MAKING A MARRIAGE: A Personal Book of Love, Marriage, and Family

Dribs and drabs of sense about marriage, sex, children, money, fights, etc. The Ryans have been married for 17 years, have three kids, professional backgrounds (he's a professor of education at Ohio State, she's a former magazine editor), and generally support the notion that you have to choose carefully before marriage and work hard at it afterwards. They've examined the current trends--premarital cohabitation, and so forth--and generally feel it's ""safer and wiser to wait until marriage to bed""; less selfish to have children than to buy a new car; better to get any conflicts out into the open than to let them fester into an eventual divorce. Besides a running joint commentary, each provides personal reminiscences of courtship and marriage, good moments and bad (including a nearly disastrous proposal scene). Other than the occasional list (strategies for dealing with anger, ""ten skills needed for a marriage""), the talk is low-key: the joys of transmitting values to your child, the need for rationality as well as romance in your choice of mate, the place of God and church in keeping our commitment sacred (""In marriage, the Christian perspective can transform an unanticipated pregnancy into God's surprise""). Gentle guidance for traditionalists.