Books like The Love Prescription — picked by fans

This bestselling classic book is designed especially for happy, newlywed or otherwise newly committed couples to teach them research-based communication and problem-solving skills, how to address “hidden” or broader issues like power and control, closeness and caring, respect and recognition, integrity, commitment, trust, and acceptance, which fuel specific conflicts around money, sex, childrearing, housework, in-laws, and others. 

It also provides tips on increasing fun, friendship, and intimacy. Based on the authors’ decades of testing the Prevention and Relationship Enhancement Program (PREP©), it provides a simple guide to essential ideas and skills that maintain a healthy marriage – skills that many people do not learn in their families growing up. 

I trained with Drs. Markman and Stanley way back in the 90s and brought PREP to NYU Medical Center and ran many couple workshops, and I’ve seen how effective these relationship tools can be for happy couples eager to… show more.

Dr. Fishbane is a clinical psychologist and couple therapist, and one of the most important clinical theorists in our field. 

She spent years amassing the emerging research on the social determinants of brain development and developed a practical approach to what she calls “neuroeducation” for couples – helping partners understand the neurophysiological underpinnings and effects of marital conflict, how partners regulate each other’s emotions, and how to manage one’s negative arousal to engage in loving, compassionate relationships. 

Although written for therapists, it is highly engaging and accessible for the general reader who seeks to understand why they become so distressed during conflict with their partners and how to manage their arousal for better communication.

The field of couple and family therapy started in the 1950s and led to several important, competing clinical theories for helping families and couples. 

However, those of us in the field regarded the introduction of systemic thinking as more than just a new therapeutic modality – we heralded it as a potential revolution in understanding and treating psychological and psychiatric issues. 

In systems theory, an individual’s emotional struggles and problematic behavior are viewed as due not only to “intrapsychic” conflicts, deficits in learning emotional- and behavioral-coping skills, and brain biology, but may affect and be affected by patterns of interaction in their intimate couple and family relationships. 

For instance, a partner’s depression may be in part caused by marital conflict and may serve to keep the other partner in the marriage (because he or she doesn’t want to abandon their depressed partner); likewise, a child’s misbehavior may redirect the parents’… show more.

Dr. Doherty, a Professor in the Department of Family Social Science and Director of the Citizen Professional Center at the University of Minnesota has long been a voice for questioning the manner in which the psychotherapy field avoids the moral/ethical issues presented by our clients. 

Some of these ethical issues are presented directly by clients; others maybe be unacknowledged by them, such as the moral issues around whether to engage in a secret affair or to withhold important information from partners, friends, or business associates in order to attain personal gain. 

From Freud onward, psychotherapists have been trained to adopt a stance of ethical neutrality, with an emphasis on maximizing the client’s individual happiness, even if this means pursuing goals that may negatively affect the lives of those with whom they have important relationships. 

This emphasis on personal happiness above all else draws upon the larger Western Eurocentric emphasis on… show more.

Jay, a selfish, self-absorbed screenwriter, reflects on his failings as a lover, husband, and friend on the eve of leaving his wife and children. From the way Jay describes his marriage and his approach to fatherhood, it’s clear he’s more than willing to throw his comfortable life away and damage three innocent people for no other reason than he’s bored, shallow, and desperate to blame his incompetency on those closest to him. What keeps the reader engaged is how painfully funny it all is – Jay’s obliviousness provides ample opportunity for mature audiences to chuckle and shake their heads at every meanspirited quip he makes at his family’s expense. By the end of the book, readers can only feel relief that he’s done them an incredible, and long overdue, service.

Penetrating? Secret Society? Pick Up Artists? Okay you’re going to have to trust me, that despite its nebulous reputation Strauss’ voyage into the underworld of the “pua” community has some merits. Firstly, it’s a fantastically funny, twisted story. Secondly, whilst every “technique” the book advocates to hone your seduction skills is squarely on the side of skeezy, just the idea that you can learn skills for dating is cool. It gripped me 15 years ago, and started me on my quest in the dating industry. 

Like some other powerhouse books I’ve read, it would take hours to fully discuss the brilliant storytelling, the compelling characters, the descriptions that have you smelling the damp earth, and to truly explain the awe I felt when reading this book.

When I say, “I’ve never read anything like this,” I usually mean that wowed me this much or that one aspect was unique or clingy. In this case, I mean it in every sense. It was chewy and raw and rare, unique and visceral, sumptuous and dark, devastating and lyrical.

Dealing with illness in magical realism is something I’m familiar with, clearly. To see it being handled in the way Sue Rainsford does is spine-tingling and refreshing, if one can call a book so guttural as this one such.

This is a pen pals turned to best friends turned to enemies turned to lovers story. And no one could write this mess better than Penelope Douglas. Punk 57 follows the friendship of two kids who only talk through letters until Misha transfers to Ryen’s school and discovers she’s nothing like in the letters. You can blame the hormones, but this book has the same amount of angst as it has of pure goodness.

Aiden and Vanessa’s story is another slow burn, but it does not feel slow at all. Zapata has a way of building a sensual story that makes you want more without feeling as if you are missing something. I did not think I would like slow-burn romances until I came across Zapata. I fell in love with these characters as they were becoming friends and ultimately as they fell in love with one another. I found myself smiling a lot watching the interactions between these two. It’s magic. I still think of Aiden often and wish he were my boyfriend! (That is how much I liked him).

This is my favorite of Kelly’s Regency novels.

It is a quiet, warm, gentle, and yearning novel, about a broken war veteran and the woman who comes to love him. While it is years since I read it, it occupies a special corner of my heart which I touch, every so often, simply to know and feel the warmth it still gives off in my memory.