I prefer to stay away from any diets as some of them go bit too extreme and might even have too low level of nutrition, but then again I don't know too much of Paleo, but at least according to this page it seems not to have big problems at least and it looks quite effective:Is anyone else doing Paleo? I lost quite a bit of weight, yes even being in post-menopause (TMI?). But that was before my mom died. I'm a comfort food eater. Gained it all back. But the diet is one of the best I've ever been on. Easy to lose weight without ever being hungry. It's basically a high fat, mod protein, low carb diet. I'm trying to find the motivation to get back in the swing of it. Tomorrow is mom's birthday and it'll be hard for me.
http://authoritynutrition.com/5-studies-on-the-paleo-diet/
Then again, some articles are pointing out at least some problems with nutrition, but they really don't show much of references for their claims:
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-paleo-diet-half-baked-how-hunter-gatherer-really-eat/
Fiber, protein and fat reduces hunger, I think it was around 20-30 grams of carbs that should be low limit and around 1000 calories for girls, staying within reasonable range I think any diet will be okay if one gets all vitamins and proper nutrition.
I have read some studies about high fat diets and they can loose weight faster during first 3 to 6 months, after 12 months weight loss rate tends to even out according to many studies.
Paleo is hugely popular, if it would be horribly wrong, I would think there would be news about that, so it must do something right for sure, so I don't really have much of opinion about it to one way or another, just generally I prefer to know for sure what I really eat and what I need, so I use my scale and spreadsheet to keep tabs on what is going on with my eating, also it helps me to change my eating to be part of new way of living, which is eating healthier, moving more and keeping better care of myself.
I would think that if Paleo helps you, just do it, but also I would think that most of these diet around are such that they are perhaps not diets to follow rest of life, more like having few months of dieting and then eating by recommendations for some time, that way there would not be missing nutritional bits.