Download or read book The Marriage Plot written by Jeffrey Eugenides and published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. This book was released on 2011-10-11 with total page 418 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A New York Times Notable Book of 2011 A Publisher's Weekly Top 10 Book of 2011 A Kirkus Reviews Top 25 Best Fiction of 2011 Title One of Library Journal's Best Books of 2011 A Salon Best Fiction of 2011 title One of The Telegraph's Best Fiction Books of the Year 2011 It's the early 1980s—the country is in a deep recession, and life after college is harder than ever. In the cafés on College Hill, the wised-up kids are inhaling Derrida and listening to Talking Heads. But Madeleine Hanna, dutiful English major, is writing her senior thesis on Jane Austen and George Eliot, purveyors of the marriage plot that lies at the heart of the greatest English novels. As Madeleine tries to understand why "it became laughable to read writers like Cheever and Updike, who wrote about the suburbia Madeleine and most of her friends had grown up in, in favor of reading the Marquis de Sade, who wrote about deflowering virgins in eighteenth-century France," real life, in the form of two very different guys, intervenes. Leonard Bankhead—charismatic loner, college Darwinist, and lost Portland boy—suddenly turns up in a semiotics seminar, and soon Madeleine finds herself in a highly charged erotic and intellectual relationship with him. At the same time, her old "friend" Mitchell Grammaticus—who's been reading Christian mysticism and generally acting strange—resurfaces, obsessed with the idea that Madeleine is destined to be his mate. Over the next year, as the members of the triangle in this amazing, spellbinding novel graduate from college and enter the real world, events force them to reevaluate everything they learned in school. Leonard and Madeleine move to a biology Laboratory on Cape Cod, but can't escape the secret responsible for Leonard's seemingly inexhaustible energy and plunging moods. And Mitchell, traveling around the world to get Madeleine out of his mind, finds himself face-to-face with ultimate questions about the meaning of life, the existence of God, and the true nature of love. Are the great love stories of the nineteenth century dead? Or can there be a new story, written for today and alive to the realities of feminism, sexual freedom, prenups, and divorce? With devastating wit and an abiding understanding of and affection for his characters, Jeffrey Eugenides revives the motivating energies of the Novel, while creating a story so contemporary and fresh that it reads like the intimate journal of our own lives.

Download or read book Former Lover s Marriage Plot written by A Yue and published by Funstory. This book was released on 2020-09-12 with total page 675 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This was the story of a tyrannical CEO of a rich beauty! When the white lotus appears between childhood and childhood, is love still stable? Johann, as the real estate mogul's woman, was a rich and beautiful woman, rich and beautiful. When a man she loved since childhood and a white lotus flower appeared before everyone, she chose to leave arrogantly, never looking back. But who could tell her who was this man who clung to her and insisted on marrying her?

Download or read book Former Lover s Marriage Plot written by A Yue and published by Funstory. This book was released on 2020-08-31 with total page 746 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This was the story of a tyrannical CEO of a rich beauty! When the white lotus appears between childhood and childhood, is love still stable? Johann, as the real estate mogul's woman, was a rich and beautiful woman, rich and beautiful. When a man she loved since childhood and a white lotus flower appeared before everyone, she chose to leave arrogantly, never looking back. But who could tell her who was this man who clung to her and insisted on marrying her?

Download or read book Blow Your House Down written by Gina Frangello and published by Catapult. This book was released on 2021-04-06 with total page 336 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice • A Good Morning America Recommended Book • A LitReactor Best Book of the Year • A BuzzFeed Most Anticipated Book of the Year • A Lit Hub Most Anticipated Book of the Year • A Rumpus Most Anticipated Book of the Year • A Bustle Most Anticipated Book of the Month "A pathbreaking feminist manifesto, impossible to put down or dismiss. Gina Frangello tells the morally complex story of her adulterous relationship with a lover and her shortcomings as a mother, and in doing so, highlights the forces that shaped, silenced, and shamed her: everyday misogyny, puritanical expectations regarding female sexuality and maternal sacrifice, and male oppression." —Adrienne Brodeur, author of Wild Game Gina Frangello spent her early adulthood trying to outrun a youth marked by poverty and violence. Now a long-married wife and devoted mother, the better life she carefully built is emotionally upended by the death of her closest friend. Soon, awakened to fault lines in her troubled marriage, Frangello is caught up in a recklessly passionate affair, leading a double life while continuing to project the image of the perfect family. When her secrets are finally uncovered, both her home and her identity will implode, testing the limits of desire, responsibility, love, and forgiveness. Blow Your House Down is a powerful testimony about the ways our culture seeks to cage women in traditional narratives of self-sacrifice and erasure. Frangello uses her personal story to examine the place of women in contemporary society: the violence they experience, the rage they suppress, the ways their bodies often reveal what they cannot say aloud, and finally, what it means to transgress "being good" in order to reclaim your own life.

Download or read book This Is the Story of a Happy Marriage written by Ann Patchett and published by A&C Black. This book was released on 2013-11-07 with total page 335 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 'So compellingly personal you feel you're looking over her shoulder as she sits down to write' New York Times 'Electrically entertaining ... Funny, generous, spirited and kind' The Times This Is the Story of a Happy Marriage is an irresistible blend of literature and memoir revealing the big experiences and little moments that shaped Ann Patchett as a daughter, wife, friend and writer. Here, Ann Patchett shares entertaining and moving stories about her tumultuous childhood, her painful early divorce, the excitement of selling her first book, driving a Winnebago from Montana to Yellowstone Park, her joyous discovery of opera, scaling a six-foot wall in order to join the Los Angeles Police Department, the gradual loss of her beloved grandmother, starting her own bookshop in Nashville, her love for her very special dog and, of course, her eventual happy marriage. This Is the Story of a Happy Marriage is a memoir both wide ranging and deeply personal, overflowing with close observation and emotional wisdom, told with wit, honesty and irresistible warmth.

Download or read book A Sorrow Beyond Dreams written by Peter Handke and published by Pushkin Press. This book was released on 2013-03-26 with total page 60 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "My mother has been dead for almost seven weeks: I had better go to work before the need to write about her, which I felt so strongly at her funeral, dies away and I fall back into the dull speechlessness with which I reacted to the nerves of her suicide." So begins Peter Handke's extraordinary confrontation with his mother's death. In a painful and courageous attempt to deal with the almost intolerable horror of her suicide, he sets out to piece together the facts of her life, as he perceives them. What emerges is a loving portrait of inconsolable grief, a woman whose lively spirit has been crushed not once but over and over again by the miseries of her place and time. Yet well into middle age, living in the Austrian village of her birth, she still remains haunted by her dreams.

Download or read book The Marriage Plot written by Naomi Seidman and published by Stanford University Press. This book was released on 2016-06-22 with total page 368 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For nineteenth-century Eastern European Jews, modernization entailed the abandonment of arranged marriage in favor of the "love match." Romantic novels taught Jewish readers the rules of romance and the choreography of courtship. But because these new conceptions of romance were rooted in the Christian and chivalric traditions, the Jewish embrace of "the love religion" was always partial. In The Marriage Plot, Naomi Seidman considers the evolution of Jewish love and marriage though the literature that provided Jews with a sentimental education, highlighting a persistent ambivalence in the Jewish adoption of European romantic ideologies. Nineteenth-century Hebrew and Yiddish literature tempered romantic love with the claims of family and community, and treated the rules of gender complementarity as comedic fodder. Twentieth-century Jewish writers turned back to tradition, finding pleasures in matchmaking, intergenerational ties, and sexual segregation. In the modern Jewish voices of Sigmund Freud, Erica Jong, Philip Roth, and Tony Kushner, the Jewish heretical challenge to the European romantic sublime has become the central sexual ideology of our time.

Download or read book Middlesex written by Jeffrey Eugenides and published by Vintage Canada. This book was released on 2011-07-18 with total page 546 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Spanning eight decades and chronicling the wild ride of a Greek-American family through the vicissitudes of the twentieth century, Jeffrey Eugenides’ witty, exuberant novel on one level tells a traditional story about three generations of a fantastic, absurd, lovable immigrant family -- blessed and cursed with generous doses of tragedy and high comedy. But there’s a provocative twist. Cal, the narrator -- also Callie -- is a hermaphrodite. And the explanation for this takes us spooling back in time, through a breathtaking review of the twentieth century, to 1922, when the Turks sacked Smyrna and Callie’s grandparents fled for their lives. Back to a tiny village in Asia Minor where two lovers, and one rare genetic mutation, set our narrator’s life in motion. Middlesex is a grand, utterly original fable of crossed bloodlines, the intricacies of gender, and the deep, untidy promptings of desire. It’s a brilliant exploration of divided people, divided families, divided cities and nations -- the connected halves that make up ourselves and our world.

Download or read book In Love written by Amy Bloom and published by Random House. This book was released on 2022-03-08 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A powerful memoir of a love that leads two people to find a courageous way to part—and a woman’s struggle to go forward in the face of loss—that “enriches the reader’s life with urgency and gratitude” (The Washington Post) “A pleasure to read . . . Rarely has a memoir about death been so full of life. . . . Bloom has a talent for mixing the prosaic and profound, the slapstick and the serious.”—USA Today ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: NPR Amy Bloom began to notice changes in her husband, Brian: He retired early from a new job he loved; he withdrew from close friendships; he talked mostly about the past. Suddenly, it seemed there was a glass wall between them, and their long walks and talks stopped. Their world was altered forever when an MRI confirmed what they could no longer ignore: Brian had Alzheimer’s disease. Forced to confront the truth of the diagnosis and its impact on the future he had envisioned, Brian was determined to die on his feet, not live on his knees. Supporting each other in their last journey together, Brian and Amy made the unimaginably difficult and painful decision to go to Dignitas, an organization based in Switzerland that empowers a person to end their own life with dignity and peace. In this heartbreaking and surprising memoir, Bloom sheds light on a part of life we so often shy away from discussing—its ending. Written in Bloom’s captivating, insightful voice and with her trademark wit and candor, In Love is an unforgettable portrait of a beautiful marriage, and a boundary-defying love.

Download or read book An American Marriage written by Tayari Jones and published by Algonquin Books. This book was released on 2018-02-06 with total page 336 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: THE INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER! OPRAH’S BOOK CLUB 2018 SELECTION “One of my favorite parts of summer is deciding what to read when things slow down just a bit, whether it’s on a vacation with family or just a quiet afternoon . . . An American Marriage by Tayari Jones is a moving portrayal of the effects of a wrongful conviction on a young African-American couple.” —Barack Obama “Haunting . . . Beautifully written.” —The New York Times Book Review “Brilliant and heartbreaking . . . Unforgettable.” —USA Today “A tense and timely love story . . . Packed with brave questions about race and class.” —People “Compelling.” —The Washington Post “Epic . . . Transcendent . . . Triumphant.” —Elle Newlyweds Celestial and Roy are the embodiment of both the American Dream and the New South. He is a young executive, and she is an artist on the brink of an exciting career. But as they settle into the routine of their life together, they are ripped apart by circumstances neither could have imagined. Roy is arrested and sentenced to twelve years for a crime Celestial knows he didn’t commit. Though fiercely independent, Celestial finds herself bereft and unmoored, taking comfort in Andre, her childhood friend, and best man at their wedding. As Roy’s time in prison passes, she is unable to hold on to the love that has been her center. After five years, Roy’s conviction is suddenly overturned, and he returns to Atlanta ready to resume their life together. This stirring love story is a profoundly insightful look into the hearts and minds of three people who are at once bound and separated by forces beyond their control. An American Marriage is a masterpiece of storytelling, an intimate look deep into the souls of people who must reckon with the past while moving forward—with hope and pain—into the future.

Download or read book Midnight Marriage written by Lucinda Brant and published by Sprigleaf. This book was released on 2014-04-24 with total page 381 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: One of the 20 Most Romantic Books Ever, According to BookBub Members Inspired by real events, a secretly arranged marriage establishes a dynasty. After years in exile, Julian returns to claim a bride he doesn’t know. To his delight, he discovers she is everything he’d hoped for. Unaware they are already married, Deb is content with her independent life. Julian’s challenge is to have her accept him on his merit, even though she has no choice at all. The future of the Roxton dukedom depends upon it. Set in the opulent world of the Georgian aristocracy, Lucinda Brant delivers another lavish 18th century experience in her trademark style—heart-wrenching drama with a happily ever after. Character-driven romantic adventure Non-explicit, mild sensuality Story length 100,000 words (not including bonus material) Reviews Lucinda Brant’s sweeping family sagas are a perfect reminder of why I fell in love with historical romance —Cheryl Bolen, New York Times bestselling author You will once again be reminded why Lucinda Brant’s books are such a treasure. —SWurman, Night Owl Reviews 5 STAR TOP PICK The energy starts on page one and never lets up. Twists and turns, dramatic revelations, and some enjoyable chaos make this a book that keeps the reader turning pages. Highly recommended! — Fiona Ingram, Readers’ Favorite 5 STAR MEDAL WINNER Lucinda Brant fully immerses the reader in the world of Georgian England, keeping you turning pages, or listening late into the night as the case may be. For those historical romance fans who have been gobsmacked by Nicholas Boulton (as a narrator), I am thrilled to report that Alex Wyndham is every bit as good. His narrative voice is deep and lovely. I unreservedly recommend that you listen to Midnight Marriage.—Lady Wesley, Romantic Historical Reviews audiobook review Accolades B.R.A.G. Medallion Honoree Readers’ Favorite Audiobook Silver Medal Winner Readers’ Favorite International Book Award Finalist

Download or read book The Story of a Marriage written by Andrew Sean Greer and published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. This book was released on 2008-04-29 with total page 212 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A Today Show Summer Reads Pick A Washington Post Book of the Year "We think we know the ones we love." So Pearlie Cook begins her indirect, and devastating exploration of the mystery at the heart of every relationship--how we can ever truly know another person. It is 1953 and Pearlie, a dutiful young housewife, finds herself living in the Sunset District in San Francisco, caring not only for her husband's fragile health, but also for her son, who is afflicted with polio. Then, one Saturday morning, a stranger appears on her doorstep, and everything changes. Lyrical, and surprising, The Story of a Marriage is, in the words of Khaled Housseini, "a book about love, and it is a marvel to watch Greer probe the mysteries of love to such devastating effect."

Download or read book Love Times Three LP written by Joe Darger and published by Harper Collins. This book was released on 2011-09-13 with total page 386 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For decades, polygamous families have been forced to hide their lifestyle. But this first-ever memoir of a polygamous family is a riveting inside look at a world we can hardly imagine, revealing the extraordinary workings of one family’s day-to-day life. In this intimate story, the Dargers explain why they chose this path despite the pressures of keeping their relationships secret and the jealousy and personal challenges that naturally ensue; why they believe polygamy should be an accepted lifestyle; and, ultimately, why they hope that by revealing their way of life in public, laws that criminalize polygamy might change. Despite the risk of legal action, the Dargers know that it’s time to counteract Hollywood’s sensational interpretation and the general public’s misunderstanding of polygamy with the truth.

Download or read book Divorced Girl Smiling written by Jackie Pilossoph and published by . This book was released on 2013-11-23 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Smile! It's not just the end of your marriage, it's the beginning of your second chance! Missy Benson has a two and a half carat diamond engagement ring with color grade H, VS2 clarity and a value of $36,000. It's absolutely gorgeous, practically flawless, and let's be honest, really big! But what the successful Chicago realtor doesn't have anymore is a husband. After 12 years of marriage, her husband, Paul, a handsome, wealthy attorney has devastated her by breaking up their marriage for Priscilla Sommerfeld, a young, personal trainer, who according to Missy's sassy assistant, J.J., looks more like a Las Vegas stripper than a fitness expert. Not sure what to do with her ring, and with no financial issues to worry about, Missy decides to put it up for sale on Craigslist. The price: 99 cents! The catch: She gets to pick the buyer. In essence, she's looking for the perfect guy, but not for herself. Her hope is to regain faith that good men do exist, and that marriages can last forever. Now referring to herself as "the divorced girl," Missy interviews dozens of young men who are vying for the huge ring. It's a contest that includes outrageous characters, hilarious and sentimental stories, and two finalists, both of whom Missy adores and who she must choose between. Then there's Parker Missoni, the sexiest contestant by far, who drives her crazy with his brutal honesty, and at the same time stops her heart with his deep brown eyes. Divorced Girl Smiling is the story of a woman's journey to do whatever it takes to heal herself from divorce. It's about acceptance, reflection, taking accountability for mistakes, and appreciating all of life's wonderful gifts. In other words, if you have the guts to put the past behind, admit your mistakes, embrace your future, and give love another chance, you will surely be a divorced girl smiling.

Download or read book A Good Marriage written by Stephen King and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2014-09-30 with total page 247 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Now a major motion picture, Stephen King's brilliant and terrifying story of a marriage with truly deadly secrets. Darcy Anderson’s husband of more than twenty years is away on one of his routine business trips when the unsuspecting Darcy looks for batteries in the garage. Her toe knocks up against a hidden box under a worktable and in it she discovers a trove of horrific evidence that her husband is two men—one, the benign father of her children, the other, a raging rapist and murderer. It’s a horrifying discovery, rendered with bristling intensity, and it definitively ends “A Good Marriage.” This story was originally published in Stephen King’s acclaimed collection, Full Dark, No Stars.

Download or read book Marriage a History written by Stephanie Coontz and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2006-02-28 with total page 448 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Just when the clamor over "traditional" marriage couldn’t get any louder, along comes this groundbreaking book to ask, "What tradition?" In Marriage, a History, historian and marriage expert Stephanie Coontz takes readers from the marital intrigues of ancient Babylon to the torments of Victorian lovers to demonstrate how recent the idea of marrying for love is—and how absurd it would have seemed to most of our ancestors. It was when marriage moved into the emotional sphere in the nineteenth century, she argues, that it suffered as an institution just as it began to thrive as a personal relationship. This enlightening and hugely entertaining book brings intelligence, perspective, and wit to today’s marital debate.

Download or read book What Shamu Taught Me About Life Love and Marriage written by Amy Sutherland and published by Random House Trade Paperbacks. This book was released on 2009-04-14 with total page 194 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: While observing trainers of exotic animals, journalist Amy Sutherland had an epiphany: What if she used their techniques with the human animals in her own life–specifically her dear husband, Scott? As Sutherland put training principles into action, she noticed that not only did her twelve-year-old marriage improve, but she herself became more optimistic and less judgmental. What started as a goofy experiment had such good results that Sutherland began using the training techniques with all the people in her life, including her mother, her friends, her students, even the clerk at the post office. Full of fun facts, fascinating insights, hilarious anecdotes, and practical tips, What Shamu Taught Me About Life, Love, and Marriage reveals the biggest lesson Sutherland learned: The only animal you can truly change is yourself.