THE LOVER'S DICTIONARY

A young man chooses an unusual format to record the details of his longtime relationship with a woman he meets online.

The two unnamed lovers at the heart of this bittersweet take on love and commitment have a common enough story. Boy meets girl, they fall hard for each other, move into an apartment, and then wonder if they should even be together. The boy, a New York literary type, chooses to tell their story as an A-Z glossary, with each word definition standing in for something associated with their relationship. The definitions—from "aberrant" to "zenith," and everything in between—offer quick glimpses of two years of couplehood. A lot can be gleaned from the brief entries, which often read as prose poems. The narrator’s beloved, we learn, is beautiful, gregarious and drinks too much. He is shy and fastidious. She is bruised from a dysfunctional past, while his childhood was happy. They travel, meet each other’s families and fall into routines. He adores her but has doubts about their ultimate compatibility. He struggles with simmering resentments, fears and neediness. And then an episode of infidelity causes possible irreparable damage. Can they even move beyond it? While gimmicky and saddled with a narrator who takes himself a bit too seriously, this adult effort from one of the authors of Nick and Nora’s Infinite Playlist (2006) still manages to hit some universal truths about love’s perfect imperfections.

A quirky Valentine to modern romance, from the guy’s point of view.