– This review contains spoilers –
As some of us students enter our twenty-something years, it can be difficult to feel a sense of stability. With new friendships, relationships, housing, schedules, or a new job, life can feel overwhelming. Sometimes you just need something to hold onto and to keep you stable. Dolly Alderton’s Everything I Know About Love is just that. It is a book that will ground you in your twenty-something discomfort. It reassures you that you will move past, grow, and learn from all the mistakes you will and are making—hopefully.
In this article, I will be taking a closer look at all my favourite and not-so-favourite parts of Everything I Know About Love, and with any luck, I will encourage you to do the same, give it a read and make some opinions of your own.
For context: This memoir is from the perspective of a white middle-class woman growing up in the suburbs of England and later in London. This needs to be addressed before I continue, as her whiteness plays a big role in all of her stories. Lots of the privilege she encounters stems from her whiteness. This is not to say that it’s a negative thing or that she does not deserve all the opportunities given to her, but it is necessary to acknowledge that for a lot of her experience and opportunities—especially in her career—her whiteness definitely helped her achieve some of them.
This fact is potentially why a good amount of her story resonated with me, as it mirrors who I am: a white middle-class woman who grew up (and is still living) in a suburb.
That is not to say that this book is only for the white middle class; there are beautiful stories of self-discovery, grief, loss, friendship, family, coming of age, self-acceptance, and, of course, love. I believe everyone can find a piece of themselves or some sort of self-reflection in this book.
I don’t think I have ever resonated and connected so deeply with a book in my entire life. That could simply be because I am not very well-read, or it could be because this book honestly deserves close to every good review it has received. Of course, with anything, there will be criticism, which not all, but most, I would agree with. However, overall, it is one of the best books I have read in a while. I laughed, cried, and felt like someone was grabbing my shoulders, looking into my eyes, and telling me that everything was going to be okay. Maybe it was the time in my life I was reading it, but it was like reading an older sister’s diary that she leaves specifically for you to learn and reflect on her triumphs and mistakes throughout her teens to her early thirties.
If you are a woman in your twenties (or really any person for that matter), I think this is the perfect book for you.
Alderton’s writing is easy to digest, heavy at times, and funny at most. It flows effortlessly, jumping chronologically, for the most part, through her life and follows the new challenges and triumphs she faces with each new chapter.
Throughout the book, Alderton adds recipes and random lists that oddly make it feel even more personal. However, there were chapters that would revolve solely around transcripts of exaggerated emails she would receive. Emails containing an invitation to a baby shower, bachelorette party (or hen night), bridal shower, or wedding. At times, these chapters felt much longer than they were, and I often found myself scanning them, hoping that when I flipped the page, it would be its last. Oftentimes, there would be another four pages of email to run through, but it wasn’t often enough that it ruined my overall takeaway from the book.
I am someone who is lucky enough in life to have an amazing group of girlfriends who love me unconditionally, and who I love in return. This book made me even more appreciative of their place in my life, because this book—however centred it may seem on romantic love—is about how important love in friendships is too. Alderton’s connection to her friends is so beautiful. There is a chapter about living with her friends, and the beauty of getting to know a person so deeply. Her writing made me jealous that I don’t get to live with my friends, although it is not always glamorous, as she demonstrates, it still left me with a yearning to experience such a deep connection with friends.
The other side of this book deals with the price of love, the loss that comes with it. Through the years, the girls get promotions, partners, and big life changes that prompt them to leave their shared home. Alderton is the last one left in the apartment and decides to start on her own by moving into her own place for the first time in her life. The girls all come back and help her move into her new place, showing that no matter how far apart life takes them, their love for each other never fades.
My favourite chapter of the book is titled “Florence.” Florence was Alderton’s best friend’s little sister growing up, causing them, in a way, to all grow up together as sisters. She was brilliant, personable, creative, passionate, and died too young. From the start of the chapter, you can sense where it is headed, but with every flip, you hope for that fairy tale ending. Alderton writes of Florence’s aspirations of being a writer and how she was a brilliant one at that. It made the dedication of this book “For Florence Kleiner” so much more bittersweet.
Everything I Know About Love is a great quick read for whenever you find yourself in a rut and need a little bit of a change, or need something to be your companion in your twenty-something discomfort.