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I can't believe I read the whole thing....

The book could be summed up in a single chapter. (Or... an Atlantic essay...?) Or with this sentence "Stop being superficial."

It's not that I don't think Lori Gottlieb has something of a point. I imagine that there is a small subset of women who are truly so picky that they judge guys as quickly as characters on Sex and the City, yet also do want a long-term life partnership. This small subset of women do need to hear that their pickiness is completely unrealistic and preventing them from finding the partnerships that they are seeking. But I also believe that the phenomenon is nowhere near as widespread of an issue as the author seems to think, though it is probably disproportionally prevalent in the subset of people who are single and never married at the age of 40 (which is really not that large of a group to pull from in the first place).

However, since I am under 30, and have been in a long-term partnership for nearing a decade, I realize that I am nowhere in the obvious audience for this book and simply couldn't understand the mindset of Gotlieb as she complains (and complains and complains) through every chapter about being alone. I was baffled that she needed so many relationship coaches, and professional matchmakers, and psychology professors, telling her the same thing over and over and over again and it still wouldn't sink in.

I was absolutely flabbergasted to hear the women profiled in the book being so picky about superficial physical characteristics (really, they wouldn't consider dating someone under 5'10"? Women care about that? They wouldn't date someone because he was bald? REALLY?). Perhaps in a way I prove her thesis correct, since I am not an overly picky person and happily committed to the first great guy who came along who was compatible with me (even though he is the same height as me and losing his hair). But that still didn't make me want to read the same whiny chapter rewritten 10 times.

Also, the author clearly doesn't know a thing about feminism if she conflates her snobbery and superficiality with feminism, i.e. How Feminism Ruined My Love Life. That chapter title alone made me want to throw this book in the dumpster.

In short, I would only recommend this book to a woman with insanely poor taste in dating partners, who is superficial and needs to be beaten over the head repeatedly in order to learn a simple lesson. For the rest of us, Lori Gottlieb's original essay in the Atlantic, from which this book originated, is quite more than enough on the subject.