Casey Johnston's A PHYSICAL EDUCATION In Store Discussion And Book Signing

Join us at 7:00 PM on Tuesday, May 13 when Casey Johnston comes to the the store to share her deeply personal memoir A Physical Education: How I Escaped Diet Culture and Gained the Power of Lifting . Casey will be joined in conversation by Alexis Madrigal and will sign copies of her book after the presentation.

“This book performs power from the inside out. Where Casey Johnston takes her body, there is joy, release, revelation.”—Lidia Yuknavitch, author of The Chronology of Water and Reading the Waves

In A Physical Education, Casey Johnston recounts how she ventured into the brave new world of weightlifting, leaving behind years of restrictive eating and endless cardio. Woven through the trajectory of how she rebuilt her strength and confidence is a staggering exposé of the damaging doctrine spread by diet and fitness culture.

Johnston's story dives deep into her own past relationships with calorie restriction, exercise, and codependency. As she progresses on her weightlifting journey, she begins to eat to fuel her growing strength—and her food cravings vanish. Her physical progress fuels a growing understanding of how mainstream messaging she received about women’s bodies was about preserving the status quo. Previously convinced that physical improvement was a matter of suffering, she now knows it requires self-regard and patience. A little pushing at a time adds up to the reawakening of parts of herself she didn’t even know were there.

A Physical Education asks why so many of us spend our lives trying to get "healthy” by actively making our bodies weaker. Casey Johnston is a voice for those of us who feel underdeveloped and unfulfilled in our bodies and are looking to come home to ourselves.

CASEY JOHNSTON is an American writer and editor. She has written the fitness advice column “Ask a Swole Woman” for multiple outlets since 2016 and a newsletter about weightlifting, She’s a Beast, since 2021.

ALEXIS MADRIGAL is an Oakland based journalist, the co-host of KQED’s current affairs show, Forum, and a contributing writer at The Atlantic. Previously, he was the editor-in-chief of Fusion and a staff writer at Wired. His latest book, The Pacific Circuit, came out in March 2025. He is the proprietor of the Oakland Garden Club, a newsletter for people who like to think about plants. Madrigal authored the book Powering the Dream: The History and Promise of Green Technology. He's been a visiting scholar at UC Berkeley’s Information School and UC Berkeley's Center for the Study of Technology, Science, and Medicine as well as an affiliate with Harvard's Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society.

THIS EVENT is free but registration is requested. Registration ends at 6:00 pm on May 13.

BECAUSE SEATING is limited, please register only if you plan to attend.

DUE TO SPACE limitations, we may not be able to accommodate every person at an event, so early registration is encouraged.

WALK-INS will be accommodated only if space allows.

WE ASK that attendees arrive between 6:45 and 7:00 PM for the event.

PLEASE leave your non-support companion animals at home.

OUR shared restrooms are not accessible after 6:30 PM, please plan accordingly.

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