Words for Wednesday: A Happy Marriage

The title of this book will probably fool a lot of readers.  Though the title fits in a way, it isn't exactly a cheerful romance.  This is another book that I picked up without really knowing what it was (dang you Barnes & Noble and your $4 books- although, thank you for getting me to buy and read great stuff that I normally would have passed over).  So I was a little surprised to actually start it and realize that this is the story of a marriage ending.  Not in divorce but in death.  The book jumps from the present to the past by having every other chapter tell about how the New York city couple met, and by having the other chapters tell how they say their good-byes as the wife dies of bladder/urinary tract cancer.  

I know, I know- you are all dying to read it now.  But really, the book has a charm despite its heavy material and I have yet to tear up.  Although I imagine tears will come.  Both the wife and the husband are rich characters and one can't help admire the realness of their love.  The story isn't the type of romance you dream about but rather the type of romance you live or that marriages you respect are made of.  They don't have all the answers and things aren't always pretty, but they do have love.

It does help that the chapters jump back and forth.  You know its a good read when, despite knowing that they end up together, I find myself fretting over whether or not they will ever get together in the chapters describing their first encounters.  He is such a nerd as a young man and she is so sophisticated that you can't help but think he is out of his league.  And the same goes for her struggle with cancer.  Though the hospice has been arranged and the funeral is being planned, there is a small part of me that thinks it isn't over yet.  I guess I'm trying to say that I am surprised to find so much hope in such a cut and dry case of a novel.

On a side, morbid note, this book definitely also plays out like a manual for how to deal with a loved one dying.  I guess it is loosely based on the author loosing his own wife, and I hope he was able to do for her in real life what he does for the characters here.  I hope I will remember this book when it comes time for me to deal with a loved one passing.