Love is not a singular concept.
In this collection, seven award-winning authors explore seven concepts of love: from Philautia, self-love, to Agape, love for humanity; and from Storge, natural affection for family, to Mania, a frenzied, obsessive love.
Seven authors; seven short stories; seven flashes of love.
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[Richard swirls shampoo into Joy's scalp - BEFORE IT DISAPPEARS BY ROWAN HISAYO BUCHANAN]***
(Sceptre Books, 3 November 2016, 167 pages, paperback, #popsugarreadingchallenge 2019, a book with 'love' in the title, bought from Amazon)
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Stories included:
- Before It Disappears by Rowan Hisayo Buchanan
- One More Thing Coming Undone by D.W Wilson
- White Wine by Nikesh Shukla
- Magdala, Who Slips Sometimes by Donal Ryan
- Codas by Carys Bray
- The Love Story by Grace McCleen
- The Human World by Bernadine Evaristo
- It Was Summer by Phoebe Ray (ScptreLoves Winner)
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I've wanted to read this collection of stories since it was announced and even entered the SceptreLoves competition when it was advertised in Writing Magazine. Too often people assume there is one kind of romantic love but there isn't and How Much the Heart Can Hold proves this. I loved this collection of stories. They prove how multi-faced and complicated love can really be. The first story, Before It Disappears by Rowan Hisayo Buchanan chilled me to the bone and is easily my favourite. The story implies the narrator's wife is ill at first, perhaps with cancer but reveals through chilling detail that she went on a hunger strike when her husband slept with someone else and is wasting away. I loved every story in the collection, especially One More Thing Coming Undone by D.W Wilson, Codas by Carys Bray and It Was Summer by Phoebe Ray.
