Amateur Marriage

Tyler, Anne. The Amateur Marriage: a Novel. New York: Ballantine, 2004.

It’s weird to say I finished this book poolside in Las Vegas, Nevada. Who would have predicted that? Certainly not me.

This is a book I will definitely read again someday. When thinking about this review I wanted to box this story into a corner and call it a sad book, but I couldn’t. It’s such an accurate portrait of how a marriage (and ultimately, a life) can end up that I can’t just call it “sad.” How can I when it’s beautiful, funny, tragic, infuriating, intelligent, frightening and honest all at the same time?
Michael and Pauline are two teenagers whose lives collide at the start of World War II. Their romance is the result of a marriage between a fear of the future and the desire to be someone else at that very instant. Michael wants a girlfriend, any girlfriend. Sensing Pauline’s fascination with the war effort he spontaneously enlists. Pauline wants a soldier for a boyfriend. Any soldier. The culture and uncertainly of the times have thrown these two people together in such a way that neither of them can back out, despite the growing realization they were never meant to be together.
One things leads to another and soon thirty years have gone by. Pauline and Michael divorce and life goes on. And on. While the marriage didn’t survive more than halfway through the novel, Michael and Pauline go on. Their relationship from beginning to end and beyond is captured beautifully.

Favorite quotes: “You know how men are about wearing ties on a Saturday” (p 31).
“I’ve reached the stage where I got so hungry that I’ve gone beyond  hunger” (p 71) …and Kisa didn’t think that was possible!
“Sometimes, Pauline got a feeling like a terrible itch, like a kind of all-over vibration, and she thought that any moment she might jump clear out of her skin” (p 71).

BookLust Twist: From More Book Lust in the chapter “Marriage Blues” (p 161).