Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #145044 in Books
• Published on: 2003-03-03
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 400 pages

Synopsis
'The beautiful irony of Happenstance is that its novels are both bound together and held apart by the strength of the marriage they describe.' Rupert Christiansen, Harpers and Queen These companion novels -- by turns touching, compassionate and humorous -- tell the stories of Jack and Brenda Bowman. In all the years of their marriage they have hardly ever been apart. In THE WIFE'S STORY, Brenda, now forty years old, and who has been surprised to discover a source of creative energy, is about to spend a week away from their home in a Chicago suburb to attend a craft convention in Philadelphia. It is her first trip alone. Removed from her familiar environment, all the gathering emotions that have unsettled her life over the last few years are focussed and bring her to a crisis. Brenda is vulnerable in a strange city. She is also ready to grasp whatever experiences come her way. In THE HUSBAND'S STORY, back in Chicago, Jack faces his own crisis. It is the first time he has been left to cope on his own. He is immobilised by self-doubt, beginning to question his worth and the value of his work as a historian. Suddenly, in that one week, his world falls apart.

He has to deal with an attempted suicide, a marital breakdown and, not least, their two difficult children. In the process, he manages to work out his feelings and to learn something about himself.

Customer Reviews

Not bad
It was a magazine review that made me buy this book. A story about a lasting marriage. Not the usual 'new love' or 'break up' story.
And yes it had some very interesting opinions from the perspective of the husband and the wife. Occasionally it even makes you think about your own relationship and it's future. It's a good read but far less engaging than I hoped for.

A sympathetic and very human account of marriage
An unusual book in which the stories of a wife and husband are told separately, the reader being left to choose which to read first. Brenda and Jack have been married for twenty years when they have to spend five days apart. The novel concentrates on their thoughts and experiences while they are separated, describing with bittersweet truthfulness the small compromises that occur to make marriage last.