To Love, Honor, and Betray

January 17, 2005
Calling all desperate housewives. While the subtitle might suggest a broad look at the state of marriage in the suburbs, this is more a beady-eyed stare into the lives of suburban married women who are having, have had or are contemplating having affairs. Gertler, a novelist (Jimmy's Girl
, etc.), and Lopez, an attorney and independent producer, contribute seven pages of an introduction and brief introductory paragraphs; after that, it's the subjects and their first-person testimonials. The women, whom the authors reached through friend and family networks, tell of cheating in retaliation for a husband's affair; because their husbands wouldn't sleep with them; or out of loneliness, spite, and even surprise ("All of a sudden, I found myself having sex with this man"). Not all of them are sympathetic characters, that's for sure. But some stories are poignant. Thirty-one years after marrying a withholding man and four years into a loving, passionate affair, "Mrs. E." admits that she fantasizes about her husband asking her how to love and pleasure her: "That would be the fairy tale.... You see, if I had my choice, I wouldn't be in this position." The lack of communication in her marriage feels symptomatic of the book as a whole. A gathering of dissatisfactions not unified by any authorial voice, this demoralizes more than it enlightens. Agent, Marcy Posner
.