Beautiful book. Should be required reading for all. ( )

"Love is a skill, not just an enthusiasm" - This is my key takeaway from this beautifully written novel.

In many passages, it felt like Alain de Botton was spying on me and writing about me. It is a simple story with profound commentary, from the modern-day philosopher Alain, that makes it a great read. We all think that we are unique, but from a therapist's point of view, we fall under specific patterns. It is nothing to be scoffed about, but many of our anxieties, frustrations and disappointments, can be well answered by the modern discipline of therapy.

A fitness coach (or therapist) can help you to be in your peak physical self. After reading this, I firmly believe, a mental coach (or a couple's therapist) can be of great help to strengthen your relationships with others and your self. ( )

Thoughts about love and marriage illustrated by the story of Rabih and Kirsten. De Bottom covers the flash of romance to the work of marriage, children, infidelity and therapy. His main message that love is not an enthusiasm but a skill. Insightful as far a it goes. Told through the eyes of Rabih, it ends some 15 years into marriage.

Wise and well written. Sometimes predictable. Overall a nice read. ( )

Rabih and Kirsten, a couple living in Scotland, fall in love, marry, and have children. The storyline follows the ups and downs of married life. The novel is a unique mix of story, philosophy, and psychology. The narrator alternates between what is currently happening in the lives of the couple and commentary about this stage in their relationship. The latter is indicated in italics. The narrator challenges romantic idealism, and the story portrays how a deeper knowledge of human behavior (and more realistic expectations) can help relationships flourish.

The writing is lively, full of insightful observations and witty asides. The tone is optimistic. The author points out that love is not something that “just happens.” It requires active commitment to sustain it. He points out underlying causes behind disagreements, many of which have to do with worldview or events that occurred long ago. It is profound in places. Though it is a novel, it could, perhaps, help people with their own relationships. I found it delightfully engaging.

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Good, kind of depressing, kind of helpful. I like the psychoanalysis of every stage of the relationship, but it doesn't make for the most compelling storyline. ( )

One of the best, if not the best, books I've read on relationships. ( )

It took me longer than expected to read this, and that might affect my view of it as being disjointed. But I certainly marked several bits as either something witty, something wise, or something I had experienced. Also, the best observation of and commentary on partners pouting and sulking. ( )

Part sweet little novel, part micro-essays and aphorisms - insightful, wise, a perfect little owner's manual for romance. ( )

This is the story of the evolution of a twenty-odd year marriage....from the first meeting of the couple until well into their parenting years. Interspersed with the story are short asides about the author's own feelings on love and behaviour in relationships. I found this disrupted the flow of the story. And the story wasn't gripping. While I agree with so many other reviewers that the writing was beautiful and the author did provide some food for thought, overall this was just a so-so read for me. ( )

"Dashuria është tema që i përputhet më së miri stilit aforistik dhe psikologjik të de Botton; në këtë roman, de Botton shpalos aftësinë e tij për të "përkthyer" në letersi shpresat, metodat dhe pasiguritë tona." "Nuk ekziston në këto kohëra asnjë shkrimtar tjetër si de Botton. Vepra e tij e fundit është po aq kthjellët dhe njerëzore sa edhe ato të mëparshmet." - The Chicago Tribune "Një roman qëmtues dhe i përshkuar nga një ndjeshmëri e kthjellët dhe aspak cinike. Mund të jetë fare mirë një kështjellë për familjen. Në qoftë se do të hiqnim emrin e autorit, ky libër do të lexohej me endje nga lexuesit e apasionuar të Milan Kundera dhe Adam Thirlëell. Autori synon të fashisë sadopak vetminë tonë- çka meriton të vlerësohet." The London Standard "Kjo nuk është një histori e rëndomtë dashurie... De Botton, mjeshtër i intriges, i rikthehet fiction-it pas njëzet vitesh dhe një numri librash të natyrave të tjera, me synimin për t'i dhënë përgjigje pyetjes çdo të thotë të jesh i martuar për një farë kohe?" Përgjigjet ndaj kesaj pyetjeje jane here plot humor, e here plot emocione...

I was hoping for a novel, but this is a philosophical treatise interspersed with tedious descriptors of a hypothetical relationship. I couldn't make it past the first 30 pages. ( )

Enjoyed this thoroughly and without rush. I'm a bit late to the party, but I love how Alain de Botton writes. I've mostly read his philosophy works, but this one is an example of how to match both worlds in a realistic, elegant way. ( )

This was the book I needed right now. I read Botton's first novel in 2009 —Essays In Love—and it was insightful, calling out issues that arose in my own relationship at the time. The novel had challenges with pacing and the protagonist was a bit too...fancy-pants for me. Regardless of that, Botton's philosophic look at a modern relationship was very helpful and unlike much else I'd read at the time. I've kept an eye on his work since.

In his return to the novel, Botton provides a stunning, insightful (and useful) look at the course of a marriage over twenty-plus years. It opened my eyes to considering different paths about how one approaches a relationship, and what is underneath the actions of another. Attachment theory, for example, is discussed near the end of the book when the fictional couple goes to counselling. Botton's insights and explanations shined a new light on the fictional couple and in turn, my own romantic relationship.

It doesn't portray perfect people - it provides a look at a better way to be. If we were a little more aware, a bit kinder and knew ourselves more, we can accept and allow our own relationships to flourish for what they are, not what we want the other person to be. It's given me a lot to think about. ( )

I was thinking: if Alain de Botton really manages to live the way he writes (or comments on the couple/family in the book) than he must be one of the most desirable partners on earth. His understanding of needs people have, combined with his ability to write it down in such a charming way, while sometimes pointing out the most uncomfortable truths - that is a rare gift. ( )

Rather than writing a book on love, de Botton thought the medium of narrative better served his insights. There’s lots of helpful, practical and insightful lessons on love here. The narrative helps but the narrator’s asides become quite preachy.

De Botton is best when talking about the reality of love — love is something we learn; love is hard; our lover is not perfect, nor are we; and therefore we need to be sympathetic toward their flaws and our own.

De Botton is confusing when speaking about sex, especially as it concerns extra marital affairs. He seems even to defend these. ( )

Een 2 voor literaire kwaliteit. Een 4 voor herkenbaarheid en inzichtelijkheid. Een boek dat ik aan veel mensen zou aanraden, hoewel ik het zelf nogal storend uitleggerig vond. Ik heb liever personages waar ik zelf wat interpretatie op mag loslaten (zoals April en Frank in Revolutionary Road, wat zo ongeveer hetzelfde verhaal vertelt). De Botton laat niet veel ruimte voor interpretatie. En naast het nogal uitleggerige verhaal - veel introspectie, weinig verhaal - met in your face personages legt hij het nog eens éxtra uit in de cursieve zijsprongetjes. Ik voel me als lezer dan niet echt serieus genomen. Anderzijds heeft hij het wel verdomd goed begrepen en kan hij het ook wel gewoon heel helder uitleggen. Als ik niet eerst Esther Perel had gelezen, was ik vast van mijn sokken geblazen van zijn inzichten. ( )

Want to fill this out later. ( )

Interesting philosphical and socilogical points to ponder, but extremely heteronormative and assumes, marriage and babies are the life path for all ( )

This book was recommended to me by a therapist who thought it might provide some points to ponder. She was correct.

The author tells the story of a couple who meet, fall in love and get married. Interspersed throughout the novel are the authors thoughts and musings on what is going on with the characters.

I particularly enjoyed the observation that what society calls “love” is only really the start of the story. That “the start” gets too much attention rather than how to sustain love throughout one’s life.

Should be required reading for all. ( )

This is a title I wanted to read because I've heard the author speak in the media over the years and always found him insightful. He did not disappoint. The book switches between the story and the author's thoughts on the particular topic, which is unusual, but it is also what makes it fiction as opposed to just essays. Which was smart because I wouldn't have read a book of essays.

I am going to take advantage of the fact that this was not an advance reader copy by leaving some quotes I particularly liked:

We would ideally remain able to laugh, in the gentlest way, when we are made the special target of a sulker's fury. We would recognize the touching paradox. The sulker may be six foot one and holding down adult employment, but the real message is poignantly retrogressive: "Deep inside, I remain an infant, and right now I need you to be my parent. I need you correctly to guess what is truly ailing me, as people did when I was a baby, when my ideas of love were first formed."

Choosing a person to marry is hence just a matter of deciding exactly what kind of suffering we want to endure rather than of assuming we have found a way to skirt the rules of emotional existence.

Regarding blame and disappointments in life:

The accusations we make of our lovers make no particular sense. We would utter such unfair things to no one else on earth. But our wild charges are a peculiar proof of intimacy and trust, a symptom of love itself- and in their own way a perverted manifestation of commitment. Whereas we can say something sensible and polite to any stranger, it is only in the presence of the lover we wholeheartedly believe in that we can dare to be extravagantly and boundlessly unreasonable.

Speaking of teaching lessons to children:

The dream is to save the child time; to pass on in one go insights that required arduous and lengthy experience to accumulate. But the progress of the human race is at every turn stymied by an ingrained resistance to being rushed to conclusions. We are held back by an inherent interest in reexploring entire chapters in the back catalogue of our species' idiocies- and to wasting a good part of life finding out for ourselves what has already been extensively and painfully charted by others.

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I am very easily charmed by Botton, okay? He's very charming. On Love was charming. The way he intersperses this story of a fictional marriage with philosophy and relationship advice is charming. And if I hadn't read Dept. of Speculation in between reading this book and reviewing it, this would probably be a very different review.

First! I really did adore this novel when I as reading it. I read it on vacation, mostly in the car, and ended up reading long sections aloud to my husband -- mostly the sections on parenting. I think it did give me some valuable insights on how couples behave in conflict, enough to be grateful that neither my husband nor I experienced any great crises in attachment as children, and to make me possibly even more invested in protecting my children from such disruptions.

But, I did read Dept. of Speculation, which made me so viscerally furious about the way our society deals with men having extramarital affairs that some was bound to spill over onto this book. And that spillover is messy and tangled. I'm not even sure that I would have wanted Rabih to do anything differently -- to tell his wife or to leave her. In fact, as I was reading, I was a little irritated at how easily Botton seemed to take monogamy as the only possible natural state for couples.

I am going to try to let it go now.

Really, this was lovely and thoughtful and realistic and charming. ( )

A quickish romp through the lives of a typical modern couple ( meet, marriage, kids, affair, keep going) interspersed with 'theory and research' insights from psychology and philosophy pertinent to the actual episode we are reading. An interesting approach and often very pertinent.

I am too far removed in age for the first parts of the book to register much more than a knowing nod. But as it progressed, it delivered more interesting insights for me. ( )

A book worth reading.

It just makes you think about what happens next and what it takes to sustain a relationship over time.

There is an insight in there that hit home. Without revealing much it discusses at some when are we really ready to get married?

I would recommend it because it is a topic that makes you think. ( )