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Breakup: The End of a Love Story
I will never forgive you.
I will never make love with you again.
I do not love you anymore.
Breakup is the erotically charged chronicle of the tempestuous final months of an eighteen-year romantic and literary partnership, self-destructing in the aftermath of the ultimate betrayal. Fearlessly and courageously, Texier chronicles the end of that love as it is wrecked by infidelity and deceit in a literary tour de force reminiscent by turns of Marguerite Duras and Henry Miller.
Texier writes in harrowing detail about the powerful sexual relationship she shared with her husband even during their breakup, how sex between them became a substitute for real intimacy, and how the fabric of a marriage (a shared cup of café au lait on a yellow table every morning, the memories of giving birth to two glorious daughters, of coediting their own literary magazine) is brutally dissolved.
Breakup is unsentimental and unflinching, a journal of love's exquisite torture. Every emotion, including rage, disgust, self-pity, hatred, sympathy, and jealousy, is mined. Heartbreaking, too, is the effect of the breakup on Texier's two children who, sometimes caught in the crossfire of their parents' turmoil, are trapped as the relationship spirals out of control and their once-secure home becomes a battlefield.
Ultimately, Breakup is about the risks one great passion involves. It is a journey of the heart in all its wild beating; a courageous diary of a soul laid bare, and the redemptive power of love.
I will never make love with you again.
I do not love you anymore.
Breakup is the erotically charged chronicle of the tempestuous final months of an eighteen-year romantic and literary partnership, self-destructing in the aftermath of the ultimate betrayal. Fearlessly and courageously, Texier chronicles the end of that love as it is wrecked by infidelity and deceit in a literary tour de force reminiscent by turns of Marguerite Duras and Henry Miller.
Texier writes in harrowing detail about the powerful sexual relationship she shared with her husband even during their breakup, how sex between them became a substitute for real intimacy, and how the fabric of a marriage (a shared cup of café au lait on a yellow table every morning, the memories of giving birth to two glorious daughters, of coediting their own literary magazine) is brutally dissolved.
Breakup is unsentimental and unflinching, a journal of love's exquisite torture. Every emotion, including rage, disgust, self-pity, hatred, sympathy, and jealousy, is mined. Heartbreaking, too, is the effect of the breakup on Texier's two children who, sometimes caught in the crossfire of their parents' turmoil, are trapped as the relationship spirals out of control and their once-secure home becomes a battlefield.
Ultimately, Breakup is about the risks one great passion involves. It is a journey of the heart in all its wild beating; a courageous diary of a soul laid bare, and the redemptive power of love.
176 pages, Paperback
First published June 3, 1999
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Displaying 1 - 29 of 29 reviews
August 12, 2018
Catherine Texier's story of the breakup of her 18 year relationship with a man who was also her literary partner, lover, best friend, and father of their 2 daughters can best be described as 'an anatomy of an affair'.
From the book's first pages, Texier provides the reader with an open access into the gradual unraveling of what had been for her, a loving and satisfying relationship. Her partner was in emotional withdrawal. Oftentimes, he was surly, abrupt, or would give her the silent treatment. The more I read, the more his selfishness became evident to me. Texier found it so hard to let go of what they had together. And, in his own way, even after admitting --- while both were seeing a psychologist to help sort out their evolving feelings about each other and their dying relationship --- to having an affair and continuing to spend time with 'the other woman', he and Texier continued an intermittent, fiery sexual relationship. As I was reading all this, I wanted to say out loud: "Why don't the two of you make a clean break of it?" Easy for me to say, I know, as a single man with no children. But that's how I felt as I watched their relationship slowly deflate and disintegrate.
I felt sorry for Texier because she was completely blindslided by her partner stepping out on her with this woman. In Texier's words: "The rage of being rejected. It’s one thing to be with a guy and see that he’s losing interest and maybe you are too, and quite another to have built a family and two literary careers and a house and eighteen years of shared companionship, the passion still going full swing in spite of the mounting tensions, and to feel the plug being pulled out overnight without warning.”
There is a denouement between Texier and her ex-partner. As a way of fully coming to grips with the end of the relationship, she has a big blowout party in the apartment she had shared with him and their children. "The party was meant as the kickoff of my new life. It was packed. It went on all night. It was exhilarating. A kind of exorcism. I was reclaiming my sexuality on the turf of our love. The very place where we had loved and hurt each other. I performed it with the ferocious energy of life feasting over a still-warm corpse. I barely had to lift a finger. Everybody had come to celebrate with me. A week before, I had bought a secondhand Isaac Mizrahi poppy-red stretch dress with spaghetti straps. I had carefully chosen the dress. Nothing short of red would have done. The dress worked its magic."
"BREAKUP: The End of a Love Story" has valuable lessons to provide the reader about the dynamics of an intimate relationship that comes to an unhappy end.
From the book's first pages, Texier provides the reader with an open access into the gradual unraveling of what had been for her, a loving and satisfying relationship. Her partner was in emotional withdrawal. Oftentimes, he was surly, abrupt, or would give her the silent treatment. The more I read, the more his selfishness became evident to me. Texier found it so hard to let go of what they had together. And, in his own way, even after admitting --- while both were seeing a psychologist to help sort out their evolving feelings about each other and their dying relationship --- to having an affair and continuing to spend time with 'the other woman', he and Texier continued an intermittent, fiery sexual relationship. As I was reading all this, I wanted to say out loud: "Why don't the two of you make a clean break of it?" Easy for me to say, I know, as a single man with no children. But that's how I felt as I watched their relationship slowly deflate and disintegrate.
I felt sorry for Texier because she was completely blindslided by her partner stepping out on her with this woman. In Texier's words: "The rage of being rejected. It’s one thing to be with a guy and see that he’s losing interest and maybe you are too, and quite another to have built a family and two literary careers and a house and eighteen years of shared companionship, the passion still going full swing in spite of the mounting tensions, and to feel the plug being pulled out overnight without warning.”
There is a denouement between Texier and her ex-partner. As a way of fully coming to grips with the end of the relationship, she has a big blowout party in the apartment she had shared with him and their children. "The party was meant as the kickoff of my new life. It was packed. It went on all night. It was exhilarating. A kind of exorcism. I was reclaiming my sexuality on the turf of our love. The very place where we had loved and hurt each other. I performed it with the ferocious energy of life feasting over a still-warm corpse. I barely had to lift a finger. Everybody had come to celebrate with me. A week before, I had bought a secondhand Isaac Mizrahi poppy-red stretch dress with spaghetti straps. I had carefully chosen the dress. Nothing short of red would have done. The dress worked its magic."
"BREAKUP: The End of a Love Story" has valuable lessons to provide the reader about the dynamics of an intimate relationship that comes to an unhappy end.
June 7, 2023
men are literally So evil and i am So afraid of marriage (and so grateful to be gay)
February 4, 2014
Without exageration, this is one of the most moving stories about the end of a relationship I've read. I don't know if it's the way that it staddles both the side where the serious passion existed and the side where that passion is over, but it's something. I expected to only see the rage against the nonspeaking partner and the hurt felt by the writer, but it seemed like I felt everything. There has to be everything if it's going to be real, because a breakup where there was nothing to morn has no magnitude. Of course, I can't say I had a good judgment of the guy, but still. The writing, the words, everything in this book hits hard...but at the same time with a unique tenderness. The words are lite rapid fire emotional bullets, gem-like dazzling and beautiful bullets. This is quite a story.
February 25, 2024
I would’ve killed this man a long time ago if I were her
February 8, 2018
Gut wrenching real memoir of the last year of a marriage. This is a tangled web of Catherine's feelings when she finds out her husband has cheated on her and is planning to move out. She goes through many stages as she still loves him. Sorrow, anger, calmness, confusion, and acceptance.
July 7, 2012
Really raw stuff. Brutally honest and affecting.
A couple of representative quotes:
1. "It's not true that stories climax and resolve. It's only true in the make-believe world of fiction. In the real world stories get told over and over, like a Mobius knot."
And though Texier embraces this sentiment of stories "told over and over" her repetition is more about emotional release than really telling stories (I kind of wish there were more scenes, more stories).
2. "Passionate love affairs die hard. They convulse and writhe and agonize till the bitter end. But the bliss and the headiness of love is worth the agony of the breakup. Death always comes at the end of life."
Oh, the hard and brutal truths of life!
A couple of representative quotes:
1. "It's not true that stories climax and resolve. It's only true in the make-believe world of fiction. In the real world stories get told over and over, like a Mobius knot."
And though Texier embraces this sentiment of stories "told over and over" her repetition is more about emotional release than really telling stories (I kind of wish there were more scenes, more stories).
2. "Passionate love affairs die hard. They convulse and writhe and agonize till the bitter end. But the bliss and the headiness of love is worth the agony of the breakup. Death always comes at the end of life."
Oh, the hard and brutal truths of life!
October 23, 2007
this book will totally inspire you the next time you think you can't live without the one who left. Brutally honest
July 24, 2011
Raw and affecting. Read it years ago and just came back to it recently.
August 19, 2014
Read this after it was recommended by Chloe Caldwell. It's entirely unforgettable.
May 6, 2020
Fearless. Best book I've read this year.
November 11, 2020
I only picked this book because it is a real life account and penned down by someone who claims to be an author. It is hard to differentiate one page from the other. They go through final stage of separation, have sex on daily basis, cook together and the husband leaves for his lover’s house. All this quite badly written. Was so angered by the book that I had to google about the characters and it seems that they finally got separated after all the rigmarole. I am sure this book would have played an important part in that.
March 1, 2019
I will not soon forget this one. For most of the book, very little actually happens but my heart raced and I couldn’t put it down. My marriage ended in twenty minutes. I am now grateful for that. But as painful as it was, she turned the breakup into something remarkable and unlike anything I’ve ever read before. I kind of want to thank her. That’s how good it is.
November 8, 2019
Basically, an unedited stream of consciousness diary through the breakup of a marriage. Repetitive and way way way too much detail about exactly who does what to whom sexually. Yes, brutally honest, but tedious.
July 20, 2018
I read it straight through. What a woman, what a love story. I had a magical romance that came an unexpected and abrupt end. I couldn't believe it either. She has captured the anguish well.
September 21, 2018
I love stories that are raw and honest. This is one!
February 27, 2024
This was on the list of required reading for my writing program. I didn't love it.
June 25, 2025
I want this man in jail
April 9, 2010
"Relationships end, affairs fall apart. But it doesn't mean that one shouldn't have them. It doesn't mean that one shouldn't fall crazily in love and live."
p.158
This memoir reads as if she simply took her journal, dispensed with the editing process and published it as is. It made me feel a bit as if I'd snuck her journal out of a secret drawer to read her secrets. I felt like a voyeur reading this. I was uncomfortable. I was also sad for her. There's no easy way out of a love affair. For the leaver, the pain will come later, when the novelty of a new sex partner may wear off and the leaver sees the trail of dead love left behind.
The leavee is left, mostly alone, wondering why rejection plays such a big role in all the feelings playing out.
Look, I know she got some mediocre reviews for publishing something so private and that may have come off as a vengeful airing of dirty laundry. But, you know what? When you, as a man, make poor decisions, lies, hurts people, virtually abandons your wife and children because something better came along AND you continue to take sexual advantage of your wife, who, by the way only has sex with you to maintain a connection, then you deserve to be outed as a douchebag liar and guilty of general, and I'm borrowing this word, assholery. That was a really long and ranty sentence. So be it. stream of consciousness typing this late at night gives me a pass on proper grammar.
By the way, the "husband", Joel Rose, married the homewrecker, whelped off a couple of boys, and enjoys life being married to his socialite in the publishing industry and all the connections that may offer. Big fucking deal. He dumped his wife and two older children for a networking opportunity. Excellent morals.
p.158
This memoir reads as if she simply took her journal, dispensed with the editing process and published it as is. It made me feel a bit as if I'd snuck her journal out of a secret drawer to read her secrets. I felt like a voyeur reading this. I was uncomfortable. I was also sad for her. There's no easy way out of a love affair. For the leaver, the pain will come later, when the novelty of a new sex partner may wear off and the leaver sees the trail of dead love left behind.
The leavee is left, mostly alone, wondering why rejection plays such a big role in all the feelings playing out.
Look, I know she got some mediocre reviews for publishing something so private and that may have come off as a vengeful airing of dirty laundry. But, you know what? When you, as a man, make poor decisions, lies, hurts people, virtually abandons your wife and children because something better came along AND you continue to take sexual advantage of your wife, who, by the way only has sex with you to maintain a connection, then you deserve to be outed as a douchebag liar and guilty of general, and I'm borrowing this word, assholery. That was a really long and ranty sentence. So be it. stream of consciousness typing this late at night gives me a pass on proper grammar.
By the way, the "husband", Joel Rose, married the homewrecker, whelped off a couple of boys, and enjoys life being married to his socialite in the publishing industry and all the connections that may offer. Big fucking deal. He dumped his wife and two older children for a networking opportunity. Excellent morals.
June 13, 2016
I inhaled this book, very easy read. Definition of guilty pleasure. I thoroughly enjoy reading about east coast, upper-middle class professionals' marital problems. Maybe because it's so out of my milieu.
This book, perhaps more than any other, made me understand the pain of a marriage breaking up. I don't know why, but I usually imagine that divorce is what both people in the situation realize is the only choice. I don't know why I have that naive view.
He is trying to leave her and she is trying to hold him. I don't know how much I should trust her, she definitely seems like the textbook unreliable narrator. But I love it when somebody lets you into that intimacy, their marriage. I'm sure this was the best revenge she could have gotten. It's always going to be out there and it's easy to google and find out who her ex is and who he left her for.
Also, books like this when someone is in incredible pain can come off sounding whiny or self indulgent. I don't know how she avoided that, but it was always absorbing, never a downer.
This book, perhaps more than any other, made me understand the pain of a marriage breaking up. I don't know why, but I usually imagine that divorce is what both people in the situation realize is the only choice. I don't know why I have that naive view.
He is trying to leave her and she is trying to hold him. I don't know how much I should trust her, she definitely seems like the textbook unreliable narrator. But I love it when somebody lets you into that intimacy, their marriage. I'm sure this was the best revenge she could have gotten. It's always going to be out there and it's easy to google and find out who her ex is and who he left her for.
Also, books like this when someone is in incredible pain can come off sounding whiny or self indulgent. I don't know how she avoided that, but it was always absorbing, never a downer.
September 26, 2008
Very "stream of consciousness" writing style (lots of intentional vagueness and NO dialogue marks - I hate that), not my favorite to read. Plus, she goes into MUCH too much detail about sex - I really don't need to know *exactly* how he performs oral sex, nor do I need to know exactly when and why he gets erections. I can understand her impulse to want to record these nitty-gritty details in a journal as her marriage is failing, somehow it's a last gasp way of saving the relationship, because forgetting feels dangerous, I get that; but it really didn't need to be included in the published book. I did appreciate her blunt and brutal honesty - once her husband admits to an affair, and he waffles for months about whether to end it or leave his wife, she writes honestly about her feelings, her ambivalence, her inability (and lack of desire) to just kick him out, the difficulty of balancing pride with love. A very quick read, I finished it in one day, even with kids pestering me.
April 29, 2010
Brutally honest, totally open, the author bares all when her husband decides he doesn't love her anymore. The pain and I believe healing that she shows in this book was inspiring for me. I too have been in a relationship where the hurt is so great, the betrayal so deep yet you can't let go. that's where she found herself and this shows how she worked her way through it. I loved it!
January 30, 2017
I kept stumbling across favorable mentions of this book so I finally read it. Perhaps because I've never gone through it, I found this memoir off-putting. I wanted to throttle (figuratively) the author, and her (ex) husband. Both were obnoxious cowards. It could have said what it needed to in 10 pages, but then the story got stretched out for 150 more.
December 3, 2014
I thought I would really like this books and that I can some what relate to the story....but it became way to repetitive for me, and the character kept repeating herself, and trying to give herself strength, which was what I was hoping this book would do for me, but it didn't.
September 23, 2007
Reading the author's raw prose after the sudden split with her husband reminded me vividly of every break-up I had endured.
March 31, 2010
Breakup: The End of a Love Story by Catherine Texier (1999)
July 23, 2016
Jiminy! Lame, lame, lame.
August 16, 2012
Devastatingly, brutally moving and thought provoking.
June 12, 2016
Fast & emotional & Real.
July 17, 2016
Well-written but OH GOD so raw and painful, why did I check this out???? Have to be in a much darker place before I'd be able to go here.
Displaying 1 - 29 of 29 reviews