All About Us (Hardcover)

Before reading further, let me emphasize a few things. This is not a book about romance, nor a guide to improve your relationship (see Relationship Rescue for that). You are encouraged to pursue this book's questions in a spirit of adventure and fun. If the idea of answering questions from a book is not your idea of adventure and fun, this book is not for you. So most people who will read and enjoy this book are ones in a good or excellent relationship who want to deepen and widen it some.

One final word of caution. There are a lot of questions in here about your sexual experiences with other people (before and during your relationship), your fantasies, and your sexual regrets. If those are not comfortable areas for a discussion, I suggest that you either skip the book or mutually agree to pass on those areas.

Another way to pursue the book (if your partner or you isn't comfortable with a discussion) is to do it privately, without sharing your answers. That makes the book experience much more like All About Me.

You should also feel free to make up your own questions. You will probably think of some that make this experience fit your relationship even better. This is a chance for all of you romantic couples to come up with lots of romantic questions.

As I went through the book (by myself, for reviewing purposes -- I plan to start it this weekend with my wife), I had a very good time. I enjoyed remembering the early days of our relationship, and the high points since then. I was thrilled to realize that I could answer some of the trivia questions that I would not have known about before we were married. That made me feel closer to her. I especially liked the questions about what I liked best about her. I know she'll enjoy hearing me say what they are.

Hmmm. Now that I think about it, this would be a good book to take along on a weekend to a country inn during leaf peeping season in New England without the children. Your selection of where you read it will also affect your pleasure from the mutual discoveries.

In almost all of the parts of the book, each person has a chance to answer independently. Although the book doesn't say anything about discussing each other's answers, I suspect that those discussions will be the best part of the experience. You could even try guessing what your partner will answer, and that could double the fun!

Basically, I suggest that you use the material here as a jumping off point for adventure and fun rather than taking the whole thing too literally.

After you are done, think about how you would like you and your partner to answer these questions 10 years from now. Then imagine what will have to happen in the next 10 years for your relationship to evolve in that happy direction.

Esentially a book of prompts designed to promote communication between couples and improve or enlighten relationships, the questions range from easy statistics to thought-provoking springboards for conversation. We take turns each night answering and then reading each other's responses. We had to ration the book section by section in order to make the fun last longer.

Any "scary" questions can be left blank, but whatever your approach to this book, you will leave it more enlightened about yourself and that special person who shares the corn flakes with you.