Walmart and Target have already been bombarded with cardboard hearts full of chocolate and cheesy cards that all supposedly mean, “I love you.” The thing is, how do you define love? How do you define a relationship? Can it even be portrayed through words?

The Lover’s Dictionary by David Levithan, takes words and combines it into a love story. This isn’t necessarily a happily ever after story – those two things don’t equate. He shares the tumultuous relationship of two people through dictionary entries. Everyone can relate because it has the highs of first falling for a crush, the newlywed phase of a young love, and then the painful insight as it all comes crashing down..

The story retaliates against the norm because the plot isn’t linear. Readers get grasps of the end of the relationship within the first pages of the book.

According to a Q&A with Amazon, Levithan has written a story for his friend’s Valentine’s gift every year for the past 23. This is the tradition (or as he calls it, the deadline) that inspired The Lover’s Dictionary. His other muse was a dictionary from his parent’s basement that was a high school gift.

What makes this book persistently interesting is that Levithan created a Twitter for the book that he frequently updates. The feed has original definitions that were not included in the book. Here’s a peek at one of my favorites.