How Understanding Your Partner's Brain and Attachment Style Can Help You Defuse Conflict and Build a Secure Relationship

I've read a few of these over the years and this one has the most direct, practical knowledge I think I've read. It doesn't try to build any illusion, but maybe that's the point. It's helped me understand my wife and myself very much.

An excellent book for both couples and therapists! Very informative and helps one understand the difference between a healthy connection as apposed to a disconnection in couple hood! - as well as how to achieve an improved relationship!

This is an easy understandable read. The sample couples/situations were great ways to see how these theories play out in real life. I highly recommend it to anyone who wants to understand the dynamic of personal relationships.

My acupuncturist recommended this book as a great resource for understanding her new relationship with her partner. Being in the second half of life and starting relationships is challenging enough, but understanding the old painful issues, patterns and attachment style can help this new relationship with this wonderful man grow. We are reading the book together and starting the exercises in each chapter. I have read many books about relationships and feel this book is a great resource for couples.

My husband and I are reading this together and I'm finding it profoundly influencing. The idea of treating our relationship as a separate identity that needs nurturing and respect is a game-changer. The chapter on how our early attachment experience informs our current behaviors is fascinating. Looking forward to finishing it and living happily ever after.

I rolled my eyes at a lot of things he said. The man clearly wants to push his own version of the attachment theory by suggesting these ideas and twisted interpretation of them in the book. Plus, I find it annoying how he randomly reminds the reader he's a therapist and "clearly he knows what he's talking about".

Honestly, if you want to read a better book that sounds more professional and on to the point of the attachment style then read "Attached."

This book seemed more written by an inspired college student or something.

Hubby and I were having stupid little arguments over stupid little things and it was driving us both crazy. My therapist recommended this book. Excellent insight into how our brains move us into offensive and defensive positions. We both read it so we now use the same language when something bothers us. We understand each other and ourselves so much more.

God. No I know I am a wave trying to behave as an island. I couldn't understand why I behave in relationships. Why I feel threatened and why I punish my partner. I hope I can put this knowledge at use and become a better human being.

Stan Tatkin's book "Wired for Love" is an excellent resource for couples and clinicians. I am clinical psychologist who works with couples. I have done training with Stan Tatkin and use his innovative and effective techniques with all of my couples. Stan's unique perspective on problems couples have provides hope and change for couples that have otherwise been "stuck" in problems for years. Even more, his approach for couples in fun and energetic, so they actually look forward to therapy sessions!

Stan's book, "Wired for Love", presents his theory and techniques in an easy-to-understand and easy-to-use format for non-clinicians. It is very readable and accessible. I highly recommend it to couples who are having problems as well as couples who are doing well but want to understand themselves and their relationship dynamics better. There is a lot to learn from this book!

Great book to understand your partner in love's thinking to head off arguments and foster and more harmonious relationship. In fact, I'm finding it is helping me understand my motivations also. Everyone needs to find books that speak to them - and this one - using the framework of anchors, islands and waves, seems to do just that. Highly recommend it to those searching for an easy to understand self-help book for troubled relationships (not seriously though).

This book brought my to tears. And the acting on these principles brought me closer to her.
Lucky to have found this book. Rare in its concision and clarity. After reading it, lucky to have found my partner.

This is an excellent guidebook to understanding your partner and theirs and your own vulnerabilities, and how you can help each keep each other on an 'even keel'. The exercises are simple and doable, backed up by theory that is not jargon. Also a great guide for couples therapists.

Wired for Love is simply the best relationship book to come out in many years. Dr. Tatkin's approach brilliantly accomplishes what the field of psychology has been working toward since Freud: a method that anyone can learn that will transform flat or conflictual relationships into the intimacy and passion we all desire.

- James Rapson, co-author Anxious to Please: 7 Revolutionary Practices for the Chronically Nice

Who doesn't want a happier relationship? This book gives a great road map. A close friend and her husband actually did a few sessions with him and it made a huge improvement in their relationship. Best to read together with your partner but useful even if you are approaching it one sided.

Great book. Very practical and useful tips inside on how to create a truly connected relationship. Kind of like a must read for those in relationships or even thinking of being in a relationship.
Not as much help for when your relationship is ending. At that point, what is done is done... But this is good to know for the next time.
And of course it's best if both partners read this and are invested in it.

There are some great ideas in this book....it allows you to see optimal relationship habits and rituals that can positively influence an existing relationship, or skills to add when trying to get a relationship! The book is an easy to understand journey into understanding success in relationships!

In this economy, many couples are separated due to the necessity to take a job out of state after a layoff. I took a job out of state with an organization that had a residential location close to my home with the belief I would be able to transfer within a couple of years with good performance. We are now approaching year 5 and the separation has been challenging. I bought this book to assist in helping my husband and I to grow in our intimacy; however, many of the exercises can only be done if the couple is actually living together. I look forward to the time when we can and, at that time, we will continue where we left off in the book!

How I wish I had a resource like this years ago when I was struggling with my marriage. I've read a number of relationship tune-up books throughout the years, and each helped somewhat. It was very encouraging to see those same familiar authors (Hendrix, Gottman, Perel, etc.) offering praise for Dr. Tatkins work at the get go. And the fact that he's put so much good information into a book that is less than 200 pages is a testament to his organized approach, which was friendly, playful, and effective.

The explanations and exercises in the book proved to me for the first time that it's not just about doing positive things for your partner, and "thinking" about the relationship, but rather there are automatic responses that mess with a relationship no matter how much "thinking" we do. What a relief to know that problems can come from our biological wiring as well as our attachment history, and they can be easily managed once you know what to look for!

While it was a relief to learn how these neurological autopilots can be tamed, it makes me sad to realize I mostly didn't know what my brain was doing when in past relationships in an effort to feel safe, which now seems tragic. Like I said, I wish I had this book sooner. By distilling a great deal of research into understandable language, Dr. Tatkin has laid out a path to intimacy that I'd not seen before but now, makes so much sense. I dare say he has improved my concept of what being in love should look and feel like. Frankly, it feels MUCH better than I ever could have imagined.

No matter how good you think your relationship is, get this book!

I'm not all the way done with this book yet, but I already think it's well worth its price. Clearly intended for people in committed relationships, it's contains quite a bit of info and insights that have already helped my wife and I take better care of each other.

Some very good ideas about the nature of coupling. Unfortunately, the writing is uneven and often hard to follow. Also, the author has deep-seated judgment around lifestyles that do not reflect his own thinking.

Having someone else explain something that is painfully obvious and simple to everyone except you is cathartic.

An excellent book with insights that I swear were written by someone looking over my shoulder!

This book seamlessly enhances complex Human Developmental Theory and explains it everyday language. We can all identify with every page. It brings relationship to life in a simple and profound and humorous way.
As a Clinician myself it allows me to meander deeper into my own Attachment Style. It's fun and fascinating! It has enhanced my clinical work as well as create growth in my relationship. Just ask my hubby!

There are many good suggestions I'm this book and I would recommend it. Still haven't had a chance to implement them, but if my wife finishes the book and we do some, I do think it will help in the long term.

I absolutely love this book and have it as recommended reading for all my students, clients, colleagues, friends and interesting strangers! In other words, everyone interested in the pleasure of an authentic committed relationship will benefit immensely from reading this book! Stan shares brilliantly from his ray of genius about helping people strengthen their relationship bond, how to create and maintain a special "couple bubble", enjoy deep connection, humor, love safety and play! My recommendation , READ it!

Diane Poole Heller, PhD.
Author of Crash Course
Creator of DARe Attachment Workshops

As a researcher I found this "lay termed" book overbearingly black and white without much insight into complex relationships that don't fall under his made-up/cheesy/unpersuasive terminology of very real classifications of attachment. I find it hard to believe that people could relate to all of the examples as they were so overtly stereotyped and watered down to the point of lacking any real insight. I would not recommend this book as the neuroscience is meager, dumbed down and honestly very old citations. With all the excellent research out there, why not delve right in? Because it's easier to make up scenarios and your interpretation of them.

The writing is bad. There is lot's of opinion stated in a very heavy-handed way. It's very monogamy and marriage biased. It's full of statements that are unsubstantiated, romantically idealized, and unhelpful. At one point the author claims that running your relationship the way they advise is a better cure for depression than medication. Sounds pretty, but has no basis in actual understanding of depression, and no data is presented to backup this assertion. This is just one example of the crap in this book. The tie-ins to Adult Attachment Theory and neuroscience are weak. If you want to read something useful on Adult Attachment Theory, I recommend "Attached: The New Science of Adult Attachment and How It Can Help You Find—and Keep—Love" and "Hold Me Tight: Seven Conversations for a Lifetime of Love" Those are books worth reading. Stay away from this one.

This book would be helpful to those who have a less developed sense of empathy and a less mature world view. It's not helpful for figuring out difficulties in emotionally mature relationships. The writing style seemed a little flippant, too.

Too often now, I've made the mistake of finding a highly-reviewed book on the store and thought to myself, "surely all these people can't be wrong!" In the case of Wired For Love, yes--they most certainly can be wrong.

To be fair--if you've never read a book on relationships, and if you've never read about how the brain works, then you'll probably get something good from this book. But if you're someone who takes pride in understanding relational dynamics, this is unlikely to be much help to you. I almost bailed on it a few times, but decided to press on and finish it. In the end, I consider it a waste of time.

Do you understand the importance of prioritizing your partner's feelings above your own in the context of a mature, committed, romantic relationship? If your answer is yes, then congratulations--you already know most of what this book will try to teach you. If you act like a selfish teenager in your relationships, this book will try to set you straight, even though someone with a teen's relational sensibilities is unlikely to be helped by a book.

Also, this book is ridiculously guilty of one of my biggest pet peeves--taking general truths but packaging them into trademarked terms made up by the author. Are you an "anchor", an "island", or a "wave?" Are your "primitives" threatening your "couple bubble", or are your "ambassadors" stepping in to protect it? It's a vocabulary that will only be understood by other people who have read the book--which I suspect is probably the point.

The book is full of overly simplistic 'real world' examples of couples who seem to magically fit whatever scenario Tatkin has described in the previous pages. Their situations are so pitch-perfect in their illustrations that you can't help but wonder if they were conjured up in Tatkin's imagination just to give his principles some kind of tangible evidence.

The top of page 80 contained a comment that I found not only false, but dangerous and unhealthy: "As partners, each holds the key to the other's self-esteem and self-worth ... self-esteem and self-worth are developed through our contact with other people. You misunderstand if you think these goods are provided by the self. They're not; they're provided by the other." Personally, I can't think of a more damaging scenario than to give someone else power over your sense of self-worth ... or to put it another way, it's incredibly unfair to make your partner *responsible* for your sense of worth. Scores of people have suffered relational problems explicitly because they depended on other, imperfect human beings for their sense of self-esteem and worthiness. When we look toward other people for our worth (as opposed to a perfect, unconditionally-loving God or Higher Power), we set ourselves up for disappointment and feelings of worthlessness.

There are brilliant books out there about improving communication in relationships. I don't believe this is one of them.

I love this book's underlying foundation: the understanding that to succeed and flourish, couples must make their relationship their top priority. A couple relationship is about US, not about 'me and 'you'. To read this in a contemporary book is a much-needed corrective to the prevailing attitude that individuals have to champion their own needs and wants to be happy in a relationship. That said, the author offers a clear strategy to address the difference in relating styles that can threaten couple bonding. Having been married happily for 40 years, I see many of the key principles my husband and I have applied clearly articulated in this book. Every couple can benefit from reading this, whether just starting out or as a refresher for ongoing couple happiness.

Wired for Love by Stan Tatkin, PSYD, is an enjoyable read, and has included the advancements of the brain sciences which are required, in my opinion, with the new discoveries in neurology as applied to counseling psychology. I gave this book a 3-star rating while recommending Tatkin’s book for reading because it contains valuable information, but can benefit from four fixes.
1. Clean up the metaphors to reflect what is meant not stated as this is confusing for the reader, for example, “War” and “tethered.” Horses are tethered.
2. The “Forward” needs rewriting to reflect a holistic conceptual framework rather than the Euro/American mechanistic “speak.”
3. Sentence structure can exemplify the regular flow and timings of the prose, for instance, in the first paragraph of page one, it is acceptable to use commas exclusively and forget the annoying rules that were taught in composition classes, the beginning argument could have been dramatic and compelling.
4. Using Freud’s brain theory is not advised as this book is not a Depth Psychology literary studies essay; the focus is on the brain sciences and couples regulatory understanding.

Dr. Tatkin states clearly that this is meant to be a brief, concise "field guide", so I understand the lack of depth and details, but it still felt lacking. He does a great job explaining what's going on in our relationships, but doesn't spend nearly enough time on solutions or problem solving. Also, the "case studies" felt very contrived and unrealistic to me. Still, overall, a valuable resource and a good first step for anyone trying to get their relationship on track.

"Wired for Love" is a must read for those who are committed to growing a splendid, romantic relationship. Tatkin's easy to read guide is full of brief couple stories to bring his teachings alive. I appreciate his practical guidance for co-creating a delightful, long lasting partnership.
- Linda Bloom, co-author of "That Which Doesn't Kill Us Makes Us Stronger: How One Couple Became Stronger At The Broken Places"

Although I haven't read many books about romantic relationships I've read a lot about them from other sources and, until read this book all the ways I found out to improve my own relationship seemed not realistic since they all stressed the importance of independence, autonomy, self-interests... In my opinion, when you really want to make your relationship work, these aspects cannot be the main rules to follow... This book takes into account our most early feelings, that stay with us until the day we die... because that's the way we are wired! When I recommended this book to my friends I told them that this book made me feel free, I didn't have to pretend any more that I was so self-sufficient and I didn't need anybody else in the world but myself. My partner and I could learn how to make our relationship better for both in ways I never imagined: communicating without feeling threatened, get what I want and what he wants together, not feeling again alone in the world... We got to build our own couple bubble and nowadays I can say that I feel him as my partner, my lover and my best friend. I'm so happy I found this book! If you want to get something similar to what my partner and I have I'd suggest you to take a look to "Wired for love", really, it's very very worth to be read. Good luck!

Easy to read and some interesting ideas
1. Very few realistic suggestions
2. No cultural differences are discussed that upset the balance
3. Does not include any example of adult children
4. Age is abandoned. Most examples are for young couples
5. Seems to take women’s side, perhaps reflecting author’s fear of losing readers
6. When one of the couples is socially very active and the other is not, the love faces hardship
7. Third party is extremely simplistic.
8. Doesn’t give suggestions- for example, when a bubble is threatened, what do you do when the other party takes no corrective actions.
9. Medical conditions are very important and are bubble busters.
10. Genetics is absolutely abandoned!!! Genes, diet, and nutrition plays major roles in mind altering chemicals.

It is confusing to me how some authors decide that the clinical terms developed over decades and supported by mountains of research are not appropriate for general audiences. Secure attachment, anxious-ambivalent attachment (resistant attachment), anxious-avoidant attachment, and sometimes disorganized/disoriented attachment are used in the psychology of interpersonal relationships. Tatkin's incessant reference to islands, anchors, and waves, made the book a muddle for me. While not a psychologist, my reading of many other books in this genre made my ability to follow Catkin's classification scheme near impossible. Good stories and thoughtful advice, but the theory presented was beyond me because of Tatkin's invented vocabulary.

We are all curious about love relationships. What makes them work? How to solve our relational problems? For many readers, this book gives magnificent information. Why? Because there are many books with great, good or bad advice for couples, but many of them present the same ideas and thus, the same perspective on the problems, and thus the same remedies which may or may not work very well in reality. If you are familiar with attachment theory, Bowlby etc, most of this research has been dedicated to observe attachment in infants with their mothers, and its results have been mainly applied on parenting. Focusing the attachment research on adults and their relationships presents new perspective on relationships and how to solve its problems. The book is fascinating.

This is an important book for anyone in a committed relationship.
It takes the the questions of:
"Why do I push him/her away when all I really want is to be close"
and
"What's wrong with him/her that he/she just doesn't get me?"
and
"What's wrong with me that I am so difficult to love".

Stan Tatkin's theory of how to make relationships go from distressed to safe and connected is grounded in science, but no need to worry about this read being too brainy. The author uses examples and metaphors that make this an interesting and valuable book for anyone wanting a better relationship and for that matter for anyone wondering what is important to focus on when getting into a long lasting secure relationship.
As couples therapist, I require all my clients to read this book.
Cynthia Eddings

I had to read a self help book for class. The assignment was obviously meant to be “tear apart a self help book in the name of feminism and diversity,” but I actually wrote a five page paper in defense of this book. The advice is based on biology and psychology. It has no holding on relationship status, sex, age, class, or race. This book could apply to anyone and it honestly helped me understand why I was mad at my wife that week and how to fix it.

Our SUPER Marriage counselor saved our marriage after so many past poor ones. She uses psychobiology etc, as one of her principles & recommended this book. She saved our marriage & we read this book at the same time. I wish we knew this & met her YEARS ago!!! If anyone wants to save their relationship then get this type of marriage counselor, as we're in the pits, and she helped us dig ourselves out. Get one that TOTALLY understands this book and below:

"couples therapy from 3 basic models... Attachment Theory, Psychobiologically, and Psychoanalytically..."

I was skeptical at first and the author's writing annoyed me. But upon reading his other book and his blog, I find the ideas introduced in this book to make a lot more sense now. I've been applying the strategies and our relationship has been really improving. The two most important ideas I got out of this book are the couple bubble (both taking care of each other's needs and insecurities) and the importance of maintaining regular eye contacts. By seeing yourself and your partner as a couple unit supporting each other, you can find more satisfaction in the relationship loving and feeling loved.

This book gives you excellent directions for changing, improving and deepening your relationship. As a therapist
for couples, my experience has been that these changes improve relationships if the partners can both participate.
The only thing the book does not provide is the personal motivation, which couples who love each other can supply
for themselves. If you have the courage to do your own part and can tolerate the stress of doing things differently,
which will definitely be present, you will see results in a short time.

Personally, I love the message that being a couple requires that both partners invest in the relationship as a separate
entity from themselves, feeding it in order to receive its benefits. It gives a deeper, more meaningful connotation to
being with someone. It implies a valuing of the other that all love implies but often gets befuddled in how to express.

Bravo, Stan. This is a manual for the ages.

As a therapist working with couples, and addressing relationship issues with individual patients, I remind them how we are taught the A,B,C's and 1,2,3's in school and not about relationships. There are some very fortunate people who have models of healthy attachments with primary caregivers (e.g. parents), and thus, lucky enough to be taught about relationship nuances at home. For the rest of folks, finding books such as Dr. Tatkin's to understand and learn about relationships is a God-send.

Key take-away principles include putting your relationship first, always; how to protect your partner and keep him/her safe; soothing / regulating anxiety when it peaks for more effective and productive communication; moving physically and emotionally closer to your partner; knowing your partner's vulnerabilities and how to help him/her; learning to reconnect and stay connected in ways that feel good to each partner; serving as the primary go-to person and being available; managing "outsiders"--be it friends or activities; and finally how partners can minimize stress for each other while optimizing each other's health.

And, for those desiring a book not ignoring same-sex relationships, he writes with subtle language to not alienate that particular subgroup.

This book is loaded with exercises that the reader/couple can consider and even try out if so inspired!

This book will definitely give you insights into how to improve your relationships. First, I sights onto yourself, then your partner. Finally, it will help you think about how to interact and relate to one another better. Earthshattering, no. Informative and important in developing and maintaining a relationship today, yes. This book provides great guidelines for establishing and maintaining a strong partnership.

Love and connection is essential to our health and wellbeing
throughout our life. Couples, despite their best intention, often
fail to preserve the bonds of support, safety and connectedness that
we all desire and need to survive and thrive in a difficult world. In
this book Stan Tatkin offers individuals and couples a lens through
which to view relationships that is very much needed in lay and
professional circles. Often well meaning self help books, counselors,
healing professionals and friends encourage strategies that
inadvertently widen the divide between couples. In our Western
society we are prided on independence and separateness. Needing
others is often seen as weakness or codependence. . . even though
current neuroscientific understandings and brain research is proving
otherwise. In simple and easy to understand language Stan brings
relevant neuroscientific discoveries to the kitchen table. For
couples struggling to preserve the bonds of intimacy, connection and
support this understanding alleviates much misunderstanding and
personal suffering. Understanding how our early subconscious
imprinting of relationships are formed provides a lens with which to
view relational difficulties non pathologically. It is a hopeful book
which bypasses the narrative story which often binds couples in a
never ending cycle of conflict, misunderstanding and hurt. Making
relationships succeed requires work and Stan challenges us to take
responsibility for understanding ourselves and our partners nervous
system and move beyond the limited concepts of codependency that often
divide us from the very connections and bonds we need and desire!
Highly recommended for every individual, couple and healing
professional! Thank you Stan!

Brian J. Whelan, LCSW, CST, SEP
Boulder, CO

this is a great book. This is the 2nd time I've bought it. I loaned my first one out and didn't get it back. It is clearly written and gets you thinking about how much we all need and want love and connection with others.

In preparing for a trip across country, we look at maps and bring along a GPS to help chart our route. While navigating the windy roads and sometimes hairpin curves of relationship, we need to develop better navigational skills. Wired For Love by Stan Tatkin is our own relational GPS that guides us efficiently, intelligently and sometimes humorously through potential traffic jams and car crashes. Understanding a clearer "map" of relationship helps us identify our own and our partner's attachment style and needs so we can spend more time enjoying the scenic route as we celebrate our "coupledom." Sara Swift M.A.

I don't normally enjoy "self help" books, but I thought this one was excellent. It really helped me understand attachment styles and why my partner and I sometimes react the way we do. We have both read this and simply by reading it have handled stress and conflict much better. Great book.

Stan has a gift for taking the complexity of human relationships and presenting them in an understandable, and compassionate, read. He introduces us to our own, inner workings, helping us to create a relationship with our own brain, and that of our partners.
Pertinent and invaluable to those who desire a safe and secure relationship, Stan develops with the reader a relationship that is akin to what he teaches.
Packed with information, beautifully organized, and delivered with humor and a kind tone, this is a must read book. Combining the latest research in the neurobiology of the brain, and attachment research, Stan gives new insights and hope into resolving issues with our partners and understanding each other's styles. Each chapter has helpful exercises to practice and apply these insights.
Finally, a book that truly teaches how to skillfully and compassionately lead us out of those dangerous cycles of communication into a deeper, more secure and satisfying relationship.

I'm about 80% through this book and I will finish it eventually by force only because I spent the $10 for it. It is not what I had expected. This book is incredibly boring with mostly scientific/psych. lecture (which according to the preview I did not see that coming) as your "information". Yes, I have taken a couple things away from it (hence the 2 stars i rated it). Yes, I do like the whole relationship styles section such as, waves, islands, and anchors because I found that I, myself am a wave and my boyfriend is largely a wave with island tendencies. Other than that, I'm disappointed.

He's an island and I am a wave. After reading this book I realized the way we get into trouble with each other is when one or both of us has let our primatives run wild. We each just thought the other was being difficult. We are working through the book trying some of the exercises. I am feeling more hopeful.

This book is great for any couple - either happy or struggling to understand each other. Even those individuals hoping to become part of a loving couple will have a head start after reading this book. Stan Tatkin has made his insightful ideas accessible to everyone. His descriptions and examples are clear and interesting. He also offers some helpful exercises to keep couples on track to check in and connect with each other. I highly recommend this book.

I was unimpressed from the forward through the first third of the book. At that point, feeling unimpressed shifted to being annoyed that I had already wasted so much time... I consulted my spouse on this matter and we agreed: hilarious. So... happy ending I guess? And on the brightside it reminded me how glad I was to be married to my spouse and not someone like this guy.

In trying to review this book, I find words fail me. They also fail The Author, even though he seldom deploys any of more than one syllable. Still, needs must when the Devil drives.

Dr. Tatkin (how far that honorific has fallen) proposes to offer a "complete insider's guide to understanding your partner's brain". Undaunted by this herculean task, he rolls up his cardigan sleeves and polishes it off in a mere 179 pages - less than half the square footage, one notes, of Kant's now-obviated Critique of Pure Reason.

I do Dr. Tatkin (that title really did used to mean something, Gentle Reader, honest) an injustice. To set the stage for his breezy elucidation of the mysteries of meat-based consciousness, he also required a foreword (written by someone claiming to be the cocreator of the dubiously Spenserian 'imago relationship therapy'). This forward assures us that from the dawn of history couplehood has been the primary social structure of our species. Lest you be tempted to question this, Archimago assures you that, despite a paucity of evidence for the dating scene of 9,000 BCE, we can rely on the "informed imagination of [a] cultural anthropologist."

To think of all those poor scientists, laboring for decades to chip out a single piece of tentative confirmation from a mountain of chaos and failed experiment, when all they really needed was informed imagination! A more delicate term for what my uncle Olaf used to call "horses***".

But let us leave Archimago's vague handwaving in the rear-view mirror and harken to Dr. Tatkin himself (I can't keep using that prefix - with your permission, I will simply call him The Author henceforth).

He too calls us back to dawn of history (or the "beginning of recorded time"), but not before whacking us with a rhetorical question. "Who among us doesn't want to feel loved?" The ham-fisted opening would put a first-year college student to shame, but I struggled manfully on, assured (wrongly, as it turns out) that The Author really did have a point.

He immediately launches us into the saga of Jenny and Bradley, a pair of sock puppets whose dialogue sounds like the excised lines from an Ionescu play. Truly, if I were a therapist and two people who talked like that came into my office, I would send them to be Turing tested. In the unlikely event that they passed, I would have them scanned for stroke damage. No well human being uses language that poorly. And every point hereafter will be illustrated by a pair of similar sock puppets. I took to imagining the cardigan'd Author, one sock on each hand, doing the voices for his creations, while an incredulous couple stared at him from the couch.

He assures us, after each negative exemplar dialogue that "it is important to remember, there is nothing wrong with [sock puppet]." After a while, I couldn't help but bark "Except for being a whiny little turd." Because oh, the whining...

I cannot, in good faith, say that this is the worst book ever written. I can only say that it is the worst book I have ever read.

A few choice phrases:

"We'll call this part of the brain the smart vagus." (One imagines the dumb vagus somewhat put out by this favoritism).
"Have your primitive talk to your partner's primitive." (A New Yorker cartoon screams to be made of this one)
"To be sure, most of us begin to realize the need to be tethered to at least one other person..." (The Author is nothing if not a true romantic).

It was at this point that my own brain, trying desperately to salvage the loss of dwindling time that was the reading thus far, tried to convince me of The Author's true genius. It opined that no couple, no matter dysfunctional, could fail but to come together in peals of laughter and savage mockery at the monumental stupidity of his magnum opus. And, in the end, isn't bringing couples together a therapist's goal?

I had almost, ALMOST convinced myself of this, when I read the following line:

"To keep it a bit lighter here, I'm going to substitute the terms anchor, island, and wave."

It was at this infelicitous nautical metaphor, Gentle Reader, that I tossed the book overboard, regretting only that I could not force the author to walk the plank after it.