The Road to Wellville

In this “wildly funny” (People) novel, an eccentric cast of characters navigates a world obsessed with health and longevity—from the New York Times bestselling author of The Tortilla Curtain. “Boyle’s send-up of dietary fanaticism cleverly reminds us of the extremes to which Americans will go in pursuit of perfection.”—Glamour The year is 1907, and the boom town of Battle Creek, Michigan, is attracting a formidable array of visitors—the rich, the preposterously rich, and the merely famous, from California, Chicago, New York, and even Europe. What draws them to this place? And what inspires them to trade in their steaks and oysters, their martinis and champagne, for a diet of bran and yogurt and a regimen of five enemas a day? Dr. John Harvey Kellogg, of course, inventor of the corn flake, peanut butter, and the coffee substitutes that have ruined so many a bright morning. Will Lightbody is a man with an undiagnosed stomach ailment whose only sin is loving his wife too much. Eleanor Lightbody, despite her upper-crust credentials, her capability and beauty, is a health nut of the first stripe—and when she journeys to Dr. Kellogg’s infamous Battle Creek Spa to live out the vegetarian ethos, poor Will goes too. Wickedly comedic, The Road to Wellville overflows with a Dickensian cast of characters—all in search of the magic pill to prolong their lives, or the profit to be had from manufacturing it.