"She has lost sixty pounds in just over six weeks! With no side effects." Li Jing knows that her research, the weight-loss compound she's developed, will change millions and millions of lives. Any risk is worth it to succeed. Unfortunately, the school board doesn't agree, and Li Jing has been expelled with a permanent black mark on her record that will keep her from ever getting a PhD… Apparently conducting unauthorized trials on human subjects is frowned upon-no matter how willing the subject was or how well the compound worked.

PEOPLE WOULD KILL TO BE THIN. Solu's luxurious celebrity-filled Cruise to Lose is billed as "the best cruise since the Titanic," and if the new diet sweetener works as promised - dropping five percent of a person's body weight in just days - it really could be the answer to the world's obesity problem. But Laurel is starting to regret accepting her friend Viv’s invitation. She's already completely embarrassed herself in front of celebrity host Tom Forelli (otherwise known as the hottest guy ever!) and she's too sick to even try the sweetener. And that's before Viv and all the other passengers start acting really strange. BUT WILL THEY DIE FOR IT, TOO? Tom Forelli knows that he should be grateful for this job and the chance to shed his childhood "Baby-Tom-Tom" image. His publicists have even set up a "romance" with a sexy reality-TV star. But as things on the ship start to get a bit wild, he finds himself drawn to a different girl. And when his celebrity hosting gig turns into an expose on the shocking side effects of Solu, it's Laurel that he's determined to save. Emmy Laybourne, author of the Monument 14 trilogy, takes readers on a dream vacation that goes first comically, then tragically, then horrifyingly wrong.