Book review

I told you about my one and only book I've read in over a year. It's Happens Every Day by Isabel Gillies. It's about the end of this couple's marriage. I don't know that I'd say I ENJOYED it. It is such a depressing subject. But having been there, it was certainly interesting.

The husband, Josiah, had been married before. He cheated on his first wife while she was pregnant and she divorced him. Josiah and Isabel had been married for about 6 years. Isabel thought she had the perfect life. Josiah was a professor at a college in Ohio and fell in love with Sylvia, a newly-married young female professor in his department.

I find it so fascinating how different people, no matter which end of the affair they're on, handle themselves. Isabel was a lot like I was.....determined to "fix" things, devastated but managed to hold things together (barely) for her kids. She didn't seem to be embarrassed and told many people in her life what was going on, which is similar to what I did as well. Josiah decided shortly after he met this other woman that he would not stay in the marriage and made that very clear. He would not, however, admit that it was because of anyone else. After Josiah told Isabel he wanted out, they spent 3 more months living together.....with Isabel hoping the whole time that he'd change his mind. She was in love with him anyway, and it made me so sad for her. To Josiah's credit, though he was pretty cruel to Isabel at times, he never waivered in his decision that he wanted out. He never pretended to want to try to work things out and stay in the marriage. So while he was cruel, at least he was truthful about that. Both Josiah and Sylvia did lie repeatedly about their involvement.

Isabel has remarried. Josiah and Sylvia are now married and both still teaching at the college. Isabel claims that she is friends with both of them. I find that hard to fathom but stranger things have happened.