Settle for Mr Good Enough

• Claims 30+ single women have lonely future
• Book is creating heated debate
• Suggests setlling for Mr Second Best

WOMEN searching for Mr Right should do it in their 20s or risk ending up lonely in their 30s.

Or so says author Lori Gottlieb, who has caused a storm in the United States for encouraging single women in their 30s to settle for Mr Second Best or even Mr Right Now.

Her book, Marry Him: The Case For Settling For Mr Good Enough, is creating a heated debate.

Miss Gottlieb, a 40-year-old single mother, admitted in her book that she wished she had settled for any of the "perfectly acceptable but uninspiring" men she rejected during her search for the perfect man.

And she claimed the notion of "The One" was a myth, accusing romantic fiction and films of betraying women by encouraging them to hold out for true love.

"We're conditioned to crave that big love," she wrote in her book.

"It's painful how pervasive the fantasy is that `The One' is out there.

"We grew up idealising marriage, but if we'd had a more realistic understanding of its cold, hard benefits, we might have done things differently.

"So we walked away from uninspiring relationships that might have made us happy."

Instead, settling for Mr Second Best could make women happier in the long run, she said.

Source: news.com.au