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Sep
29
Giveaway: Matrimony by Joshua Henkin
2008 at 4pm Posted by Rebecca Joines Schinsky
You’ve probably seen this book all over the book-o-sphere, as author Joshua Henkin has really embraced the book blogging community and has generously shared his novel and offered up personalized signed copies for many a giveaway. I read Matrimony last month and thoroughly enjoyed it—there’s a reason it was named a New York Times Notable Book in 2007. Matrimony was recently released in paperback, and even though I LOVED the hardback cover design, I think this one’s pretty nice, too.
Click the cover above to read my review and remind yourself why you want to win a free copy. Joshua has a lot of great content on his website that you might want to check out as well.
If you’d like to win a personalized, autographed copy of Matrimony, leave a comment below telling me about the funniest or most unusual marriage/relationship advice you’ve ever given or received. I’ll start: the day after we got engaged, my husband took me on a surprise trip and told the flight attendants that we were celebrating our engagement. One of them looked at me, very serious, and said, “Sugar, this is the best advice you’ll ever get: always fight naked.”
Take that to mean whatever you want, but I think it’s pretty good.
The contest is open until 11:59pm EDT next Monday, October 6.
My funniest is obey the man, he is never wrong..always listen to him and follow his everyword- heck that came from soemone on her third marriage- haha–oops third husband- 5th wedding
Great advice…I love it!
Wow. Hmmm…you know I’ve actually never received advice from anyone? Maybe that means everyone thinks I’m doing a FABULOUS job…or something. Well..I guess I’ll pick one my mom told us about fighting in general “never let the sun go down in anger…or never go to bed angry” which is something I try to follow. Thanks for the contest. I’ve been wanting to read this one.
A while back me and the consumption partner were doing a long-distance thing because my father was ill, and I would fly out to Chicago to visit him whenever I could take a long weekend. My last such flight was a huge disaster, we had an insane delay on the runway at Islip and then we finally got in the air and had almost arrived to find out that O’Hare and Midway were closed because of tornadoes, so we turned back and landed in Indianapolis, where we waited for hours until we could finally go on to Chicago.
Anyway, this whole time I was sitting next to a Hasidic rabbi and his wife. They were super friendly and I split my snack food with them so they could eat what little kosher their was, considering how long we were on the plane. But of course he was very talkative; he and his wife had gotten married at 19, their oldest children were married and in their 20s with babies of their own, and their youngest was only 5. I’m not a very friendly person, and I’m definitely not a friendly person on a plane, but the rabbi wanted my whole life story and I had to sit there for about 8 hours while he basically told me, “Ya gotta get the ring!!!” “You are a good daughter, you stay home and take care of your father, and you don’t move anywhere until you have the ring!”
Oh well, here I am.
Hmm….hubby and I have been together for almost 10 years now. I don’t think I’ve ever gotten any funny advice! I was kind of young when we got married, so most of my friends were still doing the single dating thing. Most probably thought I was crazy.
The best advice I got was “always kiss him goodnight” and overall, I do. He reminds me to, as well. Overall, I don’t mind this..unless he reminds me 10 minutes after I got into my cosy cocoon of covers and I’m just nodding off…LOL
My father was offering my husband and I marriage advice shortly after we married in 2003. The best gem he saved for my husband:
“A happy wife is a happy life.”
It’s worked pretty well for me!
My husband and I were married this past May. Recently, we were told that whenever we are disagreeing/arguing over something, one of us should just say “boobies.” It’s really hard to stay mad when someone randomly says that! It also is a reminder that what matters is our love and relationship — not the silly things that won’t matter in an hour, day, week or year. So although the “boobies” advice was a little weird and unconventional, I’m pretty fond of it!
Re: fighting naked—reminds me of advice I heard or saw on some dating/sex advice type show once. Whenever you’re fighting or trying to have a “discussion,” you should sit facing each other, up close, with your knees wide apart. Same idea really and it actually is hard to argue this way!
lol..that was a hilarious advice.. need to see if it would actually work..:) here’s the best advice i have ever received.. its worked for the past 3 yrs (that’s how long i have been married).. during my wedding, someone told me – “always nod your head and show that you’re agreeing with everything your husband says..and then go ahead and do whatever you want!.. if he ever asks you about it (Which is kinda rare), then just flash you most innocent smile and tell him that you thought that was what he wanted you to do!”.. it works for all the petty things that men don’t really care about but act like they do:)
do enter me for the giveaway!
ramya
ramyasbookshelf(at)gmail(dot)com
The best relationship advice I ever received was not the original thought of the advice-giver, but I appreciated it all the same:
“A man may be the ‘head’ of the family, but the woman is the neck — and she can turn the head anyway she wants.”
My grandmother borrowed that from “My Big Fat Greek Wedding,” but she passes that gem along to me all the time.
She doesn’t mean it in a sexist way — just that we have the ability to convince our significant other of whatever we wish! And I’ve found this to be (largely) true!
When we got married a year and a half ago we did good wishes/advice cards and got the “always fight naked” advice too. We haven’t tried it yet though…Thanks for the great giveaway! I have heard lots of good things about this book and would love to read it.
[...] also announced a giveaway of Matrimony by Joshua Henkin (click here to enter—contest closes tomorrow evening), meditated on deodorant and marketing, featured my [...]