Book: Love and Other Natural Disasters

This week I read another book from Hachette Book Group. I would say it was about as completely opposite from the last one as humanly possible. The book is titled Love and Other Natural Disasters although there really weren't any natural disasters to speak of... only man-made ones.

Here's the book description:

Is it better to unknowingly live a happy lie than to have your world shattered by a painful truth?

Eve is eight months pregnant and in the middle of a Thanksgiving celebration when she discovers that her husband Jonathan has developed an intimate relationship with a woman over the past year. Jonathon asserts his innocence (an affair involves physical intimacy, and he didn't have any), while Eve feels deeply betrayed by the emotional connection he shared with someone else. What Jon has done seems so terrifyingly out of character that Eve finds herself questioning her entire reality. Did she ever really know Jon at all? Was their happiness together a lie? Is emotional intimacy more forgivable than sexual intimacy? And can their marriage survive?

***

I did read through this book with a feeling of dread that I wouldn't like how it ended. I won't spoil it, but I will say that at least it has a hopeful ending (that was actually one of the book group questions... did you think that it had a hopeful ending?).

It was definitely an interesting look into how two people can so easily become complacent in a marriage. The ways that Eve and Jonathan use to figure themselves out I'm not sure I agree with though. In the interest of disclosure, this is NOT a Christian book so it's the views on life in general I didn't always agree with as well as one scene in the book that, while it helped the story, was rather more graphic than I needed.

Brian has been eyeing this one over my shoulder and since he really loves to analyze things I'll see if he'll read it and maybe give you his reactions later...