The Incurable Romantic

"Gripping...One of the points Tallis is making is that when we fall in love, we flirt with madness."

"People driven mad by love is the stuff of operas. But Tallis, a clinical psychologist, takes a serious look at the neuroscience of the phenomenon, focusing on sensational case studies--like the man who kept 3,000 prostitutes in his employ, spending all his money in the hopes that they would fall in love with him."

"Stories about those who arrive on a therapist's couch to complain about their love woes may appeal to our instincts for voyeurism, but Mr. Tallis never veers into prurience. Instead, he artfully heightens the ways these patients should feel familiar, as we all know a little something of love's madness."

"Tallis gives readers a peek inside the therapist's office and a sense of how otherwise reasonable people can go crazy over love.... Even if we no longer recognize love as a disorder, we cannot deny its power to destabilize and distort."

"Thrilling, sometimes desperate, shockingly dark."

"Part memoir, part scientific exploration, [The Incurable Romantic] chronicles more than a dozen tales of love gone horribly wrong."

"Mr. Tallis is a gifted storyteller....In The Incurable Romantic he applies a novelist's skill to his clinical material....[His] characters remain sharply, painfully real, their stories as inconclusive, messy and fascinating as life."

"The Incurable Romantic earns its place in the fine tradition of popular psychoanalytic writing, exemplified by Irvin D. Yalom's excellent book of case studies, Love's Executioner....[Tallis] is an amiable and acute guide to the madness of love."

"[Tallis] knows how to tell a story. Boy, does he know how to tell a story. This powerful and moving book is not just about individual cases. It's also about what the human animal needs....Powerful and moving."

"[Tallis is] a brilliant raconteur....Only someone who has never felt sick falling head over heels, suffered the agonizing pangs of jealousy, battled bestial fogs of lust or wallowed in the delirious happiness of being entwined with the object of their love could fail to be fascinated."

"Thoughtful...Tallis has a graceful narrative style, easily incorporating brief digressions on deeper philosophical issues such as free will versus determinism. Most importantly, his book is suffused with compassion, avoiding facile categorization and struggling to understand and empathize with his patients as people in pain."

"Moving, at times disturbing, and revealing-like having a productive, revelatory discussion with a trusted friend."

"For anyone who appreciates stories that delve into the psychological experience of love."

"Tallis explores...head-spinning tales of love gone wrong."

"[Tallis's] compassion for the lovelorn shows."

"Writer and subject were rarely better matched. The pain and destructiveness of obsessive love takes many fascinating forms. In this superb study Frank Tallis brings a lifetime's clinical experience and wise reflection to a condition that, by its own strange routes, leads us into the very heart of love itself. This is a brilliant, compelling book."

"This fascinating memoir peers deep into the dark heart of love."

"Frank, informative and often bleakly funny..."

"In the vein of The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat, The Incurable Romantic is a compilation of the real-life case studies of a clinical psychologist...Tallis draws his characters with such wit and skill."