Dating For Dummies

February 15, 1998
While you wouldn't want to be caught dead reading either of these titles on the subway, they offer a study in contrasts. Baber and Spitznagel seem to have set out to produce a humorous look at dating and mating, but they deliver a boorish effort that will confirm a lot of women's worst fears about male dating behavior. While some might think that the "humor book" caveat makes everything okay, the overall Beavis-and-Butthead approach to the subject--which is, less dating and more sex in these authors' minds--provides little in the laughs department. Men and women should avoid this book like a blind date with a cold sore, and libraries can pass. By contrast and in keeping with the excellent "For Dummies" treatment of complicated subjects, psychologist Browne's book offers a professional, insightful, and very readable examination of dating--real dating. Browne covers every aspect of the basic mechanics of dating in the 1990s, from making your own personal inventory to help you discover who you are and what you want, to finding appropriate people to date, to actually conducting dates at various stages of relationship development. Nothing seems to be missed by Browne: she tackles breaking up, sex, and even the darker sides of dating, like rape and stalking. This excellent book's biggest drawback for libraries is its numerous "work form" sections, an invitation to certain patrons to make it their own. But Dating for Dummies is worth the risk; recommended for all public libraries.--David M. Turkalo, Suffolk Univ. Law Sch. Lib, Boston