I put this book under Humor (What else!).

Have read, I thought it was good, was dubious at first, but very funny in parts. Hard to bite one's lip though.

RELEASE NOTES:

As a secret RABAK

HA HA HA..... i did laugh when i opened this! Thank you jacinta! Shall i pass it to IndieLibrarian when im done lol

At 30 Laura Doyle was miserable in her marriage, but she couldnt put her finger on the cause. "I was lonly and i was exhausted from trying to do everything myself. When i learned to stop controlling and criticising my husband and practiced receiving graciously, something magical happened. The union I had always dreamed of appeared. The man who had wooed me was back" writes Doyle.

In this book Doyle presents a radical and controversial approach to relationships: women can enjoy great sex, harmony and the intimacy they crave when they stop controlling their partner. Surrendering, she says, is the simplest principle for a great marriage and 1000's of women swear by it. Covering both the emotional & practical aspects of marriage, it teaches you how to: respect the man you married;express your desires; resist the temptation to bicker; take care of yourself; give him space and trust your man....

Sounds like this book should be re-named "How To Be A Door Mat" lol

Well as BigBoss has desserted me and gone to Liverpool for a couple of days (charming eh? on my own over Easter lol) I thought it rather appropriate that i grab the opportunity to read this book.....so thats what i've been doing most of today....

I have to admit, i did skip bits, found myself tutting like a lunatic and at various points picked up a pen with the intention of writing a letter to this author!!!!!!

I'm especially fond of the section on sex, esp this intro: "Your marriage contract includes an agreement to have a mutually exclusive sexual relationship, and you owe it to your marriage to manifest your intimacy physically and to keep your end of the bargain. Make yourself available for sex at least once a week whether you feel like it or not" HA HA BLOODY HA..... I dont remember signing up for that! lol

D'ya get the feeling i dont like this book ;o)

Will try to palm it off on another female, one who actually beleives that men should be surrendered to :op

Thanx Jacinta.....made my day lol!

RELEASE NOTES:

This one will be passed under the table in a brown bag to LyzzyBee.....

Hope you enjoy it! lol

RELEASE NOTES:

This one will be going to LyzzyBee at the London Meet Up....

Passed to me NOT in a brown bag and very much OVER the counter and sniggered at by Mr LyzzyBee

Thanks caffcaff! no - really!

hee hee

Liz

Can I please first point out that, although I am female, I don't believe men should be surrendered to!

Hmm... an odd choice for me. Very scarily, there's an endorsement from FAY WELDON on the back of the book!

This wasn't actually as bad as one would imagine. OK, some of the advice was way off - apparently I should give Matt full control over all of our finances, including ALL of my money, and I should ask him for my spending money every month. Er.. nope. But there is some good stuff about being more respectful and less bossy and naggy, which I am trying to carry out.

Interesting stuff, anyway.

RELEASE NOTES:

Posting to AliceF who requested it. I never thought I'd find someone who wanted it, and was a bit wary of releasing it in the wild, for some reason - so here it goes! Enjoy!

Gratefully received from LyzzyBee... Finding it very interesting so far, have to try to be patient with myself in order to give it a go; but like the book suggests, a happy/intimate marriage is worth it.

Allegedly, the "surrendering" process works best if you don't tell your spouse about it for a few months; so funnily enough, this is the one time I'm relieved my hubby doesn't look at bookcrossing.com!

BOOK RAY: This ray is currently open. Members are as follows (if you wish to join, please PM me and I will add you!):

• Laura0141 (Glasgow, Scotland)
• RubyBlueLady (Avebury, Wiltshire, UK)
• nikolacarter23 (Warwick, United Kingdom)
• scotchspaniel (merced, California, USA)

How it works:

• If you wish to be added to the list, please PM me with your details.
• We will kick off once we have 5 members.
• You will be sending the book to the person who appears after you in the list, so you need to PM them to get their address!
• It's not a race, but please read and send the book on as speedily as you can, other people are dying to read it too.
• Please journal the book once you have received it (so we all know where it currently is) and again when you have read it (so we know what you thought of it!)
• If you're the last person on the list (i.e. we run out of members), it's yours to keep, release or extend the ray.

Amazon Synopsis
At 30, Laura Doyle, like millions of women, was miserable in her marriage, but she couldn't put her finger on the cause. "I was lonely and I was exhausted from trying to do everything myself. When I learned to stop controlling and criticising my husband and practised receiving graciously, something magical happened. The union I had always dreamed of appeared. The man who had wooed me was back," writes Doyle. In "The Surrendered Wife", Laura Doyle presents a radical and controversial approach to relationships: women can enjoy great sex, harmony and the intimacy they crave when they stop controlling their partner. Surrendering, she says, is the simplest principle for a great marriage and thousands of women swear by it. Covering both the emotional and practical aspects of marriage, it teaches women valuable lessons including how to respect the man they married, how to resist the temptation to bicker and how to trust their man. But most importantly, it shows how you can fall in love with your man all over again. With marriages and relationships fast becoming the first casualty of modern life, "The Surrendered Wife" could be the key to 'happy ever after'.

Having now got out of this book about all that I can, it's ready to go to Laura0141 in Glasgow. A lot of it was quite thought-provoking, and some I am starting to apply... but most is simply not appropriate for my marriage.

Received with thanks.

I was very interested when I heard about this book as I enjoy reading about women and their roles, particularly from a non-feminist viewpoint. I read about half of this book before deciding to stop. Although some of the principles are (IMO) good, I just couldn't get my head around some of the ideas, for example, if someone were to answer my queries with 'Whatever you think,' as the author suggests, I would soon be extremely miffed and convinced that my partner was not remotely interested in me or our partnership. That's the thing - I think marriage is a partnership and that really didn't come across in this book.

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PMing RubyBlueLady for addy.

On way to RubyBlueLady

This book arrived today and I've read half of it already.

I read over half of this book the day it arrived. Unfortunately I haven't been able to force myself to pick it up again so rather than having it sit around I'll post it on to scotchspaniel (by surface mail if that's ok).

Here are my thoughts on what I read. The title is unfortunate, if I were her publisher I would have made her change it to something less 'red flag-ish'. Why is it just wives that need to be less critical and controlling, why not people in general? husbands, parents, friends, work colleagues e.t.c, why make it exclusively the job for wives?

There are good points made in this book, of course relationships will benefit if there is more respect and less criticism between couples, but I find Laura Doyle's way of putting it just gets my back up.

I recommend a far, far better book about that you can read without a sick-bucket beside you:

Lasting Love by Susan Jeffers (author of Feel the Fear and Do it Anyway).