Books › Everything I Know About Love
Everything I Know About Love
384 pages
A chaotic, fiercely funny, and ultimately tender love letter to the messy reality of growing up and the enduring power of female friendship.
What it feels like
Reading this feels like sitting on a bathroom floor at two in the morning with your funniest, most chaotic, and deeply wise best friend. The pace is brisk and episodic, pulling you through a whirlwind of disastrous dates, drunken misadventures, and the sharp growing pains of early adulthood. It balances a wry, self-deprecating tone with moments of profound, heart-stopping earnestness. The atmosphere shifts from the glittery, frantic energy of a London house party to the quiet, bittersweet realization that romantic love is not the only kind that saves you. Written in sharp, conversational prose that feels both intimately confessional and universally recognizable, it is a perfect companion for anyone navigating the messy transition into their late twenties who needs reminding that they are already enough.
- Mood
- nostalgic
- chaotic
- warm
- bittersweet
- Tone
- wry
- self-deprecating
- earnest
- confessional
- witty
- Pace
- brisk
- Themes
- female friendship · coming of age · millennial anxiety · the myth of romantic salvation · self-acceptance
- The writing
- Conversational, sharp, and intimately journalistic, blending laugh-out-loud anecdotes with tender, lyrical reflections.
- The arc
- Moves from the frantic, validation-seeking chaos of early twenties to a grounded, deeply felt appreciation for platonic love and self-worth.
- Who it's for
- Women navigating the messy transition into adulthood who crave a fiercely honest, older-sister figure to validate their struggles.
Content notes
- eating disorders
- alcohol abuse
- grief
- toxic relationships
About the book
The wildly funny, occasionally heartbreaking internationally bestselling memoir about growing up, growing older, and learning to navigate friendships, jobs, loss, and love along the ride
When it comes to the trials and triumphs of becoming an adult, journalist and former Sunday Times columnist Dolly Alderton has seen and tried it all. In her memoir, she vividly recounts falling in love, finding a job, getting drunk, getting dumped, realizing that Ivan from the corner shop might just be the only reliable man in her life, and that absolutely no one can ever compare to her best girlfriends. Everything I Know About Love is about bad dates, good friends and—above all else— realizing that you are enough.
Glittering with wit and insight, heart and humor, Dolly Alderton’s unforgettable debut weaves together personal stories, satirical observations, a series of lists, recipes, and other vignettes that will strike a chord of recognition with women of every age—making you want to pick up the phone and tell your best friends all about it. Like Bridget Jones’ Diary but all true, Everything I Know About Love is about the struggles of early adulthood in all its terrifying and hopeful uncertainty.
Description from Open Library.
Books like Everything I Know About Love
See why they match
Good MaterialDolly AldertonA sharply funny, achingly relatable autopsy of a millennial breakup that feels like venting to your smartest, messiest friend at a pub.
Big FriendshipAminatou Sow and Ann FriedmanA rigorous, big-hearted love letter to the messy, essential work of keeping your best friends close.
Conversations With FriendsSally RooneyA sharp, hyper-observant dive into the messy, overlapping boundaries of friendship, lust, and intellectual posturing.
How to be a womanCaitlin MoranA riotous, unapologetic manifesto disguised as a memoir that makes you laugh out loud while dismantling the patriarchy.
Maybe You Should Talk to SomeoneLori GottliebA warm, witty, and profoundly human look in the mirror that makes you feel a little less alone in your messiness.
Three WomenLisa TaddeoAn intensely intimate, voyeuristic deep-dive into the raw and often destructive nature of female desire.