events, hoping to catch a glimpse of the queen as she attended the Epsom Derby, or floated down the River Thames in one of the largest flotillas ever seen.

The government granted a four-day holiday (June 2–5) featuring jam-packed events in Elizabeth’s honor, from a concert at Buckingham Palace to several special exhibitions all across London, many of which will continue over the coming months.

In case you miss some of the events, you can still experience beautiful London for yourself. Maybe you won’t be one of thousands to join in all the ceremonies, but you too can float down the Thames in a riverboat, probably one of the best ways to “tour” the town.

Or you can see Westminster Abby, where kings, queens, statesmen, aristocrats, poets, priests, heroes and villains are all part of the church’s fascinating history.

Or take in the Tower of London, one of the world’s most famous fortresses, that has seen service as a royal palace, prison, armory and even a zoo.

Or ride atop the London Eye, one of London’s most popular tourist attractions since being opened in 2000. You can see all around for 25 miles, even as far as Windsor Castle on a clear day.

And then, of course, London will be playing host to the Olympic Games, expected to draw nearly six million visitors between July 27 and Aug. 12. These make London the first city ever to have hosted the Games three times.

It is estimated that some 10,500 athletes will participate in events at the Olympic Stadium in London’s Olympic Park. These Games are then followed by the Paralympics, slated for Aug. 29 to Sept. 9.

And after all is said and done, London is the perfect place to visit anytime of the year for a taste of history, food and fun.

NEW YORK — Alice Walker's "The Color Purple," a Pulitzer Prize winner in 1983 and still a widely taught and talked about novel, is finally coming out as an e-book.

We live in a time when kids of all ages are bombarded with age-sensitive material wherever they turn. “Sexting” and bullying are on the rise at an increasingly younger age, and teen moms are “celebrified.” What is a concerned — and embarrassed — parent to do? With wit, wisdom, and savvy, Deborah Roffman translates her experiences gleaned from decades of teaching kids and parents, and as a mom, into strategies to help parents navigate this tricky terrain. “Talk to Me First: Everything You Need to Know to Become Your Kids’ ‘Go-To’ Person about Sex” (Da Capo Press, $14.99) is for any parent who wants to become and remain the most credible and influential resource about sexuality in their children’s lives.

“In today’s world, putting off discussions with children about sexuality virtually guarantees that someone other than parents and teachers will become children’s primary educators,” said Roffman. “Also, four decades of research demonstrate that deliberately keeping what is truly age appropriate information away from children is falsely protective: children and teens who grow up in an atmosphere of openness about sexuality actually postpone involvement in sexual activity significantly longer than peers who don’t have that kind of relationship with important adults in their lives.”

From television commercials to easily accessible Internet pornography, it seems the pervasiveness of sexual language and images encountered by children in everyday life only seems to increase. As an educator, Roffman knows that kids needs nurturing, guidance and positive messages about sex in order to grow into healthy, happy adults.

“Children today are growing up at a time when the boundaries between a child’s world and the adult world are vanishing quickly,” explained the author. “When marketers are working hard to convince children, teens and their parents, that they are ready for adult oriented products and activities. Parents need to continually educate themselves about who children are at each stage of development and what they are capable of handling, and not, on their own. They also need to work with like-minded parent to agree on and stick to rules and limits around purchases, activities, curfews, supervision, etc., that make sense developmentally. It helps to remember that children and adolescents really do want limits and boundaries in their lives no matter how many times they may roll their eyes at adults.”

Contact Staff Writer Bobbi Booker at (215) 893-5749 or This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .

LOS ANGELES — Halloween’s coming up and with a little DIY ingenuity, you can turn your dog or cat into a bee, bear or badger. Whether you are planning for a parade, party, photo session, contest or trick-or-treating, a homemade costume for your pet can make it more fun for both of you.

You can start from scratch or go half-scratch, adding bling, attitude or accessories to human hand-me-downs or garage sale or thrift store finds. The McCall Pattern Co. even sells several patterns for pets.

Lisa Woodruff of Huntington Beach, Calif., builds whole floats around costume concepts so her pugs, stepsisters Olive and Mochi, can take part in the Haute Dog Howl’oween Parade and Costume Contest in Long Beach, Calif. They’ve attended the event, held annually on the last Sunday in October, for seven years.

The pugs have been geisha girls, fish, sushi, surfers, flowers, “pupcakes” and amateur movers. “The costumes have to be comfortable and dog friendly,” said Woodruff. “They can’t be completely indestructible, but they are dogs so they (the costumes) have to be durable.”

She shops on Craigslist and carves a lot of Styrofoam. The year Olive and Mochi were pupcakes, she started with inverted, pleated lampshades and painted them. There was a slight hitch, though: Both dogs couldn’t fit in their pupcake wagon sitting down, so her husband had to carry one down the parade route.

“We had technical difficulties. But that’s what homemade is all about,” she said.

AmyJo Casner, of Harrisville, Pa., dresses her ferrets up for Halloween.

“Ferrets don’t really have shoulders,” so the hardest part of designing clothes for them is making sure they can’t slip out of them, she said.

“The second hardest part is sewing the smallest seams on the hats. I am still improving each design and will do so until I have come up with one I can’t improve on,” she said.

Her pets, Manny, a 2-year-old therapy ferret, and Marcuz, a year-old deaf ferret, dress when they go out.

They have matching red silky shirts, commando shirts and PJs. A few months ago, they won first place in the pocket pet category at the local Fourth of July parade.

Casner also sells her designs on Etsy.com, an online homemade marketplace.

“All closures are sewed on with Velcro strips that have been cut in half and the items are machine sewn. I don’t put anything on my ferret clothing that might get easily chewed off either. Hats are held on by elastic that is triple-stitched to the brims,” she said.

The McCall Pattern Co. has several pet patterns to choose from, and they’re not just for Halloween. The busy season for pet pattern sales lasts from October to December, said Carolyne Cafaro, director of merchandising at McCall’s headquarters in New York City.

One of the most popular patterns is Santa Claus, she said, which many buyers build their Christmas cards around. Other hot sellers include a holiday apron, a doggie bathrobe and a tuxedo collar that can be used for Halloween, Christmas, weddings or any formal occasion, she said. Some buyers make costumes for their own animals; others make them as gifts for friends’ pets.

During the winter months, pet patterns will move up into the top 50 of the 600 patterns McCall sells, Cafaro said.

McCall’s packages its pet designs with a costume plus accessories.  For example, the Santa pattern comes with a collar, leg warmers, bow tie, a couple of coats, a blanket or sleeping bag and pajamas.

“Pets are so popular,” she said. “We try to come up with something new every year.”

The company also watches social media sites for comments. After a lot of requests, McCall’s designed a coat for very large dogs, she said.

Cat patterns have never been as popular as dog patterns, she said, although patterns for some items — like coats, hats, collars, leg warmers and bandannas — will work for both cats and small dogs.

McCall’s, which sells patterns under McCall, Vogue and Butterick brands, has six canine mannequins in varying sizes in its design lab, Cafaro said. And every pattern prototype is tested on a real dog before it gets final approval. “You can’t obscure their vision and they don’t like their ears flattened, they want to be able to hear,” she said.

Photographer Karen Nichols of Castro Valley, near San Francisco, sews and builds “scenes” for her three cats so she can take pictures of them and use them on greeting cards.

Over the last 10 years, she’s turned her cats into nurses, CEOs, super heroes, Christmas trees, elves, pumpkins, divas, bikers, a chicken, Sandy from “Grease” and many other things.

Most of the time, Skeezix, a 7-year-old Oriental shorthair is her main model, though his attention span is short, Nichols said. Mal, a 15-year-old Siamese, likes to pose sometimes. Tripper, a 22-pound brown tabby, used to be a feral cat so is a bit scratchy, but he is very photogenic.

Most of her ideas come as she is drifting off to sleep, Nichols said. Then she’ll shop at fabric and craft stores for material and props like shoes and eyeglasses, felt and pipe cleaners. She gets synthetic hair at her local pharmacy and turns it into a wig.

Most cats don’t like people fussing with their face or ears. “If you are doing a headpiece, hat or wig, you have to use some kind of Velcro to hold it on,” said Nichols, who writes a blog and publishes an online lifestyle magazine called “Mousebreath.”

If a cat or dog is going out in the costume, they have to be able to walk in it, so all feet have to be free, she said. But “if they are just posing for a card or photo, think of a movie set where things are not always as they appear. It only needs to look good enough for the photo. Use a stapler or safety pin to take in a dress. Do whatever you need as long as it’s OK for the photo,” she said.

She added: “You don’t want to do anything they will hate too much. You want to make it fun so they enjoy the one-on-one time and attention. — (AP)

You were so sorry.

Of all the things you regret, this one is right at the top. The bad haircut, that horrible outfit you loved at the time, things lost or lent and never found — those are all unimportant.

No, you’re most remorseful for the thing you didn’t do. You missed saying words that would have meant so much to someone.

Regrets? You’ve lived through them, but in the new novel “The Goat Woman of Largo Bay” by Gillian Royes (Atria Books   /$15), the sorrowful omission of one woman sets off a chain of events that changes an entire island.

Jamaica, says Miss Mac, is 150 miles long and fifty miles wide. Weather on the island is warm and there are two seasons: dry and wet.

It was the latter that nearly destroyed Eric Keller, an American who’d once owned a luxury hotel on a Largo peninsula. That was before the hurricane destroyed a bridge of land, leaving the hotel broken and inaccessible, a shabby island in its place.

And now there was something on that island.

Shadrack Myers, Keller’s bartender and right-hand man, spotted the figure on the island and it was a woman, not the goat he thought he’d first seen. When he and Keller rowed out to make her leave, she informed them that she was staying, offering Keller money he couldn’t refuse. She needed time, she said.

Shad could see that Keller was smitten with the woman, Simone, but it was obvious that she was harboring sorrowful secrets.

Secret-holding wasn’t foreign to Shad.

When he was just a teenager, he was involved in petty crimes and was sent to prison. There, a giant of a man saved Shad from assaults and they became brothers. But now Dollar Bill was sniffing around, hinting that Shad owed him a favor, asking for some information that Shad wasn’t willing to gather.

He had his hands full, anyway.

Eric Keller was worried about Simone, and he needed Shad’s help. Simone’s brother had come to town to fetch her, two thugs were suddenly stalking her, and curious Largoites were being kept away through the power of obeah medicine. 

She had only asked for time to heal. But time appeared to be running out.

Like a sun-warmed afternoon on a white island beach, “The Goat Woman of Largo Bay” is an unhurried novel that’s perfectly piña colada-sippable.

Or, you might get the urge to take big gulps of this book, too.

That’s because author Gillian Royes keeps the action going with Island patois, an authentic location and a cast of characters that you’ll surely enjoy meeting. I can’t wait, in fact, to read the next book about Shad Myers, a Jamaican man who isn’t highly educated, can’t read well, and doesn’t understand fancy words but who possesses smarts and the kind of street cred you’d find in Jamaica, Queens.

I think, if you’re looking for an easy-going, well-paced, non-violent mystery, you’re going to like “The Goat Woman of Largo Bay.” Grab this book soon because if you miss it, you’ll be sorry.

In “The End of Money: Counterfeiters, Preachers, Techies, Dreamers – and the Coming Cashless Society” (DeCapo Press, $25), author David Wolman dares to take a critical look at cash, considering its liabilities, and what our world would be like without those trillions of little numbered bits of paper and tiny metal disks. Wolman starts by giving readers a crash course in the rise and fall of physical money, beginning with Marco Polo’s fascination with the paper notes he saw circulating in China, then zooming through the ages to the end of the gold standard and the ascent of national currencies. On a trip around the globe, Wolman pieces together a cross-cultural picture of cash today. He takes the reader to Iceland, where he examines the connection between cash, cultural heritage and emotional value; to India, where he explores a growing trend that people in developing countries seem to be embracing faster than people in wealthy ones: using cell phones as replacements for both bank branches and cash; and to Tokyo, where he delves into the parallel worlds of counterfeiting and anti-counterfeiting technology.

Wolman begins his journey by deciding to shun cash for an entire year — a surprisingly successful experiment (with a couple of notable exceptions). He then ventures forth to find people and technologies that illuminate the road ahead. In Honolulu, he drinks Mai Tais with Bernard von NotHaus, a convicted counterfeiter and alternative-currency evangelist whom government prosecutors have labeled a domestic terrorist. In a downtrodden Oregon town, he mingles with obsessive coin collectors — the people who are supposed to love cash the most, yet don’t. And in rural Georgia, he examines why some people feel the end of cash is Armageddon’s warm-up act. After stops at the Digital Money Forum in London and Iceland’s central bank, Wolman flies to Delhi, where he sees first-hand how cash penalizes the poor more than anyone — and how mobile technologies promise to change that.

The usefulness of physical money — to say nothing of its value — is coming under fire as never before. Intrigued by the distinct possibility that cash will soon disappear, Wolman’s investigation ensures that you’ll never look at a dollar bill the same way again.

“The End of Money: Counterfeiters, Preachers, Techies, Dreamers – and the Coming Cashless Society” is available at major bookstores and online at Amazon.com.

Contact staff writer Bobbi Booker at (215) 893-5749 or This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .

Fifty years ago, the Berlin Wall was erected — an anniversary one might not want to celebrate but an important milestone in history.

The Wall ran some 97 miles around the Western sections of Berlin and 27 miles directly through the city’s center. The infamous Wall separated the capitalist West from the communist East.

After the Second World War, Germany — and its capital, Berlin — was divided into four occupation zones controlled by the United States, the United Kingdom, France and the Soviet Union. Differences between the Soviet Union and the Western nations led to the formation of the East German republic in 1949. The Berlin Wall was built in 1961.

Today, large sections of it can still be seen at several locations, making for an awesome, and, at times, eerie feeling. Chunks of it are offered at various souvenir shops to tourists, and whether or not those chunks are real no one seems to care since they supposedly mark a tangible piece of history to take home with you.

For all its history, Berlin, like any other capital city, encompasses all the hustle and bustle one would expect. Visitors have their cameras and handy dictionaries out most of the time, while the residents continue on with their busy daily lives.

Berlin is not only the capital of Germany but the largest city as well, with a population of about 3.5 million. Possibly in an effort to change the past, some of the streets throughout the city have been renamed. However, the fact that much of the city remains intact provides visitors with amazing glimpses into history — the good and the bad.

We started our tour at the Brandenburg Gate, an amazing piece of architecture and perhaps the best-known landmark in Berlin. Commissioned by Friedrich Wilhelm II in the 1700s to represent peace, the Gate has become one of Berlin’s most recognizable and photographed landmarks, becoming a symbol of a divided world when the Berlin Wall was erected.

Another famous symbol of a once-divided city is the Checkpoint Charlie Museum. During the Cold War, Checkpoint Charlie was the main gateway for non-Germans crossing between the two Berlins, and a visit to this museum is filled with photos, texts, films, documents and original recordings that chronicle some spectacular escapes.

Then there’s the impressive building known as the Reichstag where Hitler stood many times to shout out his propaganda to his “subjects” and the world at large. Today, with a glass walk-around installed on its roof, tourists can get a glimpse of the city as well as what the infamous dictator must have seen as he looked around.

But for real chills — the truly hard-to-forget kind — visit the Stasi Museum for a tour of the kinds of measures the Secret Police used to keep tabs on the population. Here, showcased are telephone surveillance techniques, devices for opening letters, a workshop for making disguises, and much, much more. Here are things that would make even James Bond proud.

But if you think of Berlin as just a city mired in treason, treachery, torture and transgressions, think again. Some beautiful buildings, museums and monuments enhance the tourists’ day.

For example, pay a visit to the Schloss Charlottenburg, a beautifully restored palace originally commissioned over 300 years ago. Inside is a small collections of romantic paintings. Outside are stunning gardens.

The Fernsehturm Television Tower is another must-see. The tower is the tallest structure in the city and features both an observation platform and also a restaurant, which revolves slowly to offer a fine city view.

Berlin is a “happening” city, revitalizing itself and boasting some fine hotels, world-class eateries, a spectacular nightlife and theaters. Museums also abound. In fact, the city is dotted with them, with some of the best dedicated to WWII, the history of the city’s art and culture, local artists, and modern subjects such as the evolution of technology.

Visitors can also enjoy the city with a sightseeing cruise of the River Spree — both day or night. There are also half-day walking tours, bike tours, or, one of my favorites, a Berlin City hop-on/hop-off bus tour on an open top double decker bus. But any way you choose to see Berlin, you can’t go wrong.

NASHVILLE, Tenn. — A new museum in the works for Nashville will aim to expand the public's idea of what makes the town Music City.

Author Sara Blaedel has been a force to be reckoned within her native Denmark as she has been a advocate and figure in crime fiction for many years, founding the first crime fiction publishing house in her home country. Blaedel’s books are published in 17 countries and she was voted Denmark’s most popular novelist for the third time in 2011. Her close relationship with the Copenhagen Police gives her novels sharp insight into current social issues, be it online dating (like in her first novel, “Call Me Princess”), human trafficking (the topic of her upcoming “Farewell to Freedom”), or honor killings. The latter subject is the focus of the international bestselling series featuring Detective Louise Rick and journalist Camilla Lind, entitled “Only One Life” (Pegasus Crime, $25.00).

It was clearly no ordinary drowning. Inspector Rick is immediately called out to Holbreak Fjord when a young immigrant girl is found in the watery depths. Her name is Samra, and the Inspector soon learns that her short life was a sad story. Her father had already been charged once with assaulting her and her mother, Sada, makes it clear that her husband is capable of killing their daughter if she brought dishonor to the family. However, the mother maintains that Samra hasn’t done anything dishonorable, yet she was supposed to be sent back to Jordan. Samra’s best friend, Dicte, thinks it was an honor killing, but a few days later Dicte is discovered, bludgeoned to death, and Samra’s younger sister has gone missing.

Navigating the complex web of family and community ties in Copenhagen’s tightly knit ethnic communities, the inspector must find this remorseless predator, or predators, before it is too late.

Contact staff writer Bobbi Booker at (215) 893-5749 or This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .