"Any prediction about future relationships must take into account the most important determinant of the future: the unquenchable, adaptable, and primordial human drive to love." Adhering to the outside-the-box style of Jesus, the last sentence of this book becomes the first sentence in our review of this expansive and mind-stretching book. The author, Helen Fischer, is chief scientific advisor to Match.com, a senior research fellow at the Kinsey Institute, a member of Rutgers' Department of Anthropology, a TED all-star, and the author of several bestselling books.
Armed with research, insights, and statistics from biology, anthropology, sociology, and psychology, Fischer "traces the trajectory" of love and relationships from courting rituals to flirtation and the art of seduction, to human bonding via sexual selection and mate choice, to lust and divorce, and to the tricky gender differences and sexual politics.
Along the path of mating, marriage, and straying, Fischer spices up this probe with bits and pieces on courtship feeding, the yearning of soul mates to find a common beat, the infatuation spurred on by odor, the brain circuitry of love, the divorce itch after four years of marriage, and data from dating sites. Anatomy of Love is both enlightening and entertaining.
