I just finished a very strange novel – The Lover’s Dictionary by David Levithan. The first thing about it that is strange is the name, since in his book he says he hates the word lover. To quote Levithan, lover has “…the tint and taint of illicit, illegitimate affections.”

The format of the book is like a dictionary. It’s difficult at first to think of it as a novel, but it tells a story. He takes words from A to Z, most are not words we would normally associate with love, and tells what they mean to him in vignettes – one line, a few words, two or three paragraphs, or even some very short stories. These are not in the order that they happen, but plucked from within the relationship at various points. Yet the reader (at least this one) can see a distinct picture of the teller’s life with the woman he loves.

The author has a delightful way with words. You can feel the love – the connections, the disconnections, the joys, the frustrations, the uncertainties, and the certainties of love. The book is very difficult to describe, but very easy to read. Thumbs up!