Going deeper
“The long game is simple to describe and harder to fake: calmer blood sugar, stronger muscle, better recovery, healthier gut function, and a pattern of eating that still feels recognisably like your life.”
Nutrition is complex, and the voices we follow don't all agree with each other — or with us — on everything. That is healthy. What follows is a list of the books, podcasts and newsletters we have found interesting and useful. Members are perfectly capable of reading them, weighing the arguments, and deciding what they think.
Books we like
Peter Attia — Outlive (2023)
The definitive modern text on longevity as a personal-health project. Attia's framing of the four horsemen of age-related death — cardiovascular disease, cancer, neurodegeneration and metabolic dysfunction — and his case for Medicine 3.0, a preventative and measurement-led approach to long-term health, has shaped how much of the longevity space now thinks and talks.
Mark Hyman — Young Forever (2023)
Hyman's synthesis of the longevity field for a general reader. Covers the biological hallmarks of ageing, dietary strategies, supplements, sleep, stress, and the importance of purpose and community. Readable, practical, and comprehensive without being dense.
Casey Means — Good Energy (2024)
Means's argument that metabolic dysfunction sits underneath most of the chronic conditions of modern life — from mental health to fertility to neurodegeneration — and that mitochondrial health is where the conversation should start. Particularly strong on the connections between food, blood sugar, and whole-body function.
Michael Greger — How Not to Age (2023)
Greger's exhaustive treatment of the evidence on ageing and nutrition. Densely cited, organised around the biological pathways of ageing, and firmly in the plant-forward tradition. The companion to his earlier ‘How Not to Die' — and the more rigorous, evidence-heavy of the two.
David Sinclair — Lifespan (2019)
The book that brought the biology of ageing to a general audience. Sinclair is one of the most influential researchers in the sirtuin and mTOR pathways that underpin much of longevity science today. More focused on the biology of ageing than on nutrition specifically, but essential context for the wider field.
Chris van Tulleken — Ultra-Processed People (2023)
The best popular account of the ultra-processed foods argument that runs through sections 2 and 4 of this brief. Van Tulleken combines a month-long self-experiment on an 80 per cent UPF diet with deep reporting on the food industry. The single most useful book for understanding why UPFs have become the central battle in public nutrition.
Tim Spector — Food for Life (2022)
Spector's synthesis of the microbiome research that has done so much to reshape nutrition thinking over the past decade. Covers plant diversity, fermented foods, personal response variability, and the case against one-size-fits-all dietary advice. The book that popularised the 30-plants-a-week principle we build on in section 4.
Michael Pollan — In Defence of Food (2008)
Still the best short book on how to think about eating. Pollan's three-sentence formulation — eat food, not too much, mostly plants — remains the most useful piece of dietary advice compressed into that few words. The deeper argument about the industrialisation of eating and the problems with single-nutrient thinking has aged better than most nutrition writing of the last twenty years.
Podcasts we like
The Drive — Peter Attia
Long-form interviews across exercise, nutrition, sleep, hormones, mental health, and emerging longevity interventions. The most serious ongoing conversation in the longevity space.
The Doctor's Farmacy — Mark Hyman
Hyman in conversation with researchers, clinicians, and fellow practitioners across longevity, metabolic health, and functional medicine. A good way to encounter voices and ideas from across the wider wellness and longevity space.
ZOE Science & Nutrition — Jonathan Wolf, Tim Spector, Sarah Berry
Weekly conversations on nutrition, gut health, and emerging research, usually anchored to a specific food topic or recent study. Accessible, evidence-led, and responsive to what's actually being published.
Huberman Lab — Andrew Huberman
Stanford neuroscientist Huberman's long-form episodes on sleep, exercise, nutrition, stress, and cognitive performance. Often goes deep on mechanism and protocol — useful for members who want to understand the biology behind the recommendations rather than just the recommendations themselves.
Newsletters and Substacks
Between books and podcasts, the following newsletters provide ongoing engagement with the field as new research emerges. All are free to subscribe to, with optional paid tiers.
Peter Attia's weekly newsletter extends The Drive with written pieces and subscriber Q&A. Mark Hyman's weekly newsletter covers a wide range of functional-medicine and longevity topics. Casey Means publishes a weekly Substack on metabolic health. ZOE sends regular updates from its research team on gut and nutrition science. For members who want rigorous, independent summaries of the evidence on individual nutrients and supplements, Examine.com is the best non-commercial source we know.
[PLACEHOLDER — Add Forever Well's own newsletter/Substack here once launched, plus any additional specialist sources the team wants to recommend.]
Forever Well deeper content
Members also have access to deeper Forever Well content that extends this brief in specific directions. This will grow over time as we commission new work and as the evidence shifts.
[PLACEHOLDER — Insert specific Forever Well content offerings here — expert interviews, masterclasses, deep-dive articles, recipe libraries, member Q&A formats, biomarker interpretation guides, etc. Placeholder retained until the content library is defined.]
Where the evidence changes — and it will — this brief will change with it. Members receive updates to the pillar briefs as significant new research warrants them, rather than being left with a snapshot from whenever they first subscribed.
A last word
Nutrition is a slow-feedback system. The effects of any single week are barely noticeable; the effects of a decade are enormous. The members who benefit most from Forever Well over the long run are not the ones who chase the newest finding or the loudest voice. They are the ones who build a pattern that compounds quietly, year after year, while everyone else is arguing about the latest headline. Everything in this brief has been aimed at helping you do that. We hope it has been useful.