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Product Details
Scribner, July 2009
Hardcover, 384 pages
ISBN-10: 1439102309
ISBN-13: 9781439102305
Description
A Happy Marriage is both intimate and expansive: It is the story of Enrique Sabas and his wife, Margaret, a novel that alternates between the romantic misadventures of the first weeks of their courtship and the final months of Margaret's life as she says good-bye to her family, friends, and children -- and to Enrique. Spanning thirty years, this achingly honest story is about what it means for two people to spend a lifetime together -- and what makes a happy marriage.
Yglesias's career as a novelist began in 1970 when he wrote an autobiographical novel at sixteen, hailed by critics for its stunning and revelatory depiction of adolescence. A Happy Marriage, his first work of fiction in thirteen years, was inspired by his relationship with his wife, Margaret, who died in 2004. Bold, elegiac, and emotionally suspenseful, even though we know what happens, Yglesias's beautiful novel will break every reader's heart -- while encouraging all of us with its clear-eyed evocation of the enduring value of marriage.
How did you come to write this book?
I’ve been a writer my entire adult life. After the death of my wife of twenty-seven years, as part of the grieving process I found myself thinking about our marriage in a way I never dared, or could have while she was alive. After a few years of this reviewing and recollection of my marriage I realized that I could write about our life together with a frankness that would be cathartic for me, and might be useful for readers in thinking about their marriages. I chose to write it as a novel, and not as a memoir, because I wanted to preserve the frankness of my private thoughts and feelings while telling the story. I believe what William Dean Howells once put this way, “No man, unless he puts on the mask of fiction, can show his real face or the will behind it.” I doubt any human being is capable of writing with absolute honesty about himself—we are all too skilled at self-deception—but the sad combination of losing my wife and needing to go on with my work, led me to hope that by writing A Happy Marriage I could provide readers with an unusually intimate portrait of marriage from a man’s point of view.
"[A] devastatingly raw appraisal of a nearly 30-year marriage...heart-wrenching."
-- Publishers Weekly
"Rafael Yglesias's novel -- long and graceful and written to display an intimacy wincingly believable -- is about life, itself, not just one particular marriage. As the book alternates between past and present, we grow, along with the characters: as they jump boundaries, so do we; as they resign themselves to a sad inevitability, we feel viscerally cornered, too. It's a punch-in-the-stomach book, but the sharpness forces us to open our eyes wide. Impressive."
-- Ann Beattie, author of Follies
"Yglesias mixes passion and pain in this deep and searing story of love. With unflinching honesty, he reveals the resilience of the human spirit in the face of illness and loss."
-- Jerome Groopman, author of How Doctors Think
"A profound deliberation on the nature of love, marriage and the process of dying.... A tour de force... [Yglesias] has found the novel of his life."
-- Dinitia Smith, New York Times
"Maybe marriage is the oldest story in the world, but in Mr. Yglesias' tender, funny, rueful telling, the lifelong relationship is the story of life itself."
-- The Wall Street Journal
"Surprising and deeply affecting... A very brave book indeed."
-- Nancy Connors, The Plain Dealer (Cleveland)
"Brave ... instantly compelling."
-- Scott Muskin, Minneapolis Star-Tribune
"Beautiful... Yglesias is a superb and courageous writer.... [A] riveting portrait of enduring love, with all its grand imperfections."
-- Karen Karbo, Bookforum
NPR, August 17, 2009
...of high school to complete his first novel at the age of 17. His latest book is A Happy Marriage. text sizeAAA August 17, 2009 Raphael Yglesias' novel is inspired by his wife, Margaret, who died in 2004. A Happy Marriage spans their 30-year ...
TheDay.com, August 2, 2009
...a work of art and of the imagination? The answer to the second is, thankfully, a resounding yes. Rafael Yglesias has transformed the story of his life and that of his wife, Margaret Joskow, who died in 2004, into a profound deliberation on ...
Tampa Bay Online, August 2, 2009
...'A Happy Marriage,' by Rafael Yglesias (Scribner, $26) How do you begin to describe a 29-year marriage? At the start of it? The end? Rafael Yglesias does both in his latest novel ...
San Francisco Chronicle, August 2, 2009
...A deeply personal story about infatuation, love, betrayal and loss, Rafael Yglesias' largely autobiographical novel is a sprawling yet intimate account of his 27-year marriage that will break readers' hearts while at the same time renewing ...
USA Today, July 29, 2009
...Rafael Yglesias' newest book, A Happy Marriage, is boldly subtitled A Novel right on its cover. It is, and it isn't. Yes, some of the names have been changed as ...
New York Times, July 18, 2009
...static prose. So if a novel begins with a happy couple, things usually sour by the end. A Happy Marriage, by Rafael Yglesias, begins in the 1970s, on the night the 21-year-old Enrique Sabas meets Margaret Cohen in his Greenwich Village ...
CHINAdaily, July 13, 2009
...and excitement to scientific work' and 'produced a new vision which has rightly been called Romantic science.' A Happy Marriage By Rafael Yglesias, published by Scribner Let's face it: Happiness is banal. We may desire loving relationships ...
