Why There Are No Good Men Left: The Romantic Plight of the New Single Woman

I wish this book had a more upbeat title. My experience of reading anything by Barbara Dafoe Whitehead is that she makes even troubling news palatable. She is calm and smart -- never shrill or alarmist. Sadly, it is true that the current generation of youngish Americans is having a difficult time figuring out mating and marriage. Defoe lays bare the trends and we are much better for looking our demons in the face. I don't believe that there are no good men left. I believe, however, that there are many men who could use a little knowledge and a shift in attitude about how they approach courtship. Reading this book would be a good start.

I decided to read this book because, as a man, I wanted to get a sense of how women were seeing the opposite sex and the dating scene in general. What I found in this book was a hard and true reality of the current dating world. The book shows the struggles for women to find a life-time partner now a days. The fact that they need to be economically independent before looking for true love is just one of the many dificulties that women face today. It also shows how people in general, women and men, have become very pratical and work oriented in and outside the work place. The drawbacks in this way of seeing life and the opposite sex can be found in between the lines.Basically, "Why are there no good men left" presents and well states a problem. The benefit of reading it is to be aware of it before, the problem comes knocking on your door.It is a must read book for women and men in their 20s and 30s and also for parents willing to understand the current changes in the dating scene.

Reviewers who criticize this book as lacking useful advice for women or overly blaming men are missing the point: It's a fascinating snapshot into the minds of modern American women and the author herself as well as an indication of the changes for society ahead. If you want to save yourself a read, here's a quick summation: Successful, attractive, demanding, self-centered and aging women seem to have a hard time finding a successful man willing to give up his own carefree life to settle down with an old maid such as herself AND they can't seem to figure out why or what do to about it! It's an unintentional black comedy that will leave people in the know laughing and everyone else will have a hard time putting it down. I can't resist putting my own 2 cents into the issues the book raises and say that it's clear these women, indeed society, need to ask what's more important to women: Money and power or romance and love. To the women in the book, the answer is quite clear but that doesn't stop them from complaining about it and making fools of themselves. Grab some popcorn and enjoy.

You hit it right on the head - professional women are victims of their own selfishness.Choosing to be the next Condi Rice is a perfectly valid life goal, but walking this path requires a degree of self-centeredness that arouses suspicions in men as to just how giving you are (e.g. will you be there for us when the pink slip comes, when the prostate goes, when we're disfigured in battle, when the business is lost and we have to start over)?What do guys want?We want a [nice looking] woman who is kind and fun to be around. That's it. That's really all there is. We're pretty simple, you see. Everything else - your degrees, your worldly experiences, your credit worthinesss, your convertible - I assure you that those are way down on our lists. Those are things that you acquire for "you", not for "us".You can have anything you want, but you can't have everything.

People will criticize this book because of the author's pro-marriage bias, because the book is repetitive and doesn't offer any real solutions, and because (for me)the women she chooses to highlight are such amazing overachievers they are hard to identify with. Although I agree with all that, I enjoyed this book enormously. It helped me to realize that I am in the norm for not having wanted to find a husband while in college(and not even having had real relationships during college), having short-lived relationships during my experimental and indecisive twenties, and now in my early thirties suddenly finding myself hardly dating at all. This book helped me to feel that it's not because there's something odd about me... I finally have a good stable job, decent income, emotional maturity, a mortgage, experience around the globe... and am attractive and in good shape... but I haven't had a relationship in three years and rarely meet any available men I would want to date (and when I do, they are totally commitmentphobic, and many peer men do seem to prefer 22-year-olds). This book helped me to realize that I am not alone (although I have felt that way) in this situation and that there are real shifts in society going on that have left me in such a puzzling situation. And that people do react as if you are needy and codependent for expressing the desire to meet someone. I work in public service and see all these incredibly messed up people breeding children, and I often think how weird it is that I could be so (relatively) together, with such a great education, and so unable to find a mate.