Valentine's Day Reads: The Theme of Love

Our Valentine's Day Reads: The Theme of Love Collection features titles centered on love and all of its complexities. This Collection represents authors who have grappled with romantic, familial, and other forms of love through writing. With titles ranging from contemporary romance picks to works by Shakespeare, this Collection has something to offer any reader who has ever lost or found love.

M. Butterfly

by David Henry Hwang

Publication year 1988

Genre Play, Fiction

Themes Emotions/Behavior: Courage, Love, Gender Identity, Sexual Identity, Marriage, Teamwork, Self Discovery, Colonialism, Politics & Government, Beauty, Loyalty & Betrayal, Trust & Doubt, Truth & Lies

Tags Historical Fiction, LGBTQ+, Drama

Originally published in 1988, M. Butterfly is a postmodern play by Chinese-American dramatist David Henry Hwang, who also wrote Yellow Face and Bondage. Hwang drew from two sources to compose his text: the 1904 opera Madame Butterfly by Giacomo Puccini and the historical espionage scandal involving French diplomat Bernard Boursicot and Chinese opera singer Shi Pei Pu. The play became Hwang’s best-known work and subsequently received the Tony Award for Best Play in the year... Read M. Butterfly Summary

Me Before You

by Jojo Moyes

Publication year 2012

Genre Novel, Fiction

Themes Love, Self Discovery, Family, Death

Tags Romance, Grief & Death, Love & Sexuality, Depression & Suicide, Realistic Fiction, Modern Classic Fiction, Dramatic Literature

Me Before You by Jojo Moyes chronicles the burgeoning romance between Will Traynor, a quadriplegic man, and Louisa Clark, his caregiver. Published in 2012, Me Before You is the first novel in Moyes’s trilogy and is followed by After You (2015) and Still Me (2018). The novel was adapted into a 2016 film starring Emilia Clarke and Sam Claflin. Written from various perspectives, Me Before You explores the complexities of disability, love, and euthanasia.This guide... Read Me Before You Summary

Meeting at Night

by Robert Browning

Publication year 1845

Genre Poem, Fiction

Themes Love, Sexual Identity, Climate, Beauty

Tags Victorian Era, Poetry: Dramatic Poem

“Meeting at Night” is a lyric love poem by English Victorian poet Robert Browning. It was published early in Browning’s career, in his 1845 collection Dramatic Romances and Lyrics, where it appeared as the first part of a poem titled “Night and Morning.” In 1849, Browning separated it into two poems, titled “Meeting at Night” and “Parting at Morning.” Browning’s poetry is often difficult, but “Meeting at Night” is straightforward to understand. The poem describes... Read Meeting at Night Summary

Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus

by John Gray

Publication year 1992

Genre Book, Nonfiction

Themes Marriage, Fear, Forgiveness, Love

Tags Self-Improvement, Psychology, Relationships, Love & Sexuality, Philosophy, Philosophy, Psychology, Romance

Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus (1992) is a self-help and personal development book by American author John Gray. The book is designed to help couples improve their relationships by accepting how different men and women are. Although the book was initially met with critical acclaim, it has lost popularity due to critiques about sexist content and the book’s worldview. Although this is Gray’s best-known work, Gray has published many similar books concerned... Read Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus Summary

Mercy

by Jodi Picoult

Publication year 1996

Genre Novel, Fiction

Themes Family, Mental Health, Equality, Love, Conflict

Tags Realistic Fiction, Romance, Mystery & Crime Fiction, Health, Modern Classic Fiction, Dramatic Literature

... Read Mercy Summary

Message In A Bottle

by Nicholas Sparks

Publication year 1998

Genre Novel, Fiction

Themes Love, Grief, Fate, Forgiveness, Guilt, Hope, Loneliness, Memory, Regret, Fathers, Friendship, Marriage, Self Discovery, Loyalty & Betrayal, Truth & Lies

Tags Romance, Southern Literature

Message in a Bottle (1998) is the second novel by Nicholas Sparks, the follow-up to his incredibly popular romance, The Notebook. It was inspired by Sparks’s father’s experience after the sudden and unexpected death of Sparks’s mother. They’d been married for 27 years when an accident on a horse led her to develop a cerebral hemorrhage. It was a fluke, a random accident, just like the one that claims Catherine’s life and that of her... Read Message In A Bottle Summary

Midaq Alley

by Naguib Mahfouz

Publication year 1947

Genre Novel, Fiction

Themes Place, War, Social Class, Love

Tags African Literature, Heinemann African Writers, Historical Fiction, Education, Education, World History, Classic Fiction

Midaq Alley (1947) is a historical realist novel by Egyptian writer Naguib Mahfouz, the 1988 Nobel Prize laureate in Literature. In this work, Mahfouz addresses the changes taking place in Egyptian society of the 1940s. The book tells the story of a group of neighbors living in Midaq Alley, a bustling market street, in the poor quarter of Cairo’s historic city center. The story is set at the end of World War II, during Britain’s... Read Midaq Alley Summary

Middlesex

by Jeffrey Eugenides

Publication year 2002

Genre Novel, Fiction

Themes Family, Perseverance, Guilt, Love, Gender Identity, Sexual Identity, Coming of Age, Self Discovery, Community, Immigration, Equality, Justice, Literature, Religion & Spirituality, Science & Technology, Truth & Lies

Tags Modern Classic Fiction, World History, Classic Fiction, Historical Fiction, LGBTQ+

Middlesex is a 2002 novel by Jeffrey Eugenides that tells a multigenerational, epic tale of a Greek family who immigrates to the US. The narrator, Calliope (or Cal) tells the story of how his grandparents, Lefty and Desdemona Stephanides, flee their homeland during a time of war and uncertainty, settling in the US. They harbor a family secret that changes the course of the narrator’s life: They’re brother and sister, and carry a genetic mutation... Read Middlesex Summary

Milk and Honey

by Rupi Kaur

Publication year 2014

Genre Poetry Collection, Fiction

Themes Mental Health, Femininity, Conflict, Emotions/Behavior: Courage, Perseverance, Hope, Love, Shame & Pride, Race, Sexual Identity, Childhood & Youth, Coming of Age, Plants, Daughters & Sons, Fathers, Self Discovery, Beauty, Power & Greed, Truth & Lies

Tags Gender & Feminism, Instapoetry, Relationships, Trauma & Abuse

From 2014 to 2024, six million copies of Rupi Kaur’s debut collection, milk and honey, were sold, making it one of the best-selling poetry books of the 21st century. It’s rise to fame is unusual. A Canadian writer of Indian heritage who amassed a large following through social media, Kaur specializes in short, vernacular poems, often made up of only a few lines, which are accompanied by original line drawings. Kaur was at first unable... Read Milk and Honey Summary

Mind Games

by Nora Roberts

Publication year 2024

Genre Novel, Fiction

Themes Conflict, Emotions/Behavior: Courage, Perseverance, Fear, Forgiveness, Grief, Love, Revenge, Mental Health, Coming of Age, Family, Self Discovery, Fame, Fate, Good & Evil, Justice, Loyalty & Betrayal, Music, Order & Chaos, Power & Greed, Safety & Danger, Trust & Doubt, Truth & Lies

Tags Romance, Horror & Suspense, Mystery & Crime Fiction, Modern Classic Fiction

... Read Mind Games Summary

Mind of My Mind

by Octavia E. Butler

Publication year 1977

Genre Novel, Fiction

Themes Conflict, Perseverance, Forgiveness, Loneliness, Love, Shame & Pride, Gender Identity, Mental Health, Race, Coming of Age, Future, Appearance & Reality, Family, Teamwork, Self Discovery, Social Class, Community, Politics & Government, Justice, Power & Greed, Safety & Danger

Tags Science Fiction, Fantasy, Gender & Feminism

... Read Mind of My Mind Summary