By Connie Guttersen and Stephanie Karpinske

Restrictive diets — think low-carb or low-fat — also are low-flavor. The Sonoma Diet (inspired by California wine country) is all about flavor through power foods (like whole grains and berries). It’s still a diet (there are strict instructions) but the lack of calorie and/or point counting means a dieter can pretend she’s just following a good cookbook while shedding pounds at the same time.

Good Housekeeping The Supermarket Diet

By Janis Jibrin

There are three plans for losing weight in this real-food-for-real-folks bible (Boot Camp, Keep on Losin’ and Stay Slim Maintenance). Each plan has a specific calorie count. Grocery lists and quick-to-prepare meals linked to recipes from the magazine round out the book. Grocery-store and label-reading information in a diet book makes perfect sense: You have to shop healthy to eat healthy.

Eat, Drink, and Weigh Less

By Mollie Katzen and Walter Willett, M.D.

Co-author Katzen is well known for her best-selling cookbooks (the Moosewood series), which makes this a diet for people who want to shrink their waistlines, not their taste buds. The concept here (besides eating tasty meals that are sometimes time-consuming to prepare) is that dieters must learn to chart their progress via a “Body Score,” which is determined by taking a quiz. The plan is based on research out of Harvard School of Public Health’s Department of Nutrition.

Weight Watchers Family Power: 5 Simple Rules for a Healthy Weight Home

By Karen Miller-Kovach

Kids learn by example. Help them and yourself at the same time by getting healthy as a family. The diet is composed of five practical rules: Focus on wholesome, nutritious foods; include treats; aim to keep non-homework screen time to two hours or less a day; try to be active an hour or more a day; the rules apply to everyone at home. If you slip, the support is built in. The book includes motivational stories from families living on message.

You: On A Diet: The Owner’s Manual for Waist Management

By Michael F. Roizen, Mehmet C. Oz

In this comprehensive tome, the authors of the bestselling YOU series (antiaging expert Roizen and famous cardiologist Oz) serve up the science behind body fat. Once you’ve slogged through the biology and psychology of weight, they offer up a solid, though far from revolutionary, diet and workout program, with plenty of easy-to-use tips. The book is selling like hotcakes.