"Was that worth it?” It’s a question we’ve all asked ourselves while crawling out of a difficult relationship. Now, perfectly timed for the eBay generation, writer and artist Leanne Shapton examines the literal implications of quantifying a love affair in her delightfully bittersweet new book: Important Artifacts and Personal Property from the Collection of Lenore Doolan and Harold Morris, Including Books, Street Fashion, and Jewelry . It’s imagined as a catalog for an auction set on Valentine’s Day 2009 at the invented Strachan & Quinn auction house. The fictional Doolan and Morris’ romance unfolds through photographs and descriptions of 332 lots, comprising things accrued during their time together, from heart-shaped Charbonnel et Walker chocolate boxes to hotel room key cards. The heroine, Doolan, has a food column called “Cakewalk” in The New York Times, in which she explores evocative treats such as the “singing hinnie.” The cakes Doolan chooses to write about reveal the state of the relationship. One lot description reads: “A clipping of Doolan’s ‘Cakewalk’ column, dated January 11, 2004, on sand cake. Title: ‘Throw Me a Crumb.’ 8 x 2½.”

Read in Readers' Guide a very illuminating review of the book by Rachel Cooke in the Observer and another, quite detailed and persuasive, in the Virginia Quarterly.