Six of the Best Love Stories

What if your enemy was also the man you love? Maddie had a plan to ensure everything in her life was perfect – from her career in fashion and her chic NYC apartment to her paediatrician boyfriend. So, when her ex comes back into her life with a request to pretend to be his fiancée, her immediate reaction is to refuse. But he only wants to fulfil his father’s last wish. When his walls come down, they’re both forced to face reality.

For August, moving to New York is supposed to prove her right: that things like magic and cinematic love stories don’t exist, and the only smart way to go through life is alone. But then, there’s this gorgeous girl on the train. August’s subway crush becomes the best part of her day, but pretty soon, she discovers there’s one big problem: Jane has been displaced in time from the 1970s and is stuck on the train, and August is going to have to help her.

This touching romantic comedy sees Vanessa quit her job to pursue her dream of travelling the globe – but she wasn’t expecting to gain millions of YouTube followers who share her joy of seizing every moment. After her half-sister suddenly leaves Vanessa with her baby, the last person she expects to show up offering help is the lawyer next door, and romance could be brewing.

A man’s fourth date ends in the emergency room. A lawyer with bipolar disorder experiences the highs and lows of dating. A widower hesitates over introducing his children to his new girlfriend. A divorcee in her seventies looks back at the beauty and rubble of past relationships. These are just a few of the people who tell their stories in the revised and updated Modern Love – a collection of the most memorable essays from the New York Times’ ‘Modern Love’ column.

Anna will never admit that she harbours a secret crush on Quan, especially because he only has eyes for her charismatic younger sister Camilla. Now, with her sister’s engagement on the line, Anna must bury her anxieties to try and seduce Quan before it’s too late. But when he discovers Anna’s true intentions, he’s forced to confront his own feelings.

Hannah and Si are in love and on the same track – until their train divides, literally splitting their tracks, on the way to a wedding. When Hannah wakes up in Paris and realises that her boyfriend (and her ticket) are 300 miles away in Amsterdam she meets Leo on the station platform. Spending the day with him in Paris forces her to question how well she really knows herself – and whether she needed to go in this wrong direction to find what she was looking for.