My New Book

"My patients have done so well on Byetta," he wrote in his book The Uncommon Doctor, "that I think it could be the next miracle drug."

He told me on the phone in January 2006 that 200 of his patients were using Byetta. Their average weight loss since the first of them started was 35 pounds, as I wrote in "Stalking Byetta." I guessed correctly that Dr. Joe would be willing to help me, since I had volunteered to edit his book, which I knew pleased him.

When I called Dr. Joe, he immediately agreed to write the foreword for my new book. This sealed my deal with Matthew.

Between mid-November 2006, when Matthew and I had our first meeting on the book, and March 15, 2007, the deadline that he gave me to finish it, I focused most of my energy on completing it, while continuing to write two articles a week here. That was a difficult period for me, especially because my wife died just five days after I submitted the manuscript to Matthew.

What I was totally unprepared for was how long it would take for the book to come off the press. Working mostly on the Web, I am more used to writing an article one day and having it appear that day or the next.

Originally, Matthew planned an October 2007 publication date. But then Perseus Book Group purchased Matthew's company. That slowed things down, but the new publisher still wanted Matthew and his books. Matthew is now vice president and executive editor of Da Capo Press and Da Capo Lifelong Books.

My new book says on the cover that it is a part of "The Marlowe Diabetes Library" while the spine says the publisher is Marlowe & Company and the title page says the publisher is Da Capo Press, a member of the Perseus Book Group. Sorta confusing, but it is finally in print.

The book is 211 numbered pages plus 25 pages of front matter, mostly Dr. Joe's preface and my introduction.

The official publication date is February 25. But Matthew writes me that "books are currently on their way to booksellers and wholesalers nationwide and should be on bookstore shelves in the next couple of weeks."

This is a trade paperback listing for US $14.95 (CAN $16.00). The ISBN is 9781600940453; the ISBN-10 is 1600940455.

Byetta helped me to lose a lot of weight. "Since starting on Byetta fewer than two years ago, my weight dropped from 312 to 181 pounds," was how I began the key paragraph of the introduction to the book. "From the start, I told everyone who would listen that my goal by October 26, 2007, was to weigh less than when the U.S. Army had honorably discharged me 50 years earlier. That meant weighing less than 195 pounds, which would also give me a BMI in the normal range."

Since then, I have kept revising my weight goals, eventually appreciating that a BMI in the low normal range is even better. As of today I have lost more than 150 pounds and have a BMI of 20.

If you have type 2 diabetes and really want to lose weight, Byetta can help you too. The only way you can lose as much as I have, however, is to to be awfully heavy when you start.