Books for the Heart

Welcome to Through Lines! Living creatively, thinking imaginatively, & practicing the craft of storytelling

Feb 04, 2026

Reading for love

I love Valentine’s Day. I love the hearts. I love the way pink and red and glitter coat every surface. I love the candy aisles in drugstores and the chocolate desserts in bakeries and the pink bubbly drinks. I love the classroom boxes of 30 paper valentines and cardboard mailboxes and the doilies and potato chips shaped as hearts. I love the Spotify playlists and the romantic comedies that are playing in movie theaters for one night only and the bouquets of flowers. I love the greeting cards with puns and art and a million creative ways to say “I care.”

I love how the holiday celebrates love in all its forms: romantic love, the love between friends, between family, between you and yourself, between us and the world we’re trying to survive in. Spending this stretch of deep winter focused on what’s close to the heart—turning toward warmth when everything is cold and bare—is beautiful.

I also love the books that celebrate, examine, and hold love. In that spirit, here’s what I’ve been reading lately.