Today I’m joining the blog tour for Stoic In Love. My review is written with thanks to Anne Cater for inviting me on the tour and to the publisher for my copy of the book.

Blurb:

You’re on date #17 since your last relationship ended in flames, and within a nanosecond of meeting Doug at a bar you realise you’ve made a huge mistake. You head to the bathroom to text your mate Lizzy and complain about how your date says aaaahh after every sip of beer, seems to style himself after Donald Trump, and definitely sniffed your hair. Ten seconds later, you realise you accidentally texted this to Doug. You sit frozen on the loo, wondering if there’s a back exit, or if you should fake your own death.

The philosophy of the Stoics can help us all navigate the life cycles of love, whether it’s dating someone wearing horns and a kaftan, a relationship where blobs of toothpaste are left smeared in the bathroom sink, or being dumped via text with just one word – enough! Across 45 rules, from dating tips like Do your due diligence to relationship advice like Don’t tell your partner to calm down to break-up wisdoms like Resist putting your foot in your mouth, Annie Lawson applies ancient wisdom to the modern world of being in love, out of love, lovesick, love-bombed or just love-tired.

Romance and its rocky pursuit often sucks but, fortunately, not always, and Stoic in Love helps us realise that we can all use a little help getting together, staying together, or moving on.

Review:

I come to Stoic In Love as a person who is chronically unlucky in love and I was intrigued to see what the stoic approach would look like. This is the first book I’ve read by this author, so I was unfamiliar with the previous book in the series and the format and style that she uses. Stoic In Love is relatively short and it’s split into smaller sections which are very easy to read. 

Stoic In Love is clearly intended as a lighthearted humorous book, and it achieves this purpose very well. Annie Lawson writes in a quite conversational way, and this allows the reader to feel as though they are not alone and allows her humour to shine through the pages. I really enjoyed her dating and relationship anecdotes and observations, which frequently made me laugh. The illustrations at the beginning of each section are also wonderful and raised several smiles.

My unfamiliarity with Annie Lawson’s work also extends to the stoic principles, and although I appreciated the humorous elements of Stoic In Love, I also enjoyed the opportunity to learn more about this philosophy, which the author has researched in great detail. I loved seeing how these principles applied to dating and relationships, and seeing where I’ve probably gone wrong!

I would definitely love to see the “Stoic” advice for other aspects of my life!

Stoic In Love is available from Amazon.

You can follow the rest of the blog tour here: