Efficient Love

Efficient Love™

 I Had 1,200 First Dates So You Don’t Have To™

For most people, dating is a fog of guesswork, chemistry, and hope.

You meet someone. You feel a spark. You trade stories, share meals, maybe share years. Somewhere along the way, you realize you’re not actually walking in the same direction. Sometimes that realization comes early. Sometimes it comes after a marriage, three moves, and a shared mortgage.

My approach to relationships started with a question:

“Is there a more efficient way to find someone truly compatible than stumbling through years of trial and error?”

That question led to my Novelist Seeks Heroine™ experiment:

  • A single webpage listing 28 attributes on one list that I foolishly believed defined long-term compatibility. (I learned it took three lists.)

  • Over 2 million visitors in the early days of the internet that started right before the turn-of-the-century (2000 not 1900!).

  • More than 15,000 responses from women who believed they might be that Heroine. (That’s one reason it took three lists: Profound, Profane and DIDO.)

  • Ten years of real-world testing: 1,200 real-world first dates. Over 300 real-world second dates – and beyond. 

  • Dozens of those 1,200 first dates ended up as lifelong, deeply, and meaningfully valued friendships that have lasted decades and have continued to this day – including many where we never made it to the second romantic date.

From all of those 15,000:

  • Exactly one woman was asked to marry me.

  • She said yes.

  • We’ve been married for more than twenty years, and still happily counting.

Efficient Love™ is the book that distills what I learned into something you can use without needing 1,200 first dates.

What Efficient Love™ Is (and Isn’t)

This is not:

  • A conquest memoir.

  • A collection of dating war stories.

  • A brag about numbers.

This is:

  • A guide to defining compatibility in clear, practical terms.

  • A way to understand your own patterns in love — who you choose, why you stay, and why you leave.

  • A framework for evaluating relationships early, kindly, and honestly.

  • A method for reducing needless heartbreak without shutting down your heart.

Core Themes in the Book

  • Clarity before chemistry: how to know what you’re actually looking for before you start searching.

  • Emotional readiness: why timing and internal alignment matter more than surface traits.

  • Patterns and repetition: how we unconsciously recreate the same relationship with different people.

  • The 28 attributes: the original list, updated with years of hindsight, nuance, and hard-won humility.

  • Efficient filtering: how to ask better questions earlier, so both people waste less time.

  • Staying or leaving: how to make those decisions with more courage and less self-sabotage.

Who This Book Is For

  • Single people tired of starting over again and again without understanding why.

  • Divorced readers who want to build something healthier next time.

  • Those in a relationship who quietly wonder, “Is this actually right for me long-term?”

  • Therapists, coaches, and matchmakers who want a structured lens to help their clients think more clearly.

And yes, it’s also for romantics who still believe in deep love — but want to pursue it intelligently.

A Note About Tone

Efficient Love™ is not cynical. It’s not bitter. It doesn’t tell you that love is a numbers game or that you should turn your dating life into a spreadsheet.

It says:

“Your heart deserves both hope and protection. Let’s give it both.”

Join the Efficient Love™ Interest List and ARC

Efficient Love™ is currently in development. You can engage at two levels:

  1. Efficient Love™ Early Interest List

    • Receive updates as chapters are completed

    • Get your “key” to the restored Novelist Seeks Heroine™ archives

    • Be notified when preorders and launch dates are set

  2. Efficient Love™ ARC

    • Read early drafts

    • Offer feedback, questions, and corrections

    • Help refine the 28-attribute framework for today’s world

    • Receive the final ebook free on launch

    • Choose whether to be thanked by name in the acknowledgments

If any part of this story makes you think, “I wish I’d had this ten years ago,” then you’re exactly the kind of reader whose voice I want shaping this book.

[Get Your Key & Join the Efficient Love List →]

[Apply for the Efficient Love ARC →]