Every once in a while I get an email to my inbox about the chance to do a book review. I usually pass because the books don't jump out at me but recently one did. It was claimed to be a controversial book on marriage written by a pastor and his wife. I signed up to get a copy.

Real Marriage: The Truth about Sex, Friendship and Life Together
by Mark & Grace Driscoll.

So here I sit after finishing the book and well, I have mixed feelings about it.

First of all, there is some "gold nuggets" (to quote an old pastor of mine) of advice and information. There is also a really great chapter on how to be friends with your spouse but the rest? It became apparent that this book is meant for couples in difficult marriages that need some redeveloping. I also started to get defensive in my mind especially the way the authors pushed their beliefs. (No ones beliefs are identical so I do bare that in mind)

I feel that the book lacks real guidance for marriage and that matches with today's society. I've been married for 15 months and not much in this book spoke to me. Society is no longer filled with the "neutral" family nor is it the norm. Not all of us get married to start a family right away. How about some modern scenarios such as how about dealing with real issues like working through finances, struggling with finding full filling employment or deal with with family crisis and grief? They've missed so many other real life struggles that are the core of building a life together and being a unit of one.

This book is not controversial or maybe it is because it's not and people are talking about it? The honesty from the authors is commended but the book doesn't flow well nor feel like a good book on marriage - it's mostly about the bad stuff, the hard stuff. I was expecting more, more about love then "doing" things to please each other. I know that marriage is not sunset and roses all the time but this book leaves out the joys. I was hoping this book was going to talk about having a healthy marriage, how to work together and about how fantastic sex is for a marriage!

The sex chapter in this book was not helpful at all! I was hoping they'd give advice to those who don't have much experience how to do things not just talk about sex related topics (eg. birth control, sexual assault, annal sex). So many Christians are clueless about love making! Something so carnal yet people think it's gross or made solely for procreation. Couples need to be intimate very often. We need those "pillow talk" times especially when the rest of life might be off balance. The chapter needed to be less technical and more real about the issues people struggle with in this department. Writing with feelings instead of stats would have been much appreciated.

Where is there discussion on topics about romancing? On communicating? About how you should talk to your spouse about everything! Or the importance of just being together doing nothing? Marriage shouldn't be as hard as they make it sound especially if you learn early on to be selfless and put your spouse above yourself.

I wish I had better things to say, I hoped for it. I will not be recommending this book even to those I know struggling in their marriage. This book is too negative.

But this is my opinion, maybe no one else will agree. This is just my gut reaction.

"Advanced Reader's Copy of the book has been provided courtesy of Thomas Nelson and Graf-Martin Communications, Inc. Available at your favourite bookseller from Thomas Nelson"

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