100 Books Like First Date Stories

I especially like this reader-friendly book because of its thoroughness, honesty, and wise advice. The authors are a married couple and social workers who draw from decades of experience counseling couples, leading workshops and seminars, and their marriage. I mention honesty because I'm impressed with the authors' openness, integrity, and conversational style.

Whether you're already married or hope to soon or someday, you'll probably benefit from how Linda and Charlie freely share knowledge gained from their successes and some embarrassing mistakes they've survived and corrected during their fifty-year, fulfilling marriage. Their commitment to growing as individuals and as a couple can be contagious, so check out this book and be prepared to stretch!

I like how author Susan Page gets to the heart of why terrific women who say they want marriage continue to stay single and what they can do about it. Hidden ambivalence is a powerful internal conflict. The author explains how unconscious marriage fears can prevent us from moving forward.

For a long time, I acted out my unconscious ambivalence by finding "warts" or shortcomings in men who wanted a serious relationship. So I can relate to hidden ambivalence as a reason many marriage-minded women stay single.

Susan Page gives many examples of ways people express their ambivalence. I agree with her that living together with no plan to marry is one example, and I admire this author for stating this now that this lifestyle has become so common. Awareness is the first step toward change. This book fosters self-awareness and empowers us to move past what's getting in our… show more.

This book can help many communication-challenged couples. It offers specific guidance on how to talk about topics for partners to address to foster long-term happiness. Couples who are dating and not yet committed will learn if deal-breakers exist by having conversations about whether they want children, what fidelity means to them, whether they're likely to support each other's goals and dreams, and more.

I strongly agree with the authors' ideas about addressing conflict with the goal of understanding rather than winning, making your relationship your top priority to succeed in marriage, and having fun together.

Many happily married people implement the ideas naturally without following the Eight Dates formula. However, as a couples therapist, I know that many will benefit from having the kinds of conversations the authors prescribe. I'm recommending this book to couples in my practice.

I like this book because the author shares her story of transforming a heartbreaking broken engagement into enhanced self-understanding and a happy marriage. The book is easy to read. As the title suggests, if a woman loves herself before entering a relationship, she'll choose wisely instead of marrying someone who's not right for her to prove she deserves love.

I'm impressed by the author's affirmation of serendipity, willingness to be open to the unexpected. Christine used to think her future marriage partner should have traits like her ex-fiancé had: average height, a full head of hair, and professional occupation.

Before she felt ready for another serious relationship, Christine writes that she started dating a man who was bald, very tall, and seemed to lack ambition. She found him fun, comfortable, and with excellent character traits. Christine married him.

A wonderful and slightly maddening memoir, this (it’s nonfiction, Jim, but not as we know it). Bayley survived her childhood by absorbing books. She evokes the worlds of David Copperfield, Jane Eyre, and everything Agatha Christie ever wrote, by ventriloquising and interweaving the voices of those stories with the story of her own parental neglect, thereby insisting, if dreamily, that the boundaries between her reliable book-land and her unstable real-life-land will remain blurred. It’s only slightly maddening (I did much the same as a child; part of me will always be Katie tumbling out of the swing). The book’s deliberate ambiguities suggest that Bayley is claiming sanctuary, reserving the right not to divulge what is still too unbearable to relate, and why shouldn’t she? It’s an amazingly honest, touching book.

GQ writer Flynn and his wife and two kids are minding their own business on their surburban Durham “faux farm” when a friend calls to ask if they want to add a peacock to the two chickens that wander their yard. They end up with three of the kaleidoscopic birds, and Flynn’s chronicle of the family’s first year with Carl, Ethel, and Mr. Pickle takes readers on an implausibly relatable journey from the bird’s place in history, culture, and myth through its evolutionary biology and breeding habits to its endangered status in the wild, offering sardonically hilarious and harrowingly poignant life lessons along the way.

When I was in graduate school, I watched the movie Awakenings with Robin Williams playing the role of Dr. Oliver Sacks. Having really enjoyed the movie, I went to a bookstore and picked this book up and could not put it down.

Sacks, more than any author I have read, captures the perspectives, struggles, triumphs, feelings, and diversity of people dealing with various psychological and neurological conditions.

At the time, studying psychology, I was reading books, listening to lectures, and watching videos about effective listening practices. Sacks made me understand seeing the person—observing and identifying subtleties, idiosyncrasies, and proclivities—was part of being an effective observer and that listening was only possible if we use our eyes as well. 

This is a revelatory, timely book that details the afterlives of the numerous discarded and recycled objects from around the world. It gave me great insights into where stuff goes once we decide that these are things that we no longer need or want and who are the people and the places who find value in what we leave behind. 

Since I taught school for thirty-one years, this book was especially fascinating to me because it involved two young teachers spending their summer in 1943 working on a production line at a San Diego bomber plant. It enlightened me significantly on how difficult it often was for women during that time to be accepted in what was usually an exclusively male world of work.

Platinga is a sergeant with the San Francisco police department. I love his book because so many of the stories are similar to ones that I experienced as a cop. It brought back some good and some not-so-good memories.

You don’t have to be a cop or a former cop to love the read, though. It’s not only a great reference book for crime writers who want to learn and add authenticity to what they’re writing but also a wonderful read for those who want to take a wild ride inside a cop’s head during the course of their tour of duty.