Published by: Penguin
Pages: 368
Date released: 07/02/2019
Date read: 18/09/2020
When it comes to the trials and triumphs of becoming a grown up, journalist and former Sunday Times dating columnist Dolly Alderton has seen and tried it all. In her memoir, she vividly recounts falling in love, wrestling with self-sabotage, finding a job, throwing a socially disastrous Rod-Stewart themed house party, getting drunk, getting dumped, realising that Ivan from the corner ship is the only man you’ve ever been able to rely on, and finding that your mates are always there at the end of every messy night out. It’s a book about bad dates, good friends and – above all else – about recognizing that you and you alone are enough.
I had been debating about reading Everything I Know About Love for a while, not really being someone who goes in for the kind ‘self-help’ relationship advice books. But a friend of mine gave it such rave viewers, she thrust it into my hands and demanded I read it. Which I did. In 2 days.
If you have read my previous review about Ghosts, you’ll know just how strong my love for Dolly Alderton is, and it all started with Everything I Know About Love.
Someone with more dating and life experience may take more away from it than I did.
Someone who has never been in a real relationship. Someone who still lives at home. Someone who was made redundant at the latter end of 2020 and is still searching for employment (at current time of writing).
I have done the things Dolly and her friends have done. Nowhere close. I was born middle-aged, preferring to make jams and chutneys and watch interior programmes than going out drinking and partying. And yet, the way she writes, makes me feel like I can identify with all of that.
I have lots of friends, but like most people, they are spread out around the country. Childhood friends, University friends, work friends. I don’t always see them all the time. To be honest, some of them I very rarely speak to. And yet there’s a handful of them I know if I rang them in the middle of the night asking for help, they’d be there, no questions asked.
Your self-worth is not measured by your boyfriend, or the notches on your bed post, or your home, or your income, or the number of friends you have. It’s measured by you. You are worth it. You are worth love. So, make sure you love yourself. As it’s the greatest love you’ll ever have.
Books By Your Bedside 