The Blue Zones Solution; Eating and Living like the World's Healthiest People, by Dan Buettner - book review: Blue-zone thinking for a long and healthy existence

The gist of the thing is on page 10 - eat well, stress less, move more, and love more

It's always handy when self-help books have those neat little bullet points at the end of chapters that sum the whole thing up, thereby enabling you to avoid the boring case studies. Well, The Blue Zones Solution is really good on that front. It's a book about those five parts of the world where more people live to be 100 than anywhere else, and has a number of useful tips so that you can too. Actually, this is the third book that Dan Buettner has squeezed out of his research first published a decade ago in National Geographic on the Blue Zones; they're the gift that keeps on giving.

The new take here is how to get other, less blessed communities to adopt the Blue Zones way of life: you set up communal walking groups, urge everyone to use a bike, cut down on evil fizzy drinks and nag people to give up smoking. Actually, the gist of the thing is on page 10; Eat well, stress less, move more and love more. See? Simple!

You expect Japan to feature and, yep, Okinawa has the world's longest lived women. Actually, Japanese old ladies are practically immortal; but these ones are especially tenacious. It's not so much their fish consumption as sweet potatoes, turmeric and seaweed, and next to no meat and dairy. For men, the highest proportions of centenarian men are in Sardinia – they're at the heart of the community, village elders, and their relations never put them in nursing homes.

One of them brags that he has sex every Sunday. Icaria in Greece has the lowest rate of middle-age mortality and of dementia. California's Loma Linda is a bit weird, being in the US where the food industry is out to kill you, but these are in fact Seventh-day Adventists, who live longer than most. The second highest concentration of male centenarians is in Costa Rica's Nicoya Peninsula, where they're big on beans and beans are superfood.

To be frank, the findings aren't that new. We've all taken on board that stress is bad and sleep is good and you're better off in the heart of the family than in a nursing home. Just try getting Brits to look after their own parents.

If you want top tips, here they are: breakfast like a king; cook at home; stop eating before you're full; go without food occasionally; eat with friends and family; eat mostly plants; retreat from meat; cut down on dairy; slash sugar; snack on nuts and eat beans. There's a bit more to it than that, but follow these simple rules and, friends, that telegraph from the Queen could be yours. Personally, I have other plans.