February shines a spotlight on love thanks to Valentine’s Day—but real relationships are far more complex than cards and chocolates can convey.
The nonfiction titles highlighted here explore love in all its forms—romantic partnerships, friendship, family, sexuality, boundaries, and self-understanding.
Blending science, psychology, personal stories, and cultural insight, these books available with your Livingston Library card, take an honest look at how we connect, why relationships can be challenging, and how we can build more meaningful bonds. Whether you’re navigating love, redefining it, or simply curious about how relationships work, these reads offer thoughtful perspectives that last well beyond February.
The Ace and Aro Relationship Guide : Making it Work in Friendship, Love and Sex by Cody Daigle-Orians
This empowering guide addresses the questions many ace and aro people grapple with—how to communicate identity, set boundaries around intimacy, and pursue relationships without compromise. Covering friendships, dating, and partnerships of all kinds, it encourages readers to live authentically, challenge limiting assumptions, and build connections that honor who they are.
Bonded by Evolution : The New Science of Finding and Keeping Love by Paul W. Eastwick
A groundbreaking look at the science of attraction and compatibility, challenging our most fundamental assumptions about how human mating evolved–to demonstrate the real keys to romantic attachment.
Connect : Building Exceptional Relationships With Family, Friends, And Colleagues by David L. Bradford
A transformative guide to building more fulfilling relationships with colleagues, friends, partners, and family, based on the landmark Interpersonal Dynamics (“Touchy-Feely”) course at Stanford’s Graduate School of Business. Through stories of people navigating tricky moments in relationships, we see the six hallmarks of an exceptional relationship in action: authenticity, vulnerability, honesty, a willingness to ask for and offer help, a shared commitment to growth, and an ability to deal productively with conflict.
Conversations On Love : Lovers, Strangers, Parents, Friends, Endings, Beginnings by Natasha Lunn
Interweaving personal essays and revealing interviews with some of the most sought-after experts on love, journalist Lunn guides us through the paradoxical heart of three key questions about love–How do we find love? How do we sustain it? And how do we survive when we lose it?
Deep Listening : Transform your Relationships with Family, Friends, and Foes by Emily Kasriel
This book explores the power of Deep Listening and how moving beyond surface-level conversations can strengthen relationships, improve leadership, and bridge divides. Drawing on research, real-world stories, and an accessible eight-step approach, Kasriel offers practical tools for listening with empathy—even in moments of disagreement—and building more meaningful connections at home, work, and in the wider community.
8 Rules Of Love : How To Find It, Keep It, And Let It Go by Jay Shetty
Inspired by Vedic wisdom and modern science, Shetty tackles the entire relationship cycle, from first dates to moving in together to breaking up and starting over. He lays out specific, actionable steps to help you develop the skills to practice and nurture love better than ever before.
The End of Love by Tamara Tenenbaum
Both an autobiography and a feminist manifesto about how we understand romantic love today, and how the contradictions of inherited traditions and technology affect the way we build relationships.
How to Love Better by Pueblo Yung
Pueblo explores how self-awareness and self-love are the foundation of healthier relationships. Through reflections on communication, attachment, heartbreak, and healing, he shows how looking inward can help us meet others with compassion rather than judgment. Blending poetry, personal insight, and practical wisdom, this book offers guidance for deepening connections at every stage of a relationship.
The Intimate Animal : The Science of Sex, Fidelity, and Why We Live and Die for Love by Justin R. Garcia
Garcia explores why we love the way we do, drawing on evolutionary science to unpack attraction, intimacy, fidelity, and long-term commitment. Tracing the arc of romantic relationships—from first spark to lasting devotion—this research-based guide offers insight into modern dating, monogamy, and how to build deeper, more fulfilling connections.
It Begins With You: The 9 Hard Truths About Love That Will Change Your Life by Jillian Turecki
The host of the top relationship podcast Jillian on Love reveals nine core truths about love and self-acceptance and provides … self-healing techniques and strategies to help us repair our relationship with ourselves and start building the rewarding [romantic] relationships we deserve.
The Lonely Hunter : How Our Search For Love Is Broken by Aimee Lutkin
Chock-full of razor-sharp observations and poignant moments of vulnerability, this is a stirring account of one woman’s experience of being alone and a revealing exposé of our culture’s deep biases against the uncoupled.
Love After 50 : How To Find It, Enjoy It, And Keep It by Francine Russo
Full of real people’s stories (including the author’s), with vivid examples of couples who have overcome their pasts to form healthy and nurturing partnerships. Russo interviewed the best experts in the field and dozens of couples to help show the way and includes plenty of practical advice.
The Love Language that Matters Most : How to Personalize Love So They Really Feel It by Gary C. Chapman
This book expands on the concept of the five love languages by examining how individuals express and interpret affection in different ways. The authors introduce the idea of “dialects” within each love language, emphasizing how personal variations can affect communication and emotional connection in relationships. Drawing on examples from a range of personal relationships, including romantic partnerships, families, and friendships, the book explores common challenges in expressing care and understanding. It offers guidance on identifying and responding to individual preferences in emotional communication, with the goal of improving interpersonal relationships.
The Love Prescription : Seven Days To More Intimacy, Connection, And Joy by John Mordechai Gottman
The authors’ decades of research have revealed that a great relationship is founded on the small stuff. The book distills the data they have gathered over the past fifty years on more than three thousand couples (everything from their body language to the way they converse to their heart rates and stress hormone levels) into a seven-day action plan to transform your relationship.
Plays Well With Others : The Surprising Science Behind Why Everything You Know About Relationships is (Mostly) Wrong by Eric Barker
Self-help blogger Barker begins by stressing the importance of first impressions and how people are perceived. In part two, Barker emphasizes the significance of friendships and how they differ in quality and change over time and as we age. Building on that, he emphasizes friendship in romantic relationships, which leads up to part three, which explores love and marriage; part four explores the benefits and pitfalls of loneliness.
Romances & Practicalities : A Love Story (Maybe Yours!) in 250 Questions by Lindsay Jill Roth
Blending personal storytelling with research-backed insight, this book offers 250 thoughtful questions designed to help couples move beyond chemistry and build real compatibility. From money and career to family, sex, and long-term goals, Roth provides a smart, engaging framework for sparking honest conversations and creating deeper, more practical—and still romantic—relationships.
Somehow: Thoughts on Love by Anne Lamott
Lamott reflects on love as a guiding force in our lives—messy, surprising, and essential. Drawing from personal experience, she explores love in its many forms, from family and community to partnership later in life, offering compassionate, humorous insights on how love sustains us even in uncertain times.
Understanding your Attachment Style : The Path to Overcoming Unhelpful Patterns and Building Healthy, Secure Relationships by Marc Cameron
This book helps readers identify their attachment patterns and shows how these habits affect relationships. Offering practical guidance, it teaches strategies to overcome unhelpful patterns and build healthier, more secure connections with partners, friends, and family.
Who Deserves Your Love : How to Create Boundaries to Start, Strengthen, or End any Relationship by K. C. Davis
This is a compassionate and practical guide to evaluating and managing your relationships-romantic, platonic, or otherwise. Drawing from her experience as a therapist, Davis helps readers identify which relationships are healthy and worth nurturing, and which may be harmful. She addresses difficult topics like conditional love, emotional boundaries, and when to step away from someone-even if they’re trying their best.
Why We Click : The Emerging Science of Interpersonal Synchrony by Kate Murphy
Murphy explores the science of interpersonal synchrony—how humans naturally “sync” with one another in movement, emotion, and even physiology. Drawing on research, stories, and real-world examples, she shows how this invisible rhythm shapes connections, influences behavior, and explains why we instantly click—or clash—with others.
—Archana Chiplunkar, Adult Services & Acquisitions Librarian