He just doesn't like you: the whole truth about men. Greg Behrendt, Liz Tuccillo

The book is dedicated to all the charming ladies whose stories inspired us to create it.
There are several people without whom this book would not exist. First of all, we thank the extraordinarily talented Sex and the City writers Cindy Chapek, Jenny Beaks, Aimee B Harris, Julia Sweeney, Julie Rottenberg, and Eliza Zaritsky (they wrote the amazing episode that first got us thinking about the book), and, of course, our wonderful boss - Michael Patrick King. We have the warmest feelings for these people and are grateful to them for their help, generosity and ability to look at any situation with humor.
We thank everyone who actively supported the crazy idea to write this book - John Melfi, Sarah Condon, Richard Oren, as well as those who collaborated with HBO. Superspy and friend Greg Kaivik, who works at ICM, helped us get the book published. Many thanks to Julia James for moral support. Our deepest gratitude goes to press agent Andy Barzvi, who first took this book seriously and then managed to sell it profitably. We say "thank you" to our editor, philologist Patrick Price, a real gentleman.

Thanks also to the men and women who filled out the questionnaires, told stories from their lives, asked questions and did not allow us to lie while writing the book. We sincerely thank all our friends and family, especially Shirley Tuccillo and Kristen Behrendt, for their tireless support and enthusiasm.
Finally, we would like to thank Amiera Ruotola Berendt for her cooperation: the fire, sense of humor, talent, love, and sex appeal that this woman possesses make this book so amazing.
The stories told in this book serve as illustrative examples. They are not based on events in the lives of specific people. Whatever you think, we did not try to publicly ridicule our friends, enemies or former partners in it.
(However, we do not deny that such a thought may have occurred to us.)

Foreword by Liz
This day started as usual. We all sat in the office of the scriptwriters of the series - "Sex and the City" and exchanged opinions, told each other about our personal lives, transferring our experiences to fate screen heroines. And, as has already happened, one of the employees asked to explain the behavior of the man she liked. He behaved somewhat inconsistently, and this confused her. We gladly got down to business and began to discuss what his actions might mean. And, as before, after intense analytical discussion, we concluded: our colleague is delightful, and he must have been frightened, because he had never met such a wonderful woman, and therefore trembled and trembled; she just has to give him time. But there was a man in the room with us that day, a script consultant. He showed up at the studio twice a week, helped develop storylines, and viewed the show from a purely male perspective. It was Greg Behrendt. That very day, Greg listened carefully to the woman's story and our comments, and then turned to her. “Looks like,” he said, “he doesn’t like you that much.”

His words caused us shock, indignation, violent laughter, horror and, above all, bewilderment. However, we immediately felt that perhaps this man was telling the truth. The truth that we have never been revealed, despite a hundred years in total, of joint experience of relationships with men, and which we certainly never tried to talk about. "Well, maybe he's right about something," we reluctantly agreed.

“But Greg is unlikely to understand why my future husband, a very busy and complex person, behaves the way he does.” — said a friend. And then the conversations began: Greg, like an omniscient Buddha, went from one woman to another, listening to the unhappy stories of their personal lives. We could find justification for the behavior of all these men, starting with a broken index finger, which is used to dial a phone number, and ending with a difficult childhood. Greg smashed our arguments one by one to smithereens. As a result of incredible efforts, Greg managed to convince us that if a guy in his right mind really fell for a woman, then nothing would stop him from winning her. And if he is not of sound mind, then why is he needed? This was confirmed by his own experience: he changed partners, was a bad boy, was a good boy and eventually fell in love with an amazing woman and married her.

All the people in the story department, and I in particular, had a miraculous insight. For many years I suffered because of men and their behavior, which confused me. Now I understand that they are not at all didn't mean to confuse me. I got myself into trouble. But the point was only that those men didn’t like me that much.

It would seem that such conclusions must inevitably undermine our self-confidence and cause panic among us. In fact, it's quite the opposite. Knowledge is power, and, most importantly, knowledge does not allow you to waste time. From that day on, I realized that I would save a lot of time if I didn’t sit by the phone for hours waiting for the man I like to call, complain for hours about him to my girlfriends, spend hours wondering if he really wanted to say “I love you and want to to be with you". Greg reminded us that we are beautiful, intelligent and witty women and should not waste time figuring out why this or that guy does not call us. As Greg said, do not waste your beauty in vain.

It is not easy. We have always been taught to look for the positive in every phenomenon and to be optimistic. But not in this situation. Now just need to see the negative side. First of all, you should immediately accept as a fact that nothing can work out, and agree that your case is the rule, not the exception. It gives a feeling of intoxicating freedom. But not everyone gets to experience it. And all because we do the opposite: we go on a date with a man, fall in love with him, and then he does an act that slightly disappoints us. This act is followed by a series of others that are no less disappointing. Then comes a period of super-inventive excuses that last for weeks or even months, and it never occurs to us that this wonderful man we like so much has long turned into an unfortunate cripple. Otherwise, how can all the excuses invented to justify him correspond to reality? We try to explain why he behaves so strangely, and sometimes we find the most ridiculous reasons, although in fact there is only one reason: he just didn’t hit us.

We have included in the book questions that women ask about real situations in their lives. It contains the most common arguments that they find to justify the behavior of men and therefore cannot put an end to non-existent relationships. Read, enjoy it, and most importantly, learn from other people's experiences and problems. And if it seems to you that your boyfriend does not crazy about you, and you feel that it's time to find out, then think - maybe he doesn't like you that much. Then leave him and go in search of a man who will truly love you.

Foreword by Greg
So, I'm sitting in the office of the scriptwriters of the series "Sex and the City", thinking about how nice it is to be the only and, moreover, a heterosexual male in the women's team (actually, at this moment I'm eating cookies), and then the women start a conversation about the men you meet. We have such conversations quite often, it even helps to write a script for a film or series about the relationship between a man and a woman. But this conversation just blew me away. I know my words may seem sarcastic, but I say what I think.

That day, one of the women comes up to me and says, "Greg, you're the man." Very subtle observation, I really am a man. Then she adds, “I dated a guy… Well, yes, I think you can call it that.” I already know the answer. “You see, we went to the movies and it was great. No, he didn't take my hand. I still don't like holding hands." Besides, I know the answer. “And then he kissed me in the parking lot. I asked if he would like to stay with me for the night, but he had an important meeting the next morning, and he refused. Is she laughing at me? I know the answer!

And I asked:

Did he call you?

- That's the problem. It was about a week ago - now she herself must guess - and today I receive a letter from him in the spirit of "why don't you call me?".

I stared at Nes, wondering why she couldn't see that the answer was written all over my face. (Oh ladies, sometimes you just piss me off!) I've got a beautiful, talented, super smart girl writing one of the best TV series, which is also famous for showing men in the true light. Yes, almost any guy would like to date her. And this amazing girl was stumped by a situation in which everything is very clear to me. In fact, the expression "to confuse" is inappropriate here, the girl is too smart for that. She's just hoping, not stuck. But the state of affairs is such that there should be no hope here,