Author Guide · Memoir and Psychology
Books Written by
Lori Gottlieb published her first book from the diary she kept at eleven, when she was starving herself. Two decades and several careers later — television, a dot-com start-up, journalism — she took a master’s in clinical psychology at Pepperdine in 2010 and became a licensed therapist in Los Angeles. Her best-known book, Maybe You Should Talk to Someone (2019), follows four of her patients and her own sessions with a therapist she calls Wendell after a sudden breakup. She also writes the “Dear Therapist” column for The Atlantic, and her 2019 TED talk was one of the most watched of that year. This guide covers her 5 key books, in order, and where to begin.
By Lisanne Swart · 5 key books · 2000–2019 · Updated October 2026
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Quick answer
Lori Gottlieb has written five books: Stick Figure (2000), Inside the Cult of Kibu (2002), I Love You, Nice to Meet You (2006), Marry Him (2010) and Maybe You Should Talk to Someone (2019), her best known. Start with Maybe You Should Talk to Someone; below is what each of the others is about and why Marry Him caused a row.
Where to Start with Lori Gottlieb
If you want her defining book
→ Maybe You Should Talk to Someone (2019) — a therapist, her patients and her own therapist.
If you want her own story from childhood
→ Stick Figure (2000) — the diary of an eleven-year-old with anorexia.
If you want the book everyone argued about
→ Marry Him (2010) — the case for settling for Mr. Good Enough.
If you want a look inside the dot-com bubble
→ Inside the Cult of Kibu (2002).
5 Lori Gottlieb Books, in Order
Stick Figure
Told through the diary entries Gottlieb kept as an eleven-year-old, the book follows her life-threatening descent into anorexia and her parents’ search for help. The American Library Association named it one of its Best Books of 2001, and Martin Scorsese optioned it for film.
Inside the Cult of Kibu
Written with Jesse Jacobs, this is an insider’s account of the dot-com crash, built around Kibu.com, a website for teenage girls where Gottlieb was editor-in-chief. It combines her own experience of the start-up with oral histories from others who worked in the boom.
I Love You, Nice to Meet You
A dating guide written with Kevin Bleyer, alternating between a man’s and a woman’s point of view on everything from first dates to break-ups. Library Journal called it a “wonderful gem of wit, honesty, snarkiness, advice, and commentary.”
Marry Him
An expansion of her 2008 essay in The Atlantic. Gottlieb, then a single mother in her early forties, draws on experts in long-term relationships and argues that women looking for a lasting partner should stop ruling men out on superficial traits. It became a New York Times bestseller, divided reviewers sharply, and Tobey Maguire’s production company bought the film rights.
Maybe You Should Talk to Someone
After her boyfriend ends their relationship because he does not want to live with a child, Gottlieb starts seeing a therapist, Wendell, while treating her own patients: John, a hostile producer; Julie, a newlywed whose cancer turns untreatable; Rita, a depressed woman nearing seventy; and Charlotte, a 27-year-old who drinks too much. It was a New York Times bestseller, Time named it a must-read of 2019, and Eva Longoria has been developing it as a television series for ABC.
In What Order to Read Lori Gottlieb
None of Gottlieb’s books continue from one another, so there is no required order. Most readers come to her through Maybe You Should Talk to Someone, and it is the best place to start: it is the only one written as a trained therapist, and it explains much of the life behind the earlier books.
After that, read by interest. Stick Figure is the most personal and goes back to her childhood; Marry Him is the most argued over; the two co-written books from the 2000s are the most of their time.
A reading path
1. Maybe You Should Talk to Someone (2019)
2. Stick Figure (2000)
3. Marry Him (2010)
4. Inside the Cult of Kibu (2002)
5. I Love You, Nice to Meet You (2006)
The years · 1966–2019
Quick facts about Lori Gottlieb
- Known for
- Lori Gottlieb is known as the psychotherapist who wrote openly about being in therapy herself, and as The Atlantic’s “Dear Therapist” columnist.
- 1966
- Born in Los Angeles
- 1989
- BA from Stanford University
- 2000
- Stick Figure
- 2010
- Master’s in clinical psychology; Marry Him
- Born
- 1966, Los Angeles, California
- Education
- BA, Stanford University (1989); MA in clinical psychology, Pepperdine University (2010)
- Profession
- Licensed marriage and family therapist in Los Angeles
- Column
- “Dear Therapist”, The Atlantic, where she is a contributing editor
- Podcast
- Co-host of Dear Therapists (iHeart)
- Earlier careers
- Television writing and development, then editor-in-chief of Kibu.com
The red mark is 2019: Maybe You Should Talk to Someone, her book about her patients and her own therapy.
How Lori Gottlieb Writes: The Therapist on the Couch
Gottlieb’s books start from her own life. Stick Figure reprints her childhood diary; Marry Him begins with her own dating history as a single mother; Maybe You Should Talk to Someone opens with a breakup that sends her into therapy. She writes in the first person and does not spare herself.
Her best-known book is built like an ensemble novel. Chapters cut between four patients and her own sessions with Wendell, so the reader watches the same ideas — grief, denial, the stories people tell about themselves — from both chairs. The New York Times called it “a kind of ensemble soap opera” and noted that she is “authentic, even raw, about herself and her patients.”
Before therapy she was a journalist, and it shows: Marry Him and the two co-written books lean on interviews with experts and ordinary people rather than on theory. Her TED talk makes the same argument as her therapy book, that people can change by editing the stories they tell about their lives.
Watch
How changing your story can change your life
In her 2019 TED talk Gottlieb argues that the stories we tell about our lives can keep us stuck, and explains how to act as your own editor.
Frequently asked questions about Lori Gottlieb’s books
How many books has Lori Gottlieb written?
Five: Stick Figure (2000), Inside the Cult of Kibu (2002, with Jesse Jacobs), I Love You, Nice to Meet You (2006, with Kevin Bleyer), Marry Him (2010) and Maybe You Should Talk to Someone (2019).
What are Lori Gottlieb’s books in order?
Stick Figure: A Diary of My Former Self (2000), Inside the Cult of Kibu (2002), I Love You, Nice to Meet You (2006), Marry Him: The Case for Settling for Mr. Good Enough (2010) and Maybe You Should Talk to Someone (2019).
Where should I start with Lori Gottlieb?
With Maybe You Should Talk to Someone (2019). It is her best-known book, the only one written as a trained therapist, and it gives the background to much of her earlier work.
What is Lori Gottlieb’s most famous book?
Maybe You Should Talk to Someone: A Therapist, HER Therapist, and Our Lives Revealed (2019), a New York Times bestseller about four of her patients and her own sessions with a therapist she calls Wendell.
Who is Wendell in Maybe You Should Talk to Someone?
Wendell is the name Gottlieb uses for the therapist she starts seeing after her boyfriend ends their relationship. He suggests her grief is about more than the breakup, and their sessions run alongside the stories of her four patients: John, Julie, Rita and Charlotte.
Is Maybe You Should Talk to Someone being made into a TV series?
A series was announced in 2018, developed by Eva Longoria for ABC. As far as is publicly known it has not yet aired.
Why was Marry Him controversial?
Marry Him (2010) grew from a 2008 essay in The Atlantic urging women to settle for “Mr. Good Enough”. Some critics called it corrosive and anti-feminist, while O magazine found it “surprisingly, unnervingly convincing”. Gottlieb said the title was ironic and that the book never tells readers not to feel passionately about their partner.
Is Lori Gottlieb a real therapist?
Yes. She took a master’s in clinical psychology at Pepperdine University in 2010 and is a licensed marriage and family therapist in Los Angeles. She also writes The Atlantic’s “Dear Therapist” column and co-hosts the Dear Therapists podcast.
What is Stick Figure about?
Her 2000 memoir, told through the diary she kept at eleven, about her anorexia and her family’s search for help. The American Library Association named it one of its Best Books of 2001.
What is Lori Gottlieb’s TED talk about?
“How changing your story can change your life” (2019) argues that the stories people tell about their lives can trap them when they are incomplete, and that you can act as your own editor. It was one of the most-watched TED talks of 2019.
Footnotes
- Lori Gottlieb — Wikipedia
- Maybe You Should Talk to Someone — Wikipedia
- Gottlieb, Lori — Encyclopedia.com
- “Marry Him’s” Lori Gottlieb: Settling and the single girl — Salon, 2010
- Lori Gottlieb — Penguin Random House
- Lori Gottlieb’s new TED talk — The Lavin Agency, 2019
Bibliography last verified 9 October 2026. Where sources give different first-publication years, this page uses the year in library catalogues or the publisher’s own record.
This list was not put together by a machine.
The notes are all mine,
and the books are all his.
Lisanne x
Written by Lisanne Swart, who has curated reading lists and author guides at lisanneswart.com since 2021.
See more on her personal bookshelf.
“To write a new chapter is to venture into the unknown.”
— Lori Gottlieb, TED talk “How changing your story can change your life” (2019)
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