Are you often nervous to kiss your date at the end of the evening? A little knowledge is often all that you need to calm your anxieties, and “The Art of Kissing” by William Cane provides quite a bit of it. In these pages, readers discover dozens of new ways to take this intimate act up a level. This guide goes beyond simple lip-on-lip action: It includes many kinds of kisses from head to toe. Even if you feel like a pro at kissing, you may be surprised to learn some new and intriguing ideas to try, such as the “Trobriand Island kiss.”

Cane explicitly gives readers the instructions to pull off any of the kisses that he describes. To get those instructions ironed out, he interviewed and looked at survey results from kissers all around the world. He spent 16 years tracking down kissing experts to learn their secrets, which he shares in this guide. While a lot of research went into it, the writing is anything but cold and analytical. The author’s engaging storytelling may even make you feel like you are the one standing on the volcano in an “eerie orange glow” and kissing your lover, for example.

The first of four parts in this book looks at the psychology behind why, how, and who people kiss. Cane relays many of those answers with direct quotes from anonymous men and women. Plus, he refers to the wisdom of some kissing experts of yesteryear, such as early-20th-century psychoanalyst Wilhelm Reich. The next two parts go in-depth on the different ways of kissing and French kissing. Then, the last section works on helping readers to hone their techniques regardless of which kiss they decide to execute. This guide may not score you the opportunity to kiss, but it will certainly help prepare you for when that moment comes.