Short Marriage

The author of Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All and Plays Well with Others returns with a collection of four insightful, loving novellas. The works trace how far people will go, through social pretense, sexual and racial secrets, to preserve their own dignity, a necessary mythology.

Jim Stenson has been flown to the bohemian island of Formentera for a monthlong gig: writing a screenplay for a famous Spanish director, loosely based on the classic French film Contempt. With his career flagging, Jim is determined to make the most of the opportunity. But the director raises the stakes, pushing Jim to draw inspiration for the script from his strained relationship with his wife Anna.

It’s summertime in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. Ian has lost his job, while his wife, Parker, thrives in her e-commerce career. Parker’s days are frenetic and full. When she’s not in Zoom meetings, she’s doom-scrolling about the virus or hanging out on Houseparty with her friends. Meanwhile, Ian claims to spend his days looking for a full-time job, but he’s mostly goofing around on Tik Tok and taking their dog, Hutch, for longer-than-necessary walks. What he really wants is to start a family, but Parker still isn’t ready.

El casamiento engañoso, trata el tema del burlador burlando, el burlador que, metido a engañar, acaba engañado con sus mismos recursos. Para ello, Cervantes noveliza todo un conjunto de falsedades creadas por los mismos protagonistas.

When a sandcastle is built, it looks good but soon the waves of nature and outside forces become bent on destroying it. So it was for a marriage that looked good from the outside. In an attempt to strengthen what was already crumbling, Godfrey and his wife, Miriam, embarked on a holiday to Venice to bolster their marriage. He became obsessed with religion and its negative effect on life, as well as admiring topless women on the beach, while she became more and more bored. The whole holiday became a disaster for both of them.

After Phoenix discovers that all of her friends are either engaged or already married, she’s convinced that love is in the air for everyone except her. Cupid’s bow and arrow skip over Phoenix by happenstance as she struggles to accept her chances of walking down the aisle next to the love of her life are officially screwed, no thanks to her best friend Xay and ex-boyfriend Asher, who is keeping a few secrets of his own.

This selection of stories relates the many experiences and complexities of womanhood; sometimes joyful, sometimes sad but always enriching. With stories by Edith Wharton, Katherine Mansfield and Elizabeth Gaskell - it includes 'Ladies in Lavender' by William J. Locke, the inspiration for the film of the same name starring Judi Dench and Maggie Smith.

Cale Landry: When the man from Wolf Creek leaves his secluded mountain refuge to seek revenge on the thief who robbed him, he never expected he’d end up taking home the wily old bandit’s gorgeous and spirited daughter, Raven. But Cale will never get back what he lost, until he learns to trust in love. Conn Benton: Conn Benton is shocked at the suggestion he should marry a Winthrop - especially that tall, redheaded Emaline - to end the feud between their families. He might marry her and bed her, but he has no intention of loving her.

The View from Mount Joy, Lorna Landvik’s delightfully quirky and intensely moving new novel, is about a man, a supermarket, the roads not taken, and the great, unexpected pleasures found in living a good life. When hunky teenage hockey player Joe Andreson and his widowed mother move to Minneapolis, Joe falls under the seductive spell of Kristi Casey, Ole Bull High’s libidinous head cheerleader, the kind of girl a guy can’t say no to, even when saying yes guarantees trouble.

Alice Lethbury, a young wife stuck in a dull, passionless marriage, decides to adopt a baby, Jane, with the consent of her reluctant husband. As Jane grows up, it becomes clear that she has entered the Lethburys' lives for a reason.

What causes a happily married Christian husband to commit adultery? How can the betrayed wife continue to honor her husband after the betrayal? What does a couple do when the other woman doesn't accept that the affair is over?

Things aren't what they seem.... As an old man still searches for.... The perfect woman. By the author of "The Killing of Train-Man Brown", "Send Me a Friend", and "And Then Her Wig Fell Off".

An early desktop computer becomes the third partner in a doomed relationship; an older brother figure whose father lives in exile imparts hilarious life lessons to his young protégé. A man attempts to quit smoking despite the fact that he’s very good at it; another masquerades as the family man he'll never be. Throughout, Pinochet’s dictatorship casts a long shadow, and men in relationships exhibit their profound capacity for both love and harm.

Alan is able to imagine every way critical equipment might break during the launch and landing of Apollo 11. But his experience in preventing cosmic disasters does nothing to prepare him for the pressures of a hasty marriage to a woman he barely knows—or the strain of keeping up appearances amid the shifting social attitudes of the late ’60s. When a crisis at home forces Alan back to earth, he’s faced with a choice he doesn’t know how to make: whether to let go or move forward.

In Polygamy: A Very Short Introduction, Sarah M.S. Pearsall explores what plural marriages reveal about the inner workings of marriage and describes the controversies surrounding it. The book emphasizes the diversity of historical polygamist societies, from the Shi'ite Muslims and Wendat men who practiced short-term marriages to the Mixteca, Maori, Inca, Algonquin, and Marta indigenous people of North America and the Pacific Islands. Pearsall also explains the divides within Christianity that led to Joseph Smith's establishment of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

In Why Love Is Important, Even if at Times Painful, Mr. Conway covers why love must be part of your world if you want happiness; how the absence of love in your life can make you crazy; why love has to be painful at times, but still worth the fight; what are the signs that accompany romantic love; what happens when you do not experience love in your life; and more. After you go through Chapter 0 and fully absorb why love is essential, you will have the courage to open your heart to its power and goodness.