Love Sense: The Revolutionary New Science of Romantic Relationships

Love makes sense3

Clinical studies, experiments and therapy show love is understandable and repairable.

An attachment bond1

Romantic love is an attachment bond like that between mother and child; humans are meant to mate for life.

Bowlby's lineage3

Johnson credits her approach to John Bowlby's theories of infant attachment.

Part one: the science3

Chapters on the brain, including oxytocin, and on the body, linking attachment and sexuality.

Part two: therapy in action3

Cases of distressed couples learning to recognize attachment issues and repair the bond.

Part three: love today3

A love story with a happy ending, then love in the 21st century.

Three styles2

Partners are sorted as secure, anxious or avoidant, with hope that insecure partners can become stable.

Thin in places2

Publishers Weekly called it admirable but at times thin, rarely applying its data to common couple problems.

Stilted dialogue2

The same review found the patient dialogue too stilted to pass for real conversation.

A promotional edge3

Kirkus read it as a self-help book that also promotes Emotionally Focused Therapy, while calling it readable.

Hold Me Tight

The practical conversations this book explains.

Attachment theory

The theory underneath.

Attachment Theory in Practice

Johnson's later clinical book on the same science.