A few reading recommendations
My favorite books that talk about love
It’s February. The month of love. And much has been said and written about love. What follows are some reading recommendations — books that deal with love — from someone who just cannot get enough of reading, exploring, knowing and speaking about love.
For those who are short on time, here are the recommendations: (1) IQ84 by Haruki Murakami; (2) The Forty Rules of Love by Elif Shafak; (3) The Anatomy of Love by Helen Fischer.
For those who can bear to read more, here is why I recommend reading these books: mainly because they talk about and deal with love. However, all three do so in different ways.
IQ84 by Haruki Murakami is by far my favourite love-story. It’s the story of a man named Tengo and a woman named Aomame. And it’s one hell of a read. As I said, it is my favourite love-story, of all I have ever read.
The Forty Rules of Love by Elif Shafak is a novel containing two stories in one — one of Ella, a housewife living in Boston, stuck in a loveless marriage; and that of Shams of Tabriz and Rumi, two scholars and friends living in the thirteenth century, whose poems of love still do not fail to strike chords with lovers after centuries have passed.
The Anatomy of Love by Helen Fischer is, unlike the previous two, non-fiction. It’s an account of how and why we fall in and out of love. It’s for those who like to have a practical view of love. Written by an anthropologist, this one studies our courting and flirting habits, compares human society with primate societies and attempts to explain why we love and why we stop loving. It’s unlike any other book I have read, and no wonder, it remains one of the most fascinating reads I have had.
That’s it. These are 3 books you might want to read before the Month of Love ends. But does it ever end?