As every writer knows, the reviewing process can be a grueling exercise in humility. Some people like what you have to say, others not so much. A lot of it depends on a person’s mood that day, or projection stemming from conflict, or just plain jealousy that you published a book and they didn’t. I know. it’s pathetic. But it happens all the time.

With this as a backdrop, I thought that i would share a recent review that meant a lot to me. The reader obviously understood the message and offered a thoughtful response, which is always appreciated.

Here it is in its entirety:

“Who wrote this book? Is he kidding? Is he serious? Is he the angriest man in the urban mid-life dating world? Or is he part of a silent majority, the rest of whom lack either the courage or literary skill (or both) to expose the innermost secrets of many middle-aged men in the world of high income big city dating?

Treat it as parody, or treat it as reality, or some of both – either way, it is a great read!

A book for men who want to confirm what they already suspect or know.

A book for women who want to understand what many men are thinking – either the men they want to avoid, the men they want to attract, or the men they are already seeing.

Meet the new, urban, single, wealthy, successful middle-aged man. He’s post-angry. He’s entitled. He’s demanding. And that is only half the story. Meet the new urban single middle-aged woman. She’s unrealistic. Utterly oblivious. Living in a dream world of self-created fantasy.

Meet Urban Dystrophy.

Where men are middle-aged at 56.

But women are middle-aged at 36.

In the world of the big city, middle aged dating is a battlefield filled with dysfunction, borderline personality disorder, hidden agenda, and narcissism. For people who find themselves single in mid life (bad), or who never married (worse), finding a mate who isn’t carrying more baggage than a UPS truck or who is who they say they are or who considers honest self representation a virtue is more unlikely than winning a multi-state lottery.

Middle age may be the new 30, but dating in middle age is the new torture. Built on mass media created thrones of high expectation, the middle aged mans dating experience is all about his desire to have the kinds of girls that he either did have or couldn’t have when he was 25. But now that he is affluent and 50, he deserves – is entitled to – those girls. Why would they want a 25-year-old guy, when he has everything to offer them? After all, we KNOW that women fall in love with their ears, not their eyes, don’t we?

For many women, this will be a primer on the kind of man to avoid. Unfortunately, the book points out that most of the men they believe they want fall right into this category.

For many men in the middle-aged dating scene, this will be a full-on reinforcement and vindication of their dating experiences and choices.

Anthropological intrigue.

In the land of Urban Dystrophy, young women in their late 20’s who are offended when men in their mid-fifties or older hit on them are offended not because they think the man is pathetic, but because the man is insulting them – how DARE he think they cannot attract an uber successful man in his early 30’s? The middle-aged man becomes the ultimate insult. For the middle-aged man who is rejected by the woman in her late 20’s or early 30’s, she’s just an idiot. No offense taken. He’ll find another.

Who is going to wait on the sidelines until she either dates down, waaaay down, the economic ladder (as men have done forever), or dates up, waaaay up, the age range (as men have done forever – after all, the 69 year old man happy to be dating her will be dating waaaay down the age range – middle aged women.

You may think that this is written from the perspective of a person who has money and financial success at the core of his soul. And maybe you think that if you have, for example, God there instead, you will have a different outcome. And you will. You won’t live in the middle of the big city, divorced or never married, hanging out in health clubs or wine bars or charity events to find love. You will be in church. That said, in the world of Urban Dystrophy, they are both a kind of self-delusion. The delusion being, that we are worthy just as we are. Self-love is delusional love, without God, or Money, or Beauty. Because, in the big city, all the self love in the world won’t get you laid – not without the other stuff, anyway.” M.F., Las Vegas, NV.