This book was okay.

Walford does his best to give a thorough explanation of what he considers the keys to longevity, as far as what can be established scientifically.

Walford is a core figure in longevity research and has been widely read and quoted, and many books are basically rehashes of his work and theories, especially concerning calorie restriction.

The writing could have been better. Walford often comes across as arrogant and he uses a lot of unnecessarily complicated language that made much of the book a chore. A lot was skipable if you are familiar with health concepts, as he describes many common health themes in a very long winded and boring way.

I wouldn’t normally bring this up in a review, but Walford died at age 79 from ALS, and that really clouds his work for me - clearly, if he followed his own advice in this book (and I think he did, with some modifications over the years), then it didn’t work out too well. 79 isn’t that bad, but as one of the giants in the field of longevity research and someone very keen to live a healthy long life, this outcome is far from impressive.

Though most of his core ideas are sound, to me, he fell far short on nutrition and ate several of the wrong foods, in my opinion. We now know for certain, in part because of the outcome of Walford’s diet on himself, that there are definitely other key factors to health and longevity.

Walford’s work should be read if you are into longevity research. But it should be taken with a grain of salt.