Plot

An overweight bachelor is fat, 40 and fed up--to the gills--but when his obese cousin Sal dies at 39, he must finally come to terms with his own weight problem.

Dominick DiNapoli has always been a big kid who loved eating. It was his favorite thing. Then his cousin dies from health complications due to a lack of exercise and improper diet. Antoinette, Dominick's sister, makes him promise to see a diet doctor and lose some weight. This is very hard for Dominick, but he tries. He also finds motivation when he meets Lydia, and he discovers a love that is more intense than his love of food. He spends so much time kissing and walking around with Lydia that he no longer eats as many unhealthy things, and he loses weight without even trying.—Siobhan Perricone

Being Italian-American, forty year old, never married Dominick is overweight having grown up in a world centered on food: it used as a reward, as a means to placate, as a comfort, etc. When Dom's favorite cousin, Sal, a year younger than him, passes away prematurely from health issues associated with being overweight, those around Dom, led by his overbearing sister Antoinette, implore him to take measures to lose weight so as not to face the same fate as Sal. Through all of Dom's attempts to maintain a weight loss regime, including through professional measures, the person receiving the brunt of Dom's frustrations related to this issue is his younger brother Frankie Jr., the two roommates in a separate suite in the family home. While unable to manage adhering to that weight loss regime in doing it for himself, Dom may be able to do it for someone else, that someone being Polish-American Lydia, who runs an antique store in the neighborhood, and with who he is falling in love. However, he learns he can't pin all his weight loss hopes and dreams on one person.—Huggo

Dominick DiNapoli always had an eating problem. When his overweight cousin dies of a heart attack, Dominick's brother Frankie convinces him to go on a diet. Dominick soon meets a beautiful girl named Lydia and they hit it off immediately. He must choose between his love for the girl and that of hot dogs and Chinese food, choosing the former.—Matthew Anscher <anscher@radonc.duke.edu>