From among the thousands that we meet, what sparks off with that one person we fall in love with? How do men and women communicate? How do they move on after a heart-break? Love and relationships have been debated upon since the dawn of time and therefore, it takes gumption to tackle such a subject and come up with the solution that Preeti Shenoy serves her readers in her latest book, Why We Love The Way We Do.
At the age of 45, Shenoy is the author of seven best-selling works of fiction and non-fiction, a nominee in Forbes’ coveted List of Influential Indians and immensely popular for her weekly column, ‘Sex and the City’, in Financial Chronicle. “Especially since my column, I have been inundated with emails with people asking me for relationship advice. And it was this practice of repetitive questions that gradually led to the idea that I must write a book,” says Preeti.
The book is divided into seven sections — ‘Finding the One’, ‘Getting Hitched’, ‘When Things Go Wrong’, ‘On Men and Women’, ‘Let’s Talk’, ‘Three to Tango’ and ‘Between the Sheets’.
“Why We Love… is my second work of non-fiction and one that took me two and a half years to research for and compile. Every chapter starts with personal anecdotes and then there are answers, both well-balanced and researched by doctors and experts on how to tackle a certain issue in a relationship,” she says. The book is a collection of essays, one that Preeti admits some readers weren’t prepared for. “Most of my books have been works of fiction, so when they picked up this one, they expected it to contain stories and felt it was total let down. But some others could relate to it. Many readers have even tweeted to Smriti Irani, HRD minister, to include it junior college curriculum,” she says.
A writer since her college days, Preeti never imagined that she would go on to become a published author. “I used to work in the education sector and then started writing a blog in 2006, after my father passed away,” she says.
Why we love the way we do by Preeti Shenoy Westland pp.276, Rs 250
And it was this blog that got her noticed. In 2007, one of her posts was picked up by a US radio channel and in 2008, she published her first book, 34 Bubblegum and Candies. “Since that was my first non-fiction book, I didn’t have any expectations. My second book, Life is What You Make It, was rejected 39 times!” she exclaims. “But since then, I haven’t looked back. I have improved so much as a writer that I wish people would read more of my books,” she jokes.
Already working on her next book, Preeti says that writing is an activity that she can’t do without. “I have to write every day — be it in my journal, a blog, chapter in my book or a tweet,” says the author, who has started writing her eighth non-fiction book and feels that a writer’s block is an excuse some people make when they don’t want to write. “You can always write, it might not be award-winning, but there is no excuse for words to stop flowing,” she asserts.
