Dear Dolly

On Love, Life and Friendship, the instant Sunday Times bestseller

By: Dolly Alderton

Narrated by: Dolly Alderton

Brought to you by Penguin.

'What I learnt from sharing my most private pain with a semi-professional problem-solver was that the mere act of asking for help was, in itself, healing. It was as if I had crept down to the docks under cover of darkness and floated a message out in a bottle, imagining how it might be received. By writing it, I was acknowledging that someone might care about me; that they'd be able to say the right thing without knowing me. Because I was feeling something that other people had felt and therefore I wasn't, as I suspected, the loneliest and strangest woman in the world'

Since early 2020, Dolly Alderton has been sharing her wisdom, warmth and wit with the countless people who have written in to her Dear Dolly agony aunt column in The Sunday Times Style. Their questions range from the painfully - and sometimes hilariously - relatable to the occasionally bizarre. They include breakups and body issues, families, friendships, dating, divorce, the pleasures and pitfalls of social media, sex, loneliness, longing, love and everything in between.

Without judgement, and with deep empathy informed by her own, much-chronicled adventures in love, friendship and dating, Dolly leads us by the hand through the various labyrinths of life, proving that a problem shared is truly a problem halved.

'Alderton is Nora Ephron for the millennial generation' Elizabeth Day

© Dolly Alderton 2022 (P) Penguin Audio 2022

Critic reviews

A compendium of good advice from her Sunday Times columns, Dear Dolly is Dolly Alderton at her wise, warm and witty best. All of human life is contained in these pages: from dating apps to eating disorders, too much sex, not enough sex and the ebb and flow of friendships, relationships and situationships. I felt like a better, kinder person for having read these letters and Dolly's thoughtful replies

With a thoughtful essay about what answering others' questions has taught her, this collection of Alderton's agony aunt advice offers bundles of empathy (and zero judgement) about life's problems, from totally relatable dilemmas to the entertainingly voyeuristic

Her refreshing take makes for compulsive reading. The result is an oddly soothing book, as the problems of others leave you not with a sense of schadenfreude but with the comforting realisation that something you have felt, or are feeling, has been felt by countless others - and it will always be that way

Alderton has struck a chord with a generation ... Invaluable ... A must for die-hard Dolly fans

Dolly Alderton is so gifted at making people care. A rare talent

Alderton is Nora Ephron for the millennial generation

Capturing the hearts and minds of young romantics and dreamers, she offers sage and sisterly advice to those in need

Alderton's wise words can resonate with women of all ages. She feels like a best friend and your older sister all rolled into one and her pages wrap around you like a warm hug

Dolly Alderton is never less than dazzling on the travails of the human heart

Loved it

Feel like I'm using Dolly as my personal life coach. My only wish is that "Dear Dolly" was longer.

Lovely book

Loved listening to this! Fun, sincere and entertaining. Extremely well written and hearing Dolly reading the book adds extra charm to it.

Dear Sugar but millennial and British

I just love Dolly Alderton, and this book is so genuine and never banale. I love that it’s narrated by her, I wouldn’t have enjoyed it in the same way if it wasn’t.