Book nook: Advice for binge eaters

FOOD: THE GOOD GIRL'S DRUG: How to Stop Using Food to Control Your Feelings, by Sunny Sea Gold. Berkley Books, $15, 238 pp.

Do you binge? Eat in secret? Lie about what you eat? Eat crazy stuff? Choose food over people?

Then you might have Binge-eating Disorder, which the Mayo Clinic calls "the most common of eating disorders." Although this book -- by Redbook magazine deputy editor Gold, founder of healthygirl.org and a former binge eater -- is targeted at young women, its advice could apply to anyone who eats too much . . . too much. (Men binge, too.)

THE SCOOP Gold quotes experts as well as young women, ages 16 to 30, about bingeing and strategies to get over it. (Making a list of 25 alternatives to eating can help when that out-of-control feeling rushes in.)

THE BOTTOM LINE Try Gold's "tools" -- physical activity, support, therapy, meditation and more. But since binge eating is a serious health issue, don't forget to see your doctor, too.