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Let’s cut to the chase. Valentine’s Day (aka Singles’ Awareness Day) can really suck sometimes. With all the red and pink fluff attacking you at Wal-Mart and Luther Vandross’s “Here and Now” infiltrating your ears every time you turn on the radio, it’s no wonder people tend to be pessimistic about it sometimes.

The truth is, this is the perfect day to get busy with loving yourself. No, that in that way. That’s another article for another time.

Here’s the thing: attempting to love someone else successfully when you may not even love yourself is a no-win situation for both parties. Maybe you do love yourself, but you just aren’t feeling so hot about your current situation-–maybe you’ve been single for way too long. Maybe you’re in a crappy relationship. Maybe your relationship is simply “sufficient”–minimal pain, but minimal joy as well. Or maybe your love life is just fine and all is well.

Whatever your situation, consider lavishing the love on yourself this Valentine’s Day with three inner-beauty enhancers in book form, sized just right for getting your groove back better than even Stella could.

1. Garner Some Confidence by Getting Gorgeous

Carmindy, makeup artisté extraordinaire of TLC’s “What Not to Wear,” has penned the cheerful full-color, coffee-table-ready makeup and personal development book Get Positively Beautiful: The Ultimate Guide to Feeling and Looking Gorgeous.

Unlike its counterparts (filled with stick-figured Swiss models and completely unattainable looks), this book offers some spice for your life as well as your face. Carmindy takes us on the journey of how she went from frump to fab by upping her own personal sense of self-worth, a journey many of us are continuously traveling. She also offers “mirror mantras” — short and sweet sayings for each of us to chant as we gaze into our own incredible pupils. The mantras teach us to appreciate and work with what we’ve got rather than attempt to conform to an “ideal” standard.

2. Get Frisky!

Getting Naked Again: Dating, Romance, Sex, and Love When You’ve Been Divorced, Widowed, Dumped, or Distracted gives us the scoop on how to regain our mojos after a serious loss of love. We don’t need a song to tell us that breaking up is hard to do. It can take years to truly get over someone, regardless of how the relationship ended. Dr. Judith Sills provides a witty self-help guide for getting us back on our love-laden feet, checking our attitudes at the door, and rebuilding lost confidence. She shows us we don’t need to bring sexy back—it never left to begin with.

3. Live, Laugh, Love, and Be Happy

I was eleven when I got my period. I remember exactly how it happened, where I was, and each detail of the ensuing story that I was too embarrassed to tell — that is, until I discovered that my story wasn’t much different from yours. Hence the premise of My Little Red Book by 18-year-old Rachel Kauder Nalebuff, who has been compiling a plethora of often hilarious and equally embarrassing first period stories from women around the world since she was 13.

Examples of these include a woman who got her period at Andy Roddick’s tennis match in 2003 and a 1941 onslaught of menstruation during World War II. There’s even a story of a woman who got her first period while jet skiing—an experience I wish upon no one. What an amazing yet satisfying confirmation that we women are alike in more ways than we know — because you always remember your first.

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