Reading List: V-day Breakup Books

Go on, you might as well eat it all.

Valentine’s Day has a sinister superpower: to make almost everyone feel stressed out about their love life. If you’re in a relationship, it poisons you with the artificially inflated expectations depicted in jewelry-store commercials and Hallmark ads; if you’re not in one, it gives you the (deeply mistaken) impression that the rest of the planet is one gigantic Noah’s Love Ark of blissfully paired-off soulmates. But shittiest of all may be if you were recently in a relationship and reasonably expected to be celebrating V-Day with someone, only to be blindsided at the last minute. If that’s your situation this year, don’t despair! Whether you want to be distracted from your drama or sniffle through a heartwarming reminder that love is real, we’ve got just the book for you.  You can buy one, two, or all of them using the nifty carousel at the bottom of the page.

If you want to experience the healing power of cruel, mocking laughter…

I Don’t Care About Your Band: What I Learned from Indie Rockers, Trust Funders, Pornographers, Felons, Faux-Sensitive Hipsters, and Other Guys I’ve Dated, by Julie Klausner

Savage mockery is the best breakup medicine, and unlucky-in-love comedienne Julie Klausner presents an astonishing history of her unfortunate hookups for your amusement. From her tweenage sexual awakenings to a decade-long parade of losers through her promiscuous twenties, Klausner mercilessly recounts her most awkward, embarrassing, and enraging encounters with the opposite sex. One minute you’ll be nodding along eagerly, and the next, you’ll be thinking, “Whoa, at least mine wasn’t THAT bad.” Warning: though you’ll be tempted, don’t binge-read this in one sitting, lest you become overwhelmed by her penis gallery and convinced that every male on the planet is a heartless, perverted, creepy man-child.

If you want a little reminder that it could have been worse…

My Boyfriend Wrote a Book About Me, Hilary Winston

Have some wine. Have some more wine. You’ll feel better.

So I thought I had it pretty rough the year that my vengeful ex-boyfriend (of just a few months, mind you) went onstage at Dan Savage’s Valentine’s Day Bash to rant about me in front of a live audience and destroy a gift I’d given him. But hey, at least he didn’t write a venomous, thinly veiled “novel” about me and call me “the fat-assed girlfriend”! TV writer Hilary Winston (Community, My Name Is Earl) describes the mortifying experience of being unflatteringly portrayed in her ex’s revenge novel, among other romantic misadventures. Read her stories and breathe a sigh of relief that you remembered to grab the naked pictures when you left your ex’s place. You did remember, right?

If you want to wallow in schadenfreude (hey, at least a breakup means you dated someone)…

Never Have I Ever: My Life (So Far) Without a Date, Katie Heaney

All right, all right, I don’t mean to hate on those who, for whatever reason, have never been in a relationship. But it is kind of a rite of passage to be put through the wringer a few times in your teens and twenties by young, ill-advised love. Katie Heaney, however, has made it to age 25 without having a boyfriend, dating someone, or even hooking up (that is what the kids do now, right?). The book’s casual, conversational style will make you feel like your funny, good-humored friend came over to cheer you up with some self-deprecating war stories from the single world. And her tales of childhood crushes on Jonathan Taylor Thomas will ring true for more than a few of us (cough).

One scoop or seven?

If you want some reassurance that you’re not a hideous monster…

It’s Not You: 27 (Wrong) Reasons You’re Single, Sara Eckel

As a single woman, it’s easy to put the blame on yourself, and internalize society’s well-worn truisms about why you’re single: you’re “too picky,” you “don’t put yourself out there,” you have “low self-esteem,” you act “too desperate.” WHATEVER. Sara Eckel (author of the Modern Love column) goes through these bogus stereotypes one by one, debunking them and sharing stories from her own personal experience. She encourages women to put the focus on everything that’s right in their lives, instead of everything that’s wrong. Through interviews, scientific research, and thoughtful exploration, she concludes that there’s no one reason that you’re single — you just are, and that’s OK. Read an interview with the author here.

If you want some tear-jerkingly wise and sweet advice…

Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Dear Sugar, Cheryl Strayed

Here’s another book by a love-advice columnist. Cheryl Strayed is the formerly anonymous writer behind “Dear Sugar”; you may recognize her name from her own personal memoir, Wild. This compilation of her columns is sure to make just about anyone cry, and I mean that in a good way. It’s intensely sincere without being cheesy; rather than dismissing letter writers with chipper platitudes, she listens deeply, acknowledges their pain, and embraces them warmly and genuinely through her empathetic words — then pushes them to break free from their emotional and psychological confinement. Definitely don’t read this in public, or you will be that weirdo weeping into your sandwich at Subway.

If you want to cry like a baby over someone else’s tragic love story…

Love Is a Mix Tape: Life and Loss, One Song at a Time, by Rob Sheffield

Here, take some. It’ll be OK.

But hey, maybe you don’t WANT to confront your emotional issues or analyze your own singledom this Valentine’s Day. Maybe you just want to wallow in the beautiful tragedy of someone else’s sad love story. For that, you’ll want Love Is a Mix Tape. Rob Sheffield is a music critic, and fittingly enough, it was music that brought him — a socially awkward music geek — and his outgoing, impulsive, punk-rock wife Renee together. They met in grad school, grew up together, and got married, forging a strong bond from their diverse and deep love of music. Then, one day, Renee suddenly collapsed, dying instantly of a pulmonary embolism, and Rob’s life imploded. He structures his story with “mix tapes,” a nod to the many homemade compilations the couple created for all sorts of moods and occasions, and as he writes about their shared life, he realizes that some songs are too painful to ever listen to again. Go ahead, get all those tears out, you’ll feel better.