BOOK REVIEWS

Quizzes can help married, engaged couples

By Regina Linksey
Catholic News Service

Mary Carty’s book, “PMAT: The Perfect Marriage Aptitude Test,” should not be read alone and placed on the bookshelf to collect dust. Instead, it should be shared with a loved one and kept readily available for later reference.

Written for engaged and married couples, the book is divided into several chapters dedicated to different aspects of life that might present obstacles to marital bliss. Within each chapter is a short opening and a list of multiple-choice questions related to real-life scenarios: Think GMAT, MCAT or SAT but without the timer and the calculator. Carty actually encourages readers to take their time to read and answer the questions. And although there is an answer sheet (No. 2 pencils optional), answer D is open for the readers to fill in their own responses.

The scenarios are not only fun and enjoyable to read, they also can spark meaningful conversations between a couple. Perhaps a particular circumstance — such as a partner mowing over a prized iris bed — never happens in the readers’ lives, but the situation might encourage a discussion that is realistic.

Reading the book together also can be a good way to connect with a spouse. It is a joint activity that forces a couple to take a moment and focus just on themselves and their relationship. Carty’s book is unique in that it is an activity book for two people. It does not preach, but it does encourage conversation and offer suggestions.

Carty illustrates each chapter with a snapshot of a wedding-cake topper staged amid life’s situations. Among other lighthearted scenes, the plastic couple is placed in front of a bed (the chapter on balancing sex, intimacy and personal boundaries), a Christmas tree (the chapter on family and friends) and a carnival scene (the chapter on food, fitness and health.)

Although the entire book generally is centered on communication — whether verbal or nonverbal — two chapters directly address communication.

Carty offers interesting solutions. When there is a roadblock in communication due to a problem, she suggests that the couple write down pros and cons and gather more information.

This is a solution that most couples may not think of in the heat of the moment but when used, it can provide the couple time to cool down and revisit the subject by reading each other’s thoughts.

Although the book does not offer groundbreaking advice or solutions, it does have a lot of “duh, we should have tried this” moments. Carty’s book is fun, important and a solid read.

(“PMAT: The Perfect Marriage Aptitude Test” by Mary T. Carty. Glitterati Incorporated (New York, 2009). 144 pp., $18.95.)

Author traces sociological history
of making marriages work

By Christopher Fenoglio
Catholic News Service

The main title of “Making Marriage Work: A History of Marriage and Divorce in the Twentieth-Century United States” by Kristin Celello (University of North Carolina Press, 2009, 232 pp., $29.95) implies that readers will find inside yet another collection of “how to” tips and tales with which to create a successful marriage.

Fortunately for the reader, especially those interested in American social history, Celello’s book is much, much more.

Based upon extensive and heavily footnoted research, Celello offers a lucid description of the rise and sociological impact of the concept that spouses must work hard to make their marriage work.

The origins of this concept can be traced to 19th-century preachers and physicians, the primary marriage counselors of the day. They saw a wide chasm between the idealism of romantic love and its ability to sustain a marriage and the inherent differences in Victorian-era men and women. They sought a more pragmatic approach to describing how couples could make a successful marriage.

This history of this concept was greatly influenced by two opposing forces: “a deep-seated anxiety about divorce on the one hand, and Americans’ desire to have stronger, more satisfying marital relationships, on the other,” she says.

Celello traces the concept from its roots through the tumultuous 1920s and ’30s when marriage education classes were begun and marriage counseling clinics were created.

Following a sharp rise in divorce cases from “war marriages,” the marriage advice industry flourished in the 1950s.

Changes in divorce laws in the 1960s and 1970s, along with the corresponding social unrest and the burgeoning feminist movement, created intense debates over the validity of marriage as society’s cornerstone.

Concurrent with the telling of this history, Celello ably exposes a gross inequality in the public discussion of roles men and women play in their marital relationship.

Throughout this entire work there’s an encouraging undercurrent of belief that nearly every marriage is worth saving, as long as the participants do the work.
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