“[Frazzetto] uses psychology, neurology and biological information to explore the ways in which intimacy manifests in different types of relationships. He recounts the stories of eight relationships, from romantic—such as Ryan and Vanessa, who have been having an affair for years—to the familial or personal. Oscar, for instance, must contend with what it means to be close to death, while Anita invents a fake boyfriend to help her cope with her loneliness. Each story puts intimacy and how we experience it on display.”
—Concepción De León, The New York Times
“Together, Closer examines the way humans relate to each other across a spectrum of relationships from parent-child to platonic friendships and, of course, romantic love. . . . The reader reads the stories of others’ lives but, of course, we are really appraising our own. Every now and then—and where this happens will depend on your intimate style—the text seems to silver into a kind of mirror. It is unnervingly accurate the way this works, and triggers an interior scrutiny. In these characters, Frazzetto is really showing us ourselves, helping us to look at what we usually look away from.”
—The Guardian
“An ambitious project . . . Giovanni Frazzetto marries science with art, the most recent discoveries of neuroscience with human stories about intimacy. . . . A clear love of art and science shines from the book.”
—The Irish Times
“[Frazzetto] ponders what intimacy really is, what it means, and how it shifts and changes throughout a person’s lifetime. . . . Regardless of whether they are heterosexual or homosexual relationships, or between a parent and child, each tender story shows a different aspect of intimacy, including the passion one first might ascribe to the word ‘intimate.’ . . . The author leaves the door open for readers to make their own comparisons and conclusions. Science and anecdote intertwine in this close examination of the bonds that bind humans together.”
—Kirkus Reviews
Praise for Giovanni Frazzetto’s Joy, Guilt, Anger, Love:
“In Frazzetto’s book, the Italian researcher and writer offers a fine primer on six emotions plus empathy. But before diving into the biology of each emotion (the role of the amygdala in fear and of serotonin reuptake in grief), he inspects his target through the lenses of psychology, philosophy, art, and personal experience. What you see is that poetry offers more insight into our feelings than does neuroanatomy or biochemistry.”
—The Washington Post
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