There is no better time to combine your love of love and your love of books than in February. Love is, undoubtedly, the most written about subject so we have selected our favourite books on love. And the best thing about them? Books don’t care if you’re single, dating, married or divorced. Wherever your heart is right now, you’ll find a book that understands.
Books About Love
In & Out Of Love
Love takes work. Whether we are looking for it, trying to keep it or recovering from losing it, love – in all it’s wonderful forms – requires our attention. Susan Quilliam illustrates this brilliantly in How to Choose a Partner as she guides us through the self-development journey necessary to find the right partner for us as individuals. We tend to worry more about finding ‘The One’ than what we will do with them when we have them. Thich Nhat Hanh addresses this in How to Love and distills it to four essentials: you can only love another when you feel true love for yourself; love is understanding; understanding brings compassion; and deep listening and loving speech are key ways of showing our love. In A Manual for Heartache, Cathy Rentzenbrink describes how she learnt to live with grief and loss and find hope again. For those with a broken heart, it is a welcome reminder that they are not alone.
Records Of Love
Who doesn’t like a good love story? Essays In Love by Alain de Botton is a unique philosophical take on the classic boy meets girl narrative. Anyone who has ever been in love will enjoy the way de Botton puts words to the previously inexplicable workings of the human heart and mind. As a companion to Love Letters of Great Men (as made famous in the Sex and they City movie), comes Love Letters of Great Women, which was put together by Ursula Doyle. This collection gives us an insight into the secret hopes and loves of some of the greatest women in history. Fast forward to 21st century love in This Modern Love by Will Darbyshire. This tender and funny book compiles over 15,000 heartfelt answers from over 100 countries to some very intimate questions.
Expressions of Love
‘Roses are red, violets are blue’ is probably the first love poem we ever learn. And while it will always have a special place in our hearts, there are so many other great love poems to enjoy. The Love Poems of Rumi is a beautifully illustrated collection of Rumi’s passionate love poems, translated by Nader Khalil. The Sun and Her Flowers is Rupi Kaur’s long-awaited second collection of poems and illustrations of love, loss, trauma, healing, and femininity. Salt by Nayyirah Waheed is a journey through warmth and sharpness. It is a collection of poems that explores the realities of multiple identities, language, diasporic life and pain, the self, community, healing, celebration, and love.
