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I Married You for Happiness
Throughout Lily Tuck's career, she's been praised by critics for her crisp, lean language and sensuous explorations of exotic locales and complex psychologies. From Siam to Paraguay and beyond, Tuck inspires readers to travel into unfamiliar realms, and her newest novel is no exception. Slender, potent, and utterly engaging, I Married You For Happiness combines marriage, mathematics, and the probability of an afterlife to create Tuck's most affecting and riveting book yet.
"His hand is growing cold, still she holds it" is how this novel that tells the story of a marriage begins. The tale unfolds over a single night as Nina sits at the bedside of her husband, Philip, whose sudden and unexpected death is the reason for her lonely vigil. Still too shocked to grieve, she lets herself remember the defining moments of their long union, beginning with their meeting in Paris. She is an artist, he a highly accomplished mathematician - a collision of two different worlds that merged to form an intricate and passionate love. As we move through select memories - real and imagined - Tuck reveals the most private intimacies, dark secrets, and overwhelming joys that defined Nina and Philip's life together.
"His hand is growing cold, still she holds it" is how this novel that tells the story of a marriage begins. The tale unfolds over a single night as Nina sits at the bedside of her husband, Philip, whose sudden and unexpected death is the reason for her lonely vigil. Still too shocked to grieve, she lets herself remember the defining moments of their long union, beginning with their meeting in Paris. She is an artist, he a highly accomplished mathematician - a collision of two different worlds that merged to form an intricate and passionate love. As we move through select memories - real and imagined - Tuck reveals the most private intimacies, dark secrets, and overwhelming joys that defined Nina and Philip's life together.
208 pages, Hardcover
First published September 6, 2011
59 people are currently reading
2027 people want to read
About the author
Lily Tuck
25 books141 followersLily Tuck is an American novelist and short story writer whose novel The News from Paraguay won the 2004 National Book Award for Fiction. Her novel Siam was nominated for the 2000 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction. She has published four other novels, a collection of short stories, and a biography of Italian novelist Elsa Morante (see "Works" below).
An American citizen born in Paris, Tuck now divides her time between New York City and Maine; she has also lived in Thailand and (during her childhood) Uruguay and Peru. Tuck has stated that "living in other countries has given me a different perspective as a writer. It has heightened my sense of dislocation and rootlessness. ... I think this feeling is reflected in my characters, most of them women whose lives are changed by either a physical displacement or a loss of some kind".
An American citizen born in Paris, Tuck now divides her time between New York City and Maine; she has also lived in Thailand and (during her childhood) Uruguay and Peru. Tuck has stated that "living in other countries has given me a different perspective as a writer. It has heightened my sense of dislocation and rootlessness. ... I think this feeling is reflected in my characters, most of them women whose lives are changed by either a physical displacement or a loss of some kind".
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 379 reviews
February 24, 2013
Lily Tuck
I Married You for Happiness
A Book Review
What is it with me lately? I'm so emotional.
Like a little girl.
How can a small book leave me with a tear in my eye?
I'm a grown man. Real men don't cry.
From the first sentence: His hand is growing cold; still she holds it.
I braced myself. Death in the first sentence! Look out, I thought.
To the last sentence: When he sees Nina at the bedroom window, he stops what he is doing and, straightening up tall, he waves to her.
No more tissues left in the Kleenex dispenser.
Almost makes you wanna cry, just those two sentences. Should I continue, should I read this book. Was I man enough.
Nina married for years, is sitting at her husbands side. He has just died.
She waits, before calling the ambulance. Just her and him. She remembers the time... a collection of memoirs, her prespective.
This story is sad, there is rarely a happy moment, but you can feel the love between the two. Almost everyone can relate in their own way. Mourning a death of a loved one, a part of life.
Beautifully written. A little French thrown in for effect. And it works setting the mood, for romance. That's what I'd call this book. A romance novel.
Hey, if it can make a grown man cry.
I give it two thumbs up and five stars.
Excuse me, I have to go blow my nose.
Dog Brindle
I Married You for Happiness
A Book Review
What is it with me lately? I'm so emotional.
Like a little girl.
How can a small book leave me with a tear in my eye?
I'm a grown man. Real men don't cry.
From the first sentence: His hand is growing cold; still she holds it.
I braced myself. Death in the first sentence! Look out, I thought.
To the last sentence: When he sees Nina at the bedroom window, he stops what he is doing and, straightening up tall, he waves to her.
No more tissues left in the Kleenex dispenser.
Almost makes you wanna cry, just those two sentences. Should I continue, should I read this book. Was I man enough.
Nina married for years, is sitting at her husbands side. He has just died.
She waits, before calling the ambulance. Just her and him. She remembers the time... a collection of memoirs, her prespective.
This story is sad, there is rarely a happy moment, but you can feel the love between the two. Almost everyone can relate in their own way. Mourning a death of a loved one, a part of life.
Beautifully written. A little French thrown in for effect. And it works setting the mood, for romance. That's what I'd call this book. A romance novel.
Hey, if it can make a grown man cry.
I give it two thumbs up and five stars.
Excuse me, I have to go blow my nose.
Dog Brindle
February 16, 2016
NO SPOILERS!!!
When I choose how many stars to give a book, I simply ask myself did I dislike it (1 star), was it OK (2 stars), did I like it (3 stars), did I really like it (4 stars) or did I find it absolutely, utterly amazing (5 stars). When I am determining the number of stars I will give a book, I do not analyze why, I just make myself honestly consider how I felt when reading the book. I am giving this book two stars. Then comes the hard part, to determine why I have reacted as I have. I don't always know. Writing the review actually helps mu understand my own emotions. It is my emotions that determine the stars.
I assume you have already read the book description. I see no point in repeating them. I will try and explain why I gave this book 2 stars. I definitely enjoyed reading about the wide variety of topics that were discussed. You get everything from Einstein to Winston Churchill to Richard Feynman to Paul Erdös to Xerosis to art to mathematics. You get lots about mathematics. Perfect numbers, prime numbers, probability, mathematical scholars, Hypatia... I could go on and on. There is lots of interesting information to be found in this book. You learn about the couple's escapades in France, Italy, Brazil and the US. There are lines of Jacques Brel's songs, dialogues in French and Italian. They spend lots of time in Brittany, France. I definitely enjoyed reading the French, hearing the Celtic village names that I recognize. I love Brittany. A reader who does not know French will loose a lot.
So if the book covers so many interesting topics, what is wrong? First of all it is extremely cerebral. Secondly, almost too many subjects are covered. There is a lack of depth to any one topic - except maybe mathematics. But I got tired with the mathematical reasoning. In fact the wife and daughter of Philip, who has died, they too get tired of his only and always analyzing everything as a numerical problem.
And he tells her, I am happy. For once he is not thinking of numbers; he is not counting. (71% through the book)
I have not long ago read a marvelous book,The Housekeeper and the Professor, the central theme of which was also mathematics. This book makes mathematics wonderful. It engagingly brings to life relationships within a "family". I never felt close to Philip or Sabine or their daughter, Louise. Sabine's thoughts about her life with Philip, thoughts she has beside her dead husband the night after his death, were not enough to draw me into their lives. Their marriage was clearly rocky at intervals, but what marriage isn't? I do leave the book with the belief that they loved each other. I liked the sparkle in the last two pages. You must read the book to find out what I am referring to!, Perhaps you will not agree with me, but think their marriage was floundering.
No, it is definitely not a bad book, but too cerebral for my tastes. I want to feel attached to the characters. I can be mad at them or I can like them, but they must move me one way or the other. Here, in this book, I merely had fun sharing their experiences. This may certainly be enough for another reader. Lots of interesting topics are covered. I adore Feynman. I want to read a whole book about Hypatia. I enjoy Brel's songs, but if you do not know French, if you do not know these songs, you will miss these delights. Brel's name is not even mentioned. Life in France is well depicted, but still it wasn't enough for me. Maybe I am just very, very picky!
I have read an egalley, in other words an ARC in digital format. Changes may occur before the book is published.
August 26, 2011
“Honey, dinner’s ready”, Nina shouts up the stairs. When her husband doesn’t appear she goes upstairs where he’s gone to lie down after a long day teaching mathematics at a local university. She finds him dead. After the next door doctor confirms Philip’s death she sits vigil through the night reflecting on their long (mostly) lovely life together. They’ve lived in France and visited many parts of Europe, South America and the States. He’s logical yet he believes in God. She’s an artist with no firm beliefs. They continually debate God’s existence. Their discussions are usually centered on Philip’s espousal of some mathematical theory. During their long marriage they’ve of course endured sorrows and times when their love for one another has waned but not enough to break their bond. By the way if you love art there are some snippets about making and appreciating art but nothing too in depth. If you’re a math lover there are multiple explorations related to its theory.
Tuck gives a moving trip through this marriage. The scenery is stunning; lots of descriptions of the natural world and its wonders. There’s no doubt she writes incredibly well. Sadly the book felt unfocussed and too dreamy. The ending didn’t work at all in my opinion. It’s a nice journey though.
Tuck gives a moving trip through this marriage. The scenery is stunning; lots of descriptions of the natural world and its wonders. There’s no doubt she writes incredibly well. Sadly the book felt unfocussed and too dreamy. The ending didn’t work at all in my opinion. It’s a nice journey though.
November 3, 2011
Based on the title and on the synopsis on the front cover, I assumed that this would be a novel about a woman reminiscing about her 43 year marriage to her husband that had just died. I assume that most people get married to be happy and look forward to happiness in their marriage. The reality of the novel was that the main character, Nora, was a cold-hearted jerk. I would like to hope that it is possible to be married to someone for a long time and not have a blatant affair. In her case, she obviously didn't view marriage as I did. I really wondered if she ever loved her husband or her daughter. The way she described both didn't imply that she really did. She needed him and was completely dependent upon him, but that isn't the same thing as love. I have one last quibble. As a daughter of a college professor, I would really like to know how Nora and Phillip had enough money to travel all over the world on a yearly basis including spending every summer in France? Because, the reality is that college professors don't make a huge amount of money. Nora was a stay at home artist and didn't contribute to the family income. I suppose one more quibble would be that I thought it was pretentious of the author to include so much non-translated French and large amounts of math theory.
December 23, 2017
https://msarki.tumblr.com/post/168850...
Phillip is dead. By holding his gradually cooling hand, Nina, for one entire night, remembers the defining moments of their long life together as husband and wife. Private intimacies, dark secrets, and overwhelming joys. How to connect with someone, even after living forty years with them? All are individuals. Best we can hope for are momentary connections. Memories. Challenges. Threats to what we deem secure. Imagine spending the entire night alone with your dead spouse. Touching, but more importantly, something needed. And for those contiguous moments, too shocked to grieve.
Lily Tuck has bought me out. I am all in. Years ago, she writes, before they met, her husband accidentally kills a woman riding in his car with him. And later, her Nina has an affair with Phillip’s best friend. And then she has another with a son of a mutual friend, hiding both of these men from him. She also conceals the necessary abortion. Now Nina wonders to herself how many secrets Phillip had, and perhaps he had other hidden lovers as well. Now neither spouse will ever know due to their marital deceits.
For a long time after, Nina is convinced that the migraine headaches are a punishment for her lies.
It is understandable that Nina suffers. The truth is often hurtful especially when it remains in hiding. She is confessing this on the page. Too late for it to benefit Phillip, or to find out what it is Nina knows is missing. Series upon series of events meant to enliven and enjoy. Never a thoughtful concern at the time for consequences. Only careful methods managing to remain concealed. These episodes blended within periods of general satisfaction.
Tuck’s writing is comfortably relaxed and warm in its feeling. No complaints about that. She is gifted and extremely sexy. Sensual to the degree my imagination soars. It is easy to want to be with Lily Tuck in every possible pose. To want her to get naked too. She even explains the difference. But intimacy ends as soon as you get inside her. It then it becomes just sex and something dogs simply do with no conscience.
She sleeps with Jean-Marc only three or four times. Not enough to qualify as a proper affair.
As morning nears and the dawn of a new day Tuck’s prose quickens. Nina hurries. Her manners choppy and seeming nervous in some way. Phillips remains dead on the bed. Nina perhaps unsure of what she truly is.
How long ago everything seems to her.
And how unreal.
Phillip is dead. By holding his gradually cooling hand, Nina, for one entire night, remembers the defining moments of their long life together as husband and wife. Private intimacies, dark secrets, and overwhelming joys. How to connect with someone, even after living forty years with them? All are individuals. Best we can hope for are momentary connections. Memories. Challenges. Threats to what we deem secure. Imagine spending the entire night alone with your dead spouse. Touching, but more importantly, something needed. And for those contiguous moments, too shocked to grieve.
Lily Tuck has bought me out. I am all in. Years ago, she writes, before they met, her husband accidentally kills a woman riding in his car with him. And later, her Nina has an affair with Phillip’s best friend. And then she has another with a son of a mutual friend, hiding both of these men from him. She also conceals the necessary abortion. Now Nina wonders to herself how many secrets Phillip had, and perhaps he had other hidden lovers as well. Now neither spouse will ever know due to their marital deceits.
For a long time after, Nina is convinced that the migraine headaches are a punishment for her lies.
It is understandable that Nina suffers. The truth is often hurtful especially when it remains in hiding. She is confessing this on the page. Too late for it to benefit Phillip, or to find out what it is Nina knows is missing. Series upon series of events meant to enliven and enjoy. Never a thoughtful concern at the time for consequences. Only careful methods managing to remain concealed. These episodes blended within periods of general satisfaction.
Tuck’s writing is comfortably relaxed and warm in its feeling. No complaints about that. She is gifted and extremely sexy. Sensual to the degree my imagination soars. It is easy to want to be with Lily Tuck in every possible pose. To want her to get naked too. She even explains the difference. But intimacy ends as soon as you get inside her. It then it becomes just sex and something dogs simply do with no conscience.
She sleeps with Jean-Marc only three or four times. Not enough to qualify as a proper affair.
As morning nears and the dawn of a new day Tuck’s prose quickens. Nina hurries. Her manners choppy and seeming nervous in some way. Phillips remains dead on the bed. Nina perhaps unsure of what she truly is.
How long ago everything seems to her.
And how unreal.
October 24, 2011
I won an advanced copy of this novel from First Reads on Goodreads- thank you!
Lily Tuck's exploration of a 40 year marriage from the point of view of the wife upon discovering her dead husband in bed is beautiful and concise. She uses her language sparingly, but is able to convey so much with just one sentence. She effortlessly weaves achronologically between the various stages of the marriage: first meeting, courtship, arguments, vacations, affairs, secrets, suspicions, and even mundane conversations.
What struck me most about this novel was the way Tuck captured an emotion that I don't quite consider jealousy, but which is similar: the knowledge that the people you know most intimately don't completely belong to you. You can spend years with someone and feel that you know everything about them, but really you don't know the conversations they have with other people, the thoughts they think but don't express, and the secrets they keep buried. For Nina, the narrator, this emotion is epitomized by Iris, a young woman who died in a car accident with her husband when he was younger. She agonizes over what kind of relationship they had, even though she knows her husband loves her and spent his life with her.
While I Married You For Happiness (I do wish she had picked another title) fits in with my typical "depressing" reading choices, I ultimately felt like it was a character study; the death of Philip is a necessary plot point to allow Nina to honestly examine her entire life, good and bad. This novel to me is more about relationships than about death, and I thoroughly enjoyed the insight into lives and experiences I couldn't possibly understand otherwise. I recommend this quick read to anyone who enjoyed Ian McEwan's On Chesil Beach, Paul Harding's Tinkers, or to anyone who likes fragmented and poetic narratives in general.
Lily Tuck's exploration of a 40 year marriage from the point of view of the wife upon discovering her dead husband in bed is beautiful and concise. She uses her language sparingly, but is able to convey so much with just one sentence. She effortlessly weaves achronologically between the various stages of the marriage: first meeting, courtship, arguments, vacations, affairs, secrets, suspicions, and even mundane conversations.
What struck me most about this novel was the way Tuck captured an emotion that I don't quite consider jealousy, but which is similar: the knowledge that the people you know most intimately don't completely belong to you. You can spend years with someone and feel that you know everything about them, but really you don't know the conversations they have with other people, the thoughts they think but don't express, and the secrets they keep buried. For Nina, the narrator, this emotion is epitomized by Iris, a young woman who died in a car accident with her husband when he was younger. She agonizes over what kind of relationship they had, even though she knows her husband loves her and spent his life with her.
While I Married You For Happiness (I do wish she had picked another title) fits in with my typical "depressing" reading choices, I ultimately felt like it was a character study; the death of Philip is a necessary plot point to allow Nina to honestly examine her entire life, good and bad. This novel to me is more about relationships than about death, and I thoroughly enjoyed the insight into lives and experiences I couldn't possibly understand otherwise. I recommend this quick read to anyone who enjoyed Ian McEwan's On Chesil Beach, Paul Harding's Tinkers, or to anyone who likes fragmented and poetic narratives in general.
August 17, 2012
Here i go again, rating a book i didn't finish. I didn't finish it because it was due back at the library and i had no more renewals. Also i realized i had no attachment to the characters. i didn't care about their story, which surprised me and actually made me feel a little sad. I had put off reading this ever since it was published because i was frightened of the potential to be too affected emotionally. But i really wanted to read it, in part to challenge myself, but in part because it was about a mathematician. and quite honestly i have a little bit of a thing for mathematicians in books. luckily for me, it was the mathematician in the book who was the sole character i cared about. but he was dead. i mean, that is what the whole book was about. however, even though the book is short, it got tedious. i didn't finish it in one sitting and by the second and third day after starting it, i had completely lost interest. Maybe, maybe, maybe i would have finished it had i been able to finish it within a day. The writing is quite pretty, but i failed to find any real depth in it, so finished or not, it fell flat.
April 4, 2015
Her simple elegant writing style carried me from page to page with crisp sentences and dense descriptions. It’s a lovely portrait of a relationship between an artist and a mathematician. Opposites connected by disparate characteristics. Making it work despite what might seem contrary. Both attracted to culture. To France. Spent every summer there. Nina sits by Philip’s dead body and reflects on the nuances and details of their marriage. She wonders if he truly loved her. If he absolutely loved her. If he was always faithful to her. She tries to remember the best moments during their decades together. It’s a lovely novel that flips back and forth through time.
July 9, 2013
Early evening, a woman's husband comes home, greets her, goes up to their bedroom and dies. She spends the night by his side, looking back on their happy marriage.
That's the plot, such as it is, to author Lily Tuck's "I Married You for Happiness."
Philip and Nina are worldly, educated, and well-traveled so that the stuff of their otherwise anonymous lives does not weigh the reader down in boring, quotidian minutiae.
She is a painter. He is a mathematician specializing in the field of probability. The novel is peppered with lectures on this topic, some to his students, some to his wife. These can be interesting or opaque and difficult to understand.
Even in the latter case, Tuck manages to make it sound good and it's not beyond reason to suspect there was something in the language associated with probability that she found pleasing to the eye and ear.
As Philip's examples and scenarios accumulate, it seems the author is trying to say this happy marriage, with its ebb and flow, glories and pratfalls, was something that might or might not have occurred given the laws governing chance and that, even though it panned out, it was not meant to be forever.
Ms. Tuck is a prior winner of the National Book Award and her command of craft is patent in "I married you for happiness."
The remembering takes place as the night winds on. The reader is kept abreast of the changing light outside, the passing of cars, and barking of dogs. You know Philip is dead and the recollections are more poignant because you know this woman will have no more of them.
There is no chronology. The memories are placed by the author in places she needs them most, the musings on probability the same, yet for all this temporal disorder, an overall impression of control seeps from this thin tome.
Maybe its the two lives detailed that imposed the order.
Those with happy marriages can mourn along with Nina, even apply the exercise to their won coupling. Those less fortunate can indulge in a kind of guilty pleasure, absolved, up to a point, by the underlying theme of chance and likelihoods.
That's the plot, such as it is, to author Lily Tuck's "I Married You for Happiness."
Philip and Nina are worldly, educated, and well-traveled so that the stuff of their otherwise anonymous lives does not weigh the reader down in boring, quotidian minutiae.
She is a painter. He is a mathematician specializing in the field of probability. The novel is peppered with lectures on this topic, some to his students, some to his wife. These can be interesting or opaque and difficult to understand.
Even in the latter case, Tuck manages to make it sound good and it's not beyond reason to suspect there was something in the language associated with probability that she found pleasing to the eye and ear.
As Philip's examples and scenarios accumulate, it seems the author is trying to say this happy marriage, with its ebb and flow, glories and pratfalls, was something that might or might not have occurred given the laws governing chance and that, even though it panned out, it was not meant to be forever.
Ms. Tuck is a prior winner of the National Book Award and her command of craft is patent in "I married you for happiness."
The remembering takes place as the night winds on. The reader is kept abreast of the changing light outside, the passing of cars, and barking of dogs. You know Philip is dead and the recollections are more poignant because you know this woman will have no more of them.
There is no chronology. The memories are placed by the author in places she needs them most, the musings on probability the same, yet for all this temporal disorder, an overall impression of control seeps from this thin tome.
Maybe its the two lives detailed that imposed the order.
Those with happy marriages can mourn along with Nina, even apply the exercise to their won coupling. Those less fortunate can indulge in a kind of guilty pleasure, absolved, up to a point, by the underlying theme of chance and likelihoods.
August 16, 2011
This author has one National Book Award and no soul. It's supposed to be an intimate look at a 40-year-marriage: it begins with a woman holding the hand of her husband, who has just died moments before, and follows her through her memories our their relationship from there. But apparently, all her nostalgia's saved for the outfits she was wearing and the exotic locations they visited together and whether or not she was pretty when they went there. Lady, your husband just died! Who cares which striped bikini you wore! There's also way too many passages like this: "What did he say to her exactly? 'I am a bit tired, I am going to lie down before supper.' or 'I'm going to lie down a bit before supper, I'm a bit tired." No wonder he was tired, living with a wife like this!
September 27, 2017
A quotation from Blaise Pascal acts as epigraph for the story,
We never keep to the present. We recall the past; we anticipate the future as if we found it too slow in coming and were trying to hurry it up, or we recall the past as if to stay its too rapid flight. We are so unwise that we wander about in times that do not belong to us…
Which sets the scene for this bitter sweet story beautifully.
Philip and Nina's history is told over the course of one night.
It's the night that Philip has died in his sleep after having a little lie down after work and just before dinner. Nina sits, shocked, with Philip's body, and throughout the long night, she remembers some of the moments that made their marriage what it was - their first meeting in Paris, the birth of their daughter, Philip's career as a mathematician, the flirtations, arguments and counselling, the jealousy, the secrets and, of course, their love, that endured it all.
Philip was a mathematician, so quite a lot of probability and philosophy was thrown into the mix. His rational nature often clashed with Nina's more artistic soul and their marriage, like most, I guess, became a compromise and dance around each other's emotional abilities and needs.
Tuck throws in the occasional harsh reality check - like Nina suddenly remembering a story about an elderly local woman who was brutally raped when her home was broken into, who subsequently died, not so much from the pain, but the shame.
This is where Tuck excelled. She showed us the complicated and sometimes random nature of grief. Weird trivial thoughts and practical matters often interrupted and intruded on Nina's ability to process what had happened. The reality of her loss would hit her anew, as another memory led her back to this present moment. And then off again.
Tuck used a fragmentary style of writing which suited the in and out, to and fro nature of Nina's thoughts. The writing was sparse yet delicate as Tuck explored the age-old tragedy of how one partner will eventually predecease the other in any marriage. And that even though we all know this harsh fact right from the start, it still catches us by surprise when it actually happens.
Full review here - http://bronasbooks.blogspot.com.au/20...
We never keep to the present. We recall the past; we anticipate the future as if we found it too slow in coming and were trying to hurry it up, or we recall the past as if to stay its too rapid flight. We are so unwise that we wander about in times that do not belong to us…
Which sets the scene for this bitter sweet story beautifully.
Philip and Nina's history is told over the course of one night.
It's the night that Philip has died in his sleep after having a little lie down after work and just before dinner. Nina sits, shocked, with Philip's body, and throughout the long night, she remembers some of the moments that made their marriage what it was - their first meeting in Paris, the birth of their daughter, Philip's career as a mathematician, the flirtations, arguments and counselling, the jealousy, the secrets and, of course, their love, that endured it all.
Philip was a mathematician, so quite a lot of probability and philosophy was thrown into the mix. His rational nature often clashed with Nina's more artistic soul and their marriage, like most, I guess, became a compromise and dance around each other's emotional abilities and needs.
Tuck throws in the occasional harsh reality check - like Nina suddenly remembering a story about an elderly local woman who was brutally raped when her home was broken into, who subsequently died, not so much from the pain, but the shame.
This is where Tuck excelled. She showed us the complicated and sometimes random nature of grief. Weird trivial thoughts and practical matters often interrupted and intruded on Nina's ability to process what had happened. The reality of her loss would hit her anew, as another memory led her back to this present moment. And then off again.
Tuck used a fragmentary style of writing which suited the in and out, to and fro nature of Nina's thoughts. The writing was sparse yet delicate as Tuck explored the age-old tragedy of how one partner will eventually predecease the other in any marriage. And that even though we all know this harsh fact right from the start, it still catches us by surprise when it actually happens.
Full review here - http://bronasbooks.blogspot.com.au/20...
September 30, 2021
When Nina Hoffman's husband, Philip, fails to come down for dinner, she discovers him dead, suddenly, unexpectedly, stretched out on their bed. They're long married and their daughter Louise, in her 30s, lives across the country. Over the course of Nina's all-night vigil next to her husband, her memories flood, snapshots of their lives together, beginning when they met in Paris, fragmentary flashbacks, of courtship, their yearly vacations in France, giving birth to Louise in a snowstorm, and more. The texture of memory is delicate, broken, random, flouts sequential time, and juxtaposes the important with the trivial. Grief is complicated, mourning along with practical thoughts. This is an elegant novel, at its heart is the marital relationship complicated by the differences between the emotional and the cerebral, the concrete and the abstract. Nina is a painter, and Philip is a mathematician and professor, whose bits of lectures to his students we read. She thinks of the secrets she kept from him, and what he might have kept from her. Tuck is not an emotional writer, there is a coolness to her work, that I found very effective here.
dnf
September 21, 2025I listened to almost eighty per cent of this and it wasn't making me happy
December 3, 2012
I went into this book certain that it would be depressing, and I couldn't have been more wrong! You can't blame me though when you hear the premise. Nina's making dinner when her husband Philip comes home from work. When she calls him for dinner, she finds him on their bed, dead of an apparent cardiac arrest. The book takes place over that night, as she sits with his body, waiting for morning when she will call the doctor and their daughter and make all the arrangements. She spends the night remember all of the important moments of their relationship and marriage, some good and some bad.
The title itself should have been a clue, but I read it in an accusing tone when instead it should have just be a straightforward, factual tone. This is one problem with print. It's also a problem of my assumption. The vast majority of novels about marriage are about how bad it is. What makes this novel refreshing isn't that Nina and Philip didn't cheat on each other, didn't have secrets from each other, and didn't have regrets - because they did. The refreshment comes in that they didn't make those flaws the centerpiece of their marriage - they were low-drama people and they built around their problems instead of opening wounds and rubbing salt on them. And this book certainly is a strong argument for discernment over honesty.
Normally I'm not crazy about books that happen in one day (in fact this one is more like 8 hours) because they try to cram too many things into one day, but this book is the opposite. In fact, after Philip's death (which technically takes place before the book even begins but not by much), nothing happens. Nina drinks a bottle of wine and puts on a couple of jackets, but that's it. The real events of the novel take place over 40 years. I also am not a fan of no-quotation-marks dialogue, but again it makes sense, because Nina really isn't talking to anyone, she's just remembering conversations. It was confusing once or twice, but that was more due to a lack of dialogue tags than the lack of quotation marks.
In the end, I found the book somewhat optimistic, although I'd really call it more realistic with a happy ending. Not happy, in that Nina and Philip had planned to be together (and Philip had planned to be alive) much longer, but none of us get to choose when and how we die, and in the end Philip's life seems to have been overall happy, fulfilled. I am not entirely sure I understand the ending (which makes me happy that my second book club will be discussing this, tomorrow), and there were a lot of unexplained/untranslated French words and phrases, but that notwithstanding, I liked the book a lot, and it was short. If you're looking for something literary but not depressing or too taxing, this book is perfect.
The title itself should have been a clue, but I read it in an accusing tone when instead it should have just be a straightforward, factual tone. This is one problem with print. It's also a problem of my assumption. The vast majority of novels about marriage are about how bad it is. What makes this novel refreshing isn't that Nina and Philip didn't cheat on each other, didn't have secrets from each other, and didn't have regrets - because they did. The refreshment comes in that they didn't make those flaws the centerpiece of their marriage - they were low-drama people and they built around their problems instead of opening wounds and rubbing salt on them. And this book certainly is a strong argument for discernment over honesty.
Normally I'm not crazy about books that happen in one day (in fact this one is more like 8 hours) because they try to cram too many things into one day, but this book is the opposite. In fact, after Philip's death (which technically takes place before the book even begins but not by much), nothing happens. Nina drinks a bottle of wine and puts on a couple of jackets, but that's it. The real events of the novel take place over 40 years. I also am not a fan of no-quotation-marks dialogue, but again it makes sense, because Nina really isn't talking to anyone, she's just remembering conversations. It was confusing once or twice, but that was more due to a lack of dialogue tags than the lack of quotation marks.
In the end, I found the book somewhat optimistic, although I'd really call it more realistic with a happy ending. Not happy, in that Nina and Philip had planned to be together (and Philip had planned to be alive) much longer, but none of us get to choose when and how we die, and in the end Philip's life seems to have been overall happy, fulfilled. I am not entirely sure I understand the ending (which makes me happy that my second book club will be discussing this, tomorrow), and there were a lot of unexplained/untranslated French words and phrases, but that notwithstanding, I liked the book a lot, and it was short. If you're looking for something literary but not depressing or too taxing, this book is perfect.
June 30, 2011
This beautifully poetic novel chronicles a 40-year marriage with all its thrills and pain and quiet satisfactions. Nina has found her husband dead in bed. She sits with him all night and remembers their life together. Her thoughts are free floating moving from their courtship in Paris to their lives as parents and professionals in America. We learn of Nina's brief affair and the tragic accident that haunts Philip.
Tuck manages this material beautifully. I felt as though I were in the presence of a great jazz musician. She seemed to know exactly when to touch upon a tender moment in their relationship or revisit a painful one. She plays with Philip's knowledge of probability and Nina's paintings as recurring motifs. When you are not quite sure where she's going with an idea she manages to pull it back into the narrative again like a saxophone solo dovetailing into the melody.
I wish I could have read it all in one sitting. It deserves that.
Tuck manages this material beautifully. I felt as though I were in the presence of a great jazz musician. She seemed to know exactly when to touch upon a tender moment in their relationship or revisit a painful one. She plays with Philip's knowledge of probability and Nina's paintings as recurring motifs. When you are not quite sure where she's going with an idea she manages to pull it back into the narrative again like a saxophone solo dovetailing into the melody.
I wish I could have read it all in one sitting. It deserves that.
October 3, 2017
2.5
It was OK.
I read this book because I really enjoyed Sisters by the same author .
We spend 24 hrs with Nina who reminisces about life with her deceased husband. It was a pleasant enough read, although in the end I didn't care whether the protagonist shared an afternoon at the Louvre with her partner or had the perfect croissant at a certain café. Like I said, the writing was quite beautiful, but I didn't care to listen to someone I didn't connect with reflect on their marriage.
It was OK.
I read this book because I really enjoyed Sisters by the same author .
We spend 24 hrs with Nina who reminisces about life with her deceased husband. It was a pleasant enough read, although in the end I didn't care whether the protagonist shared an afternoon at the Louvre with her partner or had the perfect croissant at a certain café. Like I said, the writing was quite beautiful, but I didn't care to listen to someone I didn't connect with reflect on their marriage.
Read
October 12, 2012It takes a while, I’ve learned, to reclaim the rhythms of your reading life after it having been atrophied for so long—more so, infuriatingly enough, to maintain those rhythms. In desperation, you return to the kind of books you’re confident are yours, written with you in mind as the ideal reader. A desperation because, well, consider the existential crisis: After months of erratic reading—of rarely being able to immerse yourself in a book as you used to (and with an alarming yet deeply rewarding frequency)—I wondered what it was I really liked to read, and if it would be so easy to slip into them once again.
Lily Tuck’s I Married You for Happiness was a book I’d long espied on other people’s blogs, and dearly wished for myself. I wanted it badly—it would be deeply reflective, I gathered; it was about a marriage, and there’s nothing like the Domestic and its myriad tensions to get me going. There were bad reviews here and there, about implausibility, unlikeability, slowness, lack of linearity—sometimes, all of the above. Not facets I usually concerned myself with, but I was gun-shy: When I saw the book in a bookstore, I didn’t buy it. I’d return to that bookstore again and again, then tell myself that it’s just not me anymore. What use did I have for marriages?
And then I had to buy it. Very casually, one day during a bookstore run I had no business of making, I picked it up: Might as well, I told myself, it’s on sale anyway. The nonchalance fooled it none, looking back—as soon as I got home, I tore the wrapper open and began reading. “His hand is growing cold,” began the book, “still she holds it.”
The book is a vigil. Nina spends the night with her husband Philip, who has just died. His body is unmoving on the bed they have shared for some 43 years, dinner has long grown cold downstairs, and Nina sits there with her Philip, keeping watch over him. As with any vigil, the mind slips in and out of the present—as she holds Philip’s hand growing cold, Nina reviews the romance of their early years, the infidelities struck, the suspicions aroused, and a marriage. A long marriage that has just ended.
To focus my love for this book, to make sense of my blabby self, I’ll address what other people have seen as this book’s flaws. One, it is implausible. Yes, I quite agree. There’s an idealism to it all—how they first meet in a café in Paris, for example, how Philip simply asks if this seat is taken. And the days that followed, them making love in cramped quarters all over the city of Lurve. More un-realism: How could Philip and Nina, a mathematician and a painter respectively (and one gets the impression that Nina is not at all famed), afford all those trips all over the world?
Well, yes, it is implausible. The entire novel is self-indulgent, reading like a short story that got out of hand because there’s too much richness to try to stifle—or to even attempt contain would result in a piece so dense it’d wring the reader dry. But pooh-pooh on reality. This is authorial will we have here, and the priority is romanticism. Not romance, per se, not even idealism—just the experience of a shared life that was not so bad, was it?
And then, the unlikeability. Nina, some have grumbled, is unlikeable because of her life choices, and especially in contrast to sweet, silent, long-suffering Philip. It’s not so much the reaching for moral ascendancy that gnaws at me, it’s the fact that within the novel, it works that way. Someone has to be the villain in this relationship at this juncture—and because Nina’s alive, and because she loves this man just dead, she’s going to take the hit. I’m not saying that Nina’s set herself out to be a martyr. Far from it: There’s a matter-of-factness to Nina’s lyrical narrative. This is how I was when we were married, is her plain-speaking. She flirts and sleeps with other men, she gets raped with an acquaintance whose baby she’d also abort without telling her Philip. This is how she was when they were married.
And then, the slowness. There is slowness—like molasses, isn’t that the phrase? I point you to J.L. Carr’s conscious tedium, which I never did transcend. That is slowness, contrived or otherwise. This, Lily Tuck’s tidy little book, this is quietness. Again: It’s a vigil. There’s a solemnness to the recounting of 43 years of marriage, but it’s always charged. That’s what reminiscence does. That’s what reminiscence at such a dire, completely final stage does. Look beyond the surface where nothing happens—look at the volatility between these two, look how Nina grows jealous too easily, how Philip is so painfully ignorant, how Philip addresses his class. The very fact that Nina imagines her Philip addressing his class.
And, at last, the lack of linearity. In and out through scenes she goes, recalling and glimpsing and reiterating. Each moment of their marriage painstakingly revealed, as is the entirety of it. Obviously, the vignettes serve a purpose: To define a marriage through scenes. Are they milestones in a life shared? Not necessarily—though they are always charged. It’s books like this that confirm what fertile ground for literature marriage is. Then why these scenes? I could think of reasons, but the fact is they feel right. More importantly, they feel whole. They make this marriage whole and real for us.
All these elements come together and highlight the inherent sadness of Nina’s endeavor, and its necessity. Reliving 43 years of marriage—all the sins committed against each other, all the guilt carried and may well continue to, as well as all the love—all the giddy romance, all the breathless wonder of each other’s existence, and all those affirming, quiet moments where you simply love. There’s something relentlessly beautiful about the futility of this vigil. How pointless it is, ultimately—but how inevitable. Just—damn, Lily Tuck.
It’s love between me and this book. I’m fully enamored. I’m it’s ideal reader, as simple as that. Consider my reading existence affirmed, ladies and gentlemen. [Now, for that whole ‘nother creature that is constant, if continuous reaffirmation.]
Oh, a final note: This title has been inducted into my special collection of writerly bitterness, which contains all the titles and turns of phrase that evoke deep envy in me, and on bad days, self-flagellation. How could you be so daft as to miss that, Sasha?
- - -
[cross-posted]
Lily Tuck’s I Married You for Happiness was a book I’d long espied on other people’s blogs, and dearly wished for myself. I wanted it badly—it would be deeply reflective, I gathered; it was about a marriage, and there’s nothing like the Domestic and its myriad tensions to get me going. There were bad reviews here and there, about implausibility, unlikeability, slowness, lack of linearity—sometimes, all of the above. Not facets I usually concerned myself with, but I was gun-shy: When I saw the book in a bookstore, I didn’t buy it. I’d return to that bookstore again and again, then tell myself that it’s just not me anymore. What use did I have for marriages?
And then I had to buy it. Very casually, one day during a bookstore run I had no business of making, I picked it up: Might as well, I told myself, it’s on sale anyway. The nonchalance fooled it none, looking back—as soon as I got home, I tore the wrapper open and began reading. “His hand is growing cold,” began the book, “still she holds it.”
The book is a vigil. Nina spends the night with her husband Philip, who has just died. His body is unmoving on the bed they have shared for some 43 years, dinner has long grown cold downstairs, and Nina sits there with her Philip, keeping watch over him. As with any vigil, the mind slips in and out of the present—as she holds Philip’s hand growing cold, Nina reviews the romance of their early years, the infidelities struck, the suspicions aroused, and a marriage. A long marriage that has just ended.
To focus my love for this book, to make sense of my blabby self, I’ll address what other people have seen as this book’s flaws. One, it is implausible. Yes, I quite agree. There’s an idealism to it all—how they first meet in a café in Paris, for example, how Philip simply asks if this seat is taken. And the days that followed, them making love in cramped quarters all over the city of Lurve. More un-realism: How could Philip and Nina, a mathematician and a painter respectively (and one gets the impression that Nina is not at all famed), afford all those trips all over the world?
Well, yes, it is implausible. The entire novel is self-indulgent, reading like a short story that got out of hand because there’s too much richness to try to stifle—or to even attempt contain would result in a piece so dense it’d wring the reader dry. But pooh-pooh on reality. This is authorial will we have here, and the priority is romanticism. Not romance, per se, not even idealism—just the experience of a shared life that was not so bad, was it?
And then, the unlikeability. Nina, some have grumbled, is unlikeable because of her life choices, and especially in contrast to sweet, silent, long-suffering Philip. It’s not so much the reaching for moral ascendancy that gnaws at me, it’s the fact that within the novel, it works that way. Someone has to be the villain in this relationship at this juncture—and because Nina’s alive, and because she loves this man just dead, she’s going to take the hit. I’m not saying that Nina’s set herself out to be a martyr. Far from it: There’s a matter-of-factness to Nina’s lyrical narrative. This is how I was when we were married, is her plain-speaking. She flirts and sleeps with other men, she gets raped with an acquaintance whose baby she’d also abort without telling her Philip. This is how she was when they were married.
And then, the slowness. There is slowness—like molasses, isn’t that the phrase? I point you to J.L. Carr’s conscious tedium, which I never did transcend. That is slowness, contrived or otherwise. This, Lily Tuck’s tidy little book, this is quietness. Again: It’s a vigil. There’s a solemnness to the recounting of 43 years of marriage, but it’s always charged. That’s what reminiscence does. That’s what reminiscence at such a dire, completely final stage does. Look beyond the surface where nothing happens—look at the volatility between these two, look how Nina grows jealous too easily, how Philip is so painfully ignorant, how Philip addresses his class. The very fact that Nina imagines her Philip addressing his class.
And, at last, the lack of linearity. In and out through scenes she goes, recalling and glimpsing and reiterating. Each moment of their marriage painstakingly revealed, as is the entirety of it. Obviously, the vignettes serve a purpose: To define a marriage through scenes. Are they milestones in a life shared? Not necessarily—though they are always charged. It’s books like this that confirm what fertile ground for literature marriage is. Then why these scenes? I could think of reasons, but the fact is they feel right. More importantly, they feel whole. They make this marriage whole and real for us.
All these elements come together and highlight the inherent sadness of Nina’s endeavor, and its necessity. Reliving 43 years of marriage—all the sins committed against each other, all the guilt carried and may well continue to, as well as all the love—all the giddy romance, all the breathless wonder of each other’s existence, and all those affirming, quiet moments where you simply love. There’s something relentlessly beautiful about the futility of this vigil. How pointless it is, ultimately—but how inevitable. Just—damn, Lily Tuck.
It’s love between me and this book. I’m fully enamored. I’m it’s ideal reader, as simple as that. Consider my reading existence affirmed, ladies and gentlemen. [Now, for that whole ‘nother creature that is constant, if continuous reaffirmation.]
Oh, a final note: This title has been inducted into my special collection of writerly bitterness, which contains all the titles and turns of phrase that evoke deep envy in me, and on bad days, self-flagellation. How could you be so daft as to miss that, Sasha?
- - -
[cross-posted]
February 28, 2012
Lily Tuck`s novel, I Married You for Happiness, is the story of a woman mourning the sudden death of her husband. It was shortly before dinner when Philip came home from his college teaching position. When Nina calls him for dinner he is dead. She lies by his cold body all night remembering their lives together. The prose is spare and lovely, recalling their joys, passions and pains of their forty-two years together.
Recently, I've read three memoirs about grieving a spouse after sudden death: Joan Didion's The Year of Magical Thinking, Joyce Carol Oates' A Widow's Story: A Memoir, and Francisco Goldman's Say Her Name: A Novel. Lily Tuck's book covers similar territory as these memoirs but in novelistic form.
Nina is an artist and Philip is a mathematician specializing in probability. They have one daughter, thirty-five year old Louise. This book takes place over the course of one night following Philip's death. As the story unfolds, Louise does not yet know her father has died. Nina just wants to spend this one night next to Philip. "In the morning she will make telephone calls, she will write e-mails, make arrangements; the death certificate, the funeral home, the church service - whatever needs to be done. Tonight - tonight, she wants nothing. She wants to be alone. Alone with Philip.
Nina tries to remember their lives together, the big things and the little things. She is especially focused on thoughts about a woman that Philip had known before meeting her. Iris and Philip were in a car crash and Iris died. Had Iris lived, Nina wonders, would Philip have married her instead of Nina? She puts together different theories of probability in her mind for different scenarios and tries to think like her husband would in these situations. "What if she finds a photo of Iris? The photo slips out from in between papers, from inside a folder in a desk drawer."
Simple things cause her great anxiety. What were the exact last words she said to Philip? What did they do yesterday, last weekend? She is not sure and this bothers her. She wants to know and hold the past close to her, remembering all that she can.
She and Philip were so different. Nina paints mostly landscapes and portraits, usually with water colors. Philip gives lectures on probability. She remembers lots of mathematical problems and information that Philip has shared with her even though many are beyond her capacity to understand. "Most mathematical functions, Philip tells her, are classified as two-way functions because they are easy to do and easy to undo - like addition and subtraction, for example. The way turning a light on and turning it off is a two-way function. A one-way function is more complicated because although it may be easy to do, you cannot undo it. Like mixing paint, you can't unmix it, or like breaking an egg shell, you can't put the egg back together." Nina thinks about the physics of alternate universes and wonders if Philip can be alive and dead. Is he really dead?
Nina also gives a lot of thought to the existence of an afterlife and what the great philosophers had to say about it, especially Pascal. Pascal believed it was a better probability to believe in God than not because if God existed and one behaved righteously, they could have eternal life. Still, Nina is not convinced. Ironically, Philip the mathematician had more of a belief in afterlife than does Nina. Philip believes in a libertarian God, "a God who allows room for free will."
Nina struggles to remember where they've lived, what countries they've visited, how many houses they resided in, how many animals they've owned. These little things help her feel closer to Philip as she spends the night next to him holding his hand and stroking his face. This is her night to be with him, her last night to shower herself in their love.
Philip's favorite color was red. He once brought her a red embroidered coat from Hong Kong. She rarely ever wore it. However, tonight she puts it on over an old coat she is wearing and parades around the room in it wondering if Philip would have found this silly. She is doing this as an homage to their love.
During their marriage, Nina had an affair and once was raped. She kept both of these occurences secret from Philip. She worries about Philip's faithfulness to her. "Sometimes when Philip comes back from being away, she sniffs through his laundry, searching for the scent of an unfamiliar perfume - patchouli, jasmine, tuberoses. What is her name? The name of a city. Sofia."
The prose is spare and the book is written in short vignettes, each about some aspect of their life together or their belief system. As the night progresses, Nina drinks wine, dozes occasionally, but mostly stays up and remembers and imagines their time together. Theirs was a great love and one that has withstood the test of time. Lily Tuck understands what it is like to be with one person for forty-two years. She understands great love and passion.
Interestingly, Ms. Tuck has borrowed information from some of the greatest mathematicians, logicians, physicists, and philosophers for this book: Pascal, Einstein, Wilczek, Erdish, Hofstadter, Hawking, and Feynman to name a few. Though the parts about physics and math were sometimes difficult for me to get my head around, they served nicely to illustrate the yin and yang of this marriage. This is a short and lovely book, an homage to a great love, now lost in real time, but forever present in Nina's heart and mind.
Recently, I've read three memoirs about grieving a spouse after sudden death: Joan Didion's The Year of Magical Thinking, Joyce Carol Oates' A Widow's Story: A Memoir, and Francisco Goldman's Say Her Name: A Novel. Lily Tuck's book covers similar territory as these memoirs but in novelistic form.
Nina is an artist and Philip is a mathematician specializing in probability. They have one daughter, thirty-five year old Louise. This book takes place over the course of one night following Philip's death. As the story unfolds, Louise does not yet know her father has died. Nina just wants to spend this one night next to Philip. "In the morning she will make telephone calls, she will write e-mails, make arrangements; the death certificate, the funeral home, the church service - whatever needs to be done. Tonight - tonight, she wants nothing. She wants to be alone. Alone with Philip.
Nina tries to remember their lives together, the big things and the little things. She is especially focused on thoughts about a woman that Philip had known before meeting her. Iris and Philip were in a car crash and Iris died. Had Iris lived, Nina wonders, would Philip have married her instead of Nina? She puts together different theories of probability in her mind for different scenarios and tries to think like her husband would in these situations. "What if she finds a photo of Iris? The photo slips out from in between papers, from inside a folder in a desk drawer."
Simple things cause her great anxiety. What were the exact last words she said to Philip? What did they do yesterday, last weekend? She is not sure and this bothers her. She wants to know and hold the past close to her, remembering all that she can.
She and Philip were so different. Nina paints mostly landscapes and portraits, usually with water colors. Philip gives lectures on probability. She remembers lots of mathematical problems and information that Philip has shared with her even though many are beyond her capacity to understand. "Most mathematical functions, Philip tells her, are classified as two-way functions because they are easy to do and easy to undo - like addition and subtraction, for example. The way turning a light on and turning it off is a two-way function. A one-way function is more complicated because although it may be easy to do, you cannot undo it. Like mixing paint, you can't unmix it, or like breaking an egg shell, you can't put the egg back together." Nina thinks about the physics of alternate universes and wonders if Philip can be alive and dead. Is he really dead?
Nina also gives a lot of thought to the existence of an afterlife and what the great philosophers had to say about it, especially Pascal. Pascal believed it was a better probability to believe in God than not because if God existed and one behaved righteously, they could have eternal life. Still, Nina is not convinced. Ironically, Philip the mathematician had more of a belief in afterlife than does Nina. Philip believes in a libertarian God, "a God who allows room for free will."
Nina struggles to remember where they've lived, what countries they've visited, how many houses they resided in, how many animals they've owned. These little things help her feel closer to Philip as she spends the night next to him holding his hand and stroking his face. This is her night to be with him, her last night to shower herself in their love.
Philip's favorite color was red. He once brought her a red embroidered coat from Hong Kong. She rarely ever wore it. However, tonight she puts it on over an old coat she is wearing and parades around the room in it wondering if Philip would have found this silly. She is doing this as an homage to their love.
During their marriage, Nina had an affair and once was raped. She kept both of these occurences secret from Philip. She worries about Philip's faithfulness to her. "Sometimes when Philip comes back from being away, she sniffs through his laundry, searching for the scent of an unfamiliar perfume - patchouli, jasmine, tuberoses. What is her name? The name of a city. Sofia."
The prose is spare and the book is written in short vignettes, each about some aspect of their life together or their belief system. As the night progresses, Nina drinks wine, dozes occasionally, but mostly stays up and remembers and imagines their time together. Theirs was a great love and one that has withstood the test of time. Lily Tuck understands what it is like to be with one person for forty-two years. She understands great love and passion.
Interestingly, Ms. Tuck has borrowed information from some of the greatest mathematicians, logicians, physicists, and philosophers for this book: Pascal, Einstein, Wilczek, Erdish, Hofstadter, Hawking, and Feynman to name a few. Though the parts about physics and math were sometimes difficult for me to get my head around, they served nicely to illustrate the yin and yang of this marriage. This is a short and lovely book, an homage to a great love, now lost in real time, but forever present in Nina's heart and mind.
September 25, 2021
This book was beautifully written and the author did everything right. It should have been a masterpiece. But, somehow, it just didn't work. I never came to care about the main character or found her interesting. It was a noble swing of the bat that would have been a homerun if it had connected. While I didn't especially enjoy this particular book, I would absolutely read another one by this author because she's clearly capable of writing an epic novel on the level of Nabokov or Ishiguro. Maybe next time.
September 9, 2017
Occasionally, I struggled with this book. It is sparse and somewhat pretentious. I got a bit irritated trying to follow the protagonist's stream-of-consciousness... but oh, it ultimately gutted me. It is a poignant look at grief and the moments that make a marriage. Really just stunning in the end. My heart is aching.
January 18, 2021
A hybrid piece that's a collection of topics woven into one story. Enjoyable to read as both a reader and a writer.
August 31, 2024
Got this book because I liked the cover so fitting that it was mostly an aesthetic experience
April 16, 2021
“Perhaps death, she thinks, is like one of those stars — a star that can be seen only backward in time and exists in an unobservable state. While life, she has heard said, was created from stars — the stars’ debris.”
This was a lovely book. The narrator, a middle-aged woman named Nina, sits with her recently-dead husband throughout the night. Nina contemplates the years that led her to this very moment and reflects on her life and new identity, now that she is no longer a partner in a marriage. It’s a mix of memories, questions and doubts, reflections, and math, all told in beautiful and incisive language.
I found this book to be emotional and honest - I felt like I knew Nina and her husband Philip and their relationship. The ending left me a little confused, but I liked pondering it. Recommended, but it won’t be for every reader.
This was a lovely book. The narrator, a middle-aged woman named Nina, sits with her recently-dead husband throughout the night. Nina contemplates the years that led her to this very moment and reflects on her life and new identity, now that she is no longer a partner in a marriage. It’s a mix of memories, questions and doubts, reflections, and math, all told in beautiful and incisive language.
I found this book to be emotional and honest - I felt like I knew Nina and her husband Philip and their relationship. The ending left me a little confused, but I liked pondering it. Recommended, but it won’t be for every reader.
January 4, 2022
The writing is strange but in a "stream of consciousness" kind of way, which is kind of the point. Poetic, interesting.
August 16, 2011
I'm a sucker for books that appeal to this undiagnosed ADD of mine. Though calling Lily Tuck a great Jazz artist (as an earlier reviewer has) is perhaps a more flattering way of describing why I enjoyed this book so much.
I MARRIED YOU FOR HAPPINESS is written in short, thoughtful bursts. While it reminded me a bit of VISIT FROM THE GOON SQUAD, Lilly Tuck's novel alternates scenes from paragraph to paragraph or even sentence to sentence, has only one narrator, and is refreshingly breezy and engaging for what would seem a gloomy plot line. The intricate pivoting from scene to scene is a masterful depiction of the scattered thoughts and emotions that follow a heavy emotional blow. It's a wonderfully original way of conveying what could be a dark story in an uplifting and engaging way.
Nina spends the night in her and her husband Phillip's suburban bedroom- where she's just found her husband dead of sudden cardiac arrest. There the book switches from the time she spends in this bedside vigil to a kaleidoscopic trip through various memories she's enshrined, regretted, and imagined over in this forty-three year marriage.
My eyes were rolling at first when we meet this not-yet-couple in a romantic French setting, where's she's working in an art gallery(of course) and he's attending a conference(who hasn't).
There is also the annoying admission that I've not studied French (yet). I keep meaning to take those classes but the time just passes me by. So the very small pieces of French that intersperse this novel were sadly lost on me.
Quand il me prend dans ses bras
Il me parle tout bas
Il est entre dans mon Coeur
Une part de Bonheur
Google Translate says:
When he takes me in his arms
He speaks softly
He entered my heart
Part of Happiness
Well that figures very nicely in to this storyline and I'm happy to know it. I'm not spending any additional time translating.
There's too much good work in here to quibble though. Lily Tuck has done a deep dive in to math and science to develop Phillip's vocation as an accomplished professor. Often his easily understood, entertaining lessons on probability and existence are contrasted with both the scenes in life this couple passes through and Nina's more artistic views. The numbers work or they can only be described as imperfect theories - while Nina and Phillip's love was strong and true it too is not perfect. This is all balanced with the ideas of life and death and the fragile line that separates them.
It would be illuminating to read this a second time right after the first. Even more would come to light much the way it seems to have for Nina throughout this one last night with Phillip.
I MARRIED YOU FOR HAPPINESS is written in short, thoughtful bursts. While it reminded me a bit of VISIT FROM THE GOON SQUAD, Lilly Tuck's novel alternates scenes from paragraph to paragraph or even sentence to sentence, has only one narrator, and is refreshingly breezy and engaging for what would seem a gloomy plot line. The intricate pivoting from scene to scene is a masterful depiction of the scattered thoughts and emotions that follow a heavy emotional blow. It's a wonderfully original way of conveying what could be a dark story in an uplifting and engaging way.
Nina spends the night in her and her husband Phillip's suburban bedroom- where she's just found her husband dead of sudden cardiac arrest. There the book switches from the time she spends in this bedside vigil to a kaleidoscopic trip through various memories she's enshrined, regretted, and imagined over in this forty-three year marriage.
My eyes were rolling at first when we meet this not-yet-couple in a romantic French setting, where's she's working in an art gallery(of course) and he's attending a conference(who hasn't).
There is also the annoying admission that I've not studied French (yet). I keep meaning to take those classes but the time just passes me by. So the very small pieces of French that intersperse this novel were sadly lost on me.
Quand il me prend dans ses bras
Il me parle tout bas
Il est entre dans mon Coeur
Une part de Bonheur
Google Translate says:
When he takes me in his arms
He speaks softly
He entered my heart
Part of Happiness
Well that figures very nicely in to this storyline and I'm happy to know it. I'm not spending any additional time translating.
There's too much good work in here to quibble though. Lily Tuck has done a deep dive in to math and science to develop Phillip's vocation as an accomplished professor. Often his easily understood, entertaining lessons on probability and existence are contrasted with both the scenes in life this couple passes through and Nina's more artistic views. The numbers work or they can only be described as imperfect theories - while Nina and Phillip's love was strong and true it too is not perfect. This is all balanced with the ideas of life and death and the fragile line that separates them.
It would be illuminating to read this a second time right after the first. Even more would come to light much the way it seems to have for Nina throughout this one last night with Phillip.
February 11, 2012
The main character in this book, Nina, is exactly the kind of female protagonist I can't stand. You're supposed to think she's interesting because she's intelligent and introspective and has sensitive feelings, but really she's just a passive hanger-on in her husband's way more interesting life, a sort of half-formed ghost wandering languidly in a world made by men, where most of the decisions are taken by men and all of the interesting things are done by men. She passively allows her husband woo her back in the 60s, then she passively let his cousin rape her. She has a random, brief affair for no apparent reason.
Things her husband Philip does:
1. Teaches mathematical theory at a university
2. Does mathematical research
3. Tends a massive vegetable garden
4. Apparently is always the one to initiate sex.
Things Nina does:
1. Dabs a little paint on a canvas every now and then when she feels like it
2. Lies down with migraine headaches
3. Thinks about what to cook for dinner
4. Whinges about picking up Philip's socks.
Yuck. Those kind of women are not interesting in real life, and they are not interesting as literary characters. Passive, uninteresting female protagonists are my pet peeve in women's literature.
But, there were other things that I really liked about this book. It takes place mostly in Nina's head (which, in fairness, might be one reason why she seems so passive). It takes place in one night, as she sits beside Philip's recently-dead body. His heart apparently just stopped while he was lying down waiting for her to finish cooking dinner. She thinks about the course of their 43-year marriage, how she will tell their daughter, feels guilty that she had the affair all those years ago. The way her mind keeps ping-ponging back and forth in time seemed very realistic for such a situation. I sometimes have trouble with novels that move back and forth in time, but this author handled it very deftly, and I never felt disoriented. Nina's feelings seemed realistic, too. She loved Philip, but of course he got on her nerves a lot. Husbands will do that! But now she's sorry she ever let little things bother her, and wonders how she will live without him. She reminisces a lot about their sex life, which also rang true to me. The other thing I liked about this book was how Philip's different mathematical theories, and their disagreement about the existence of God, were woven into their life story as Nina recalls it. And I really liked how it ended: Nina's love for Philip, theories of probability, and questions about God all came together very nicely in the end.
Things her husband Philip does:
1. Teaches mathematical theory at a university
2. Does mathematical research
3. Tends a massive vegetable garden
4. Apparently is always the one to initiate sex.
Things Nina does:
1. Dabs a little paint on a canvas every now and then when she feels like it
2. Lies down with migraine headaches
3. Thinks about what to cook for dinner
4. Whinges about picking up Philip's socks.
Yuck. Those kind of women are not interesting in real life, and they are not interesting as literary characters. Passive, uninteresting female protagonists are my pet peeve in women's literature.
But, there were other things that I really liked about this book. It takes place mostly in Nina's head (which, in fairness, might be one reason why she seems so passive). It takes place in one night, as she sits beside Philip's recently-dead body. His heart apparently just stopped while he was lying down waiting for her to finish cooking dinner. She thinks about the course of their 43-year marriage, how she will tell their daughter, feels guilty that she had the affair all those years ago. The way her mind keeps ping-ponging back and forth in time seemed very realistic for such a situation. I sometimes have trouble with novels that move back and forth in time, but this author handled it very deftly, and I never felt disoriented. Nina's feelings seemed realistic, too. She loved Philip, but of course he got on her nerves a lot. Husbands will do that! But now she's sorry she ever let little things bother her, and wonders how she will live without him. She reminisces a lot about their sex life, which also rang true to me. The other thing I liked about this book was how Philip's different mathematical theories, and their disagreement about the existence of God, were woven into their life story as Nina recalls it. And I really liked how it ended: Nina's love for Philip, theories of probability, and questions about God all came together very nicely in the end.
November 8, 2015
This book tells the fictional story of Nina reminiscing over her and her husband's (Philip's) life through one night after she finds him dead in their bedroom.
She flits from one memory to another before maybe going back to the same time of the previous memory before moving on again, in a sort of stream of consciousness way. For me this made it a rather fragmented book with the best bits being when a memory was expanded in full before she moved on to the next recollection. (This approach means that if you put the book down you may forget characters by the time they reappear.
Memories mainly focus on their times spent abroad, notably in Paris. In fact this is where they met and there are lots of little bits in French so a passing knowledge of French would be useful (Italian and Spanish also feature but not to the same extent). There are also a few imagined scenes where Nina fills in the gaps, for example Philip's time spent with a woman called Sofia.
Lastly there is a lot of mathematical talk. Maybe Philip is a really boring guy as Maths is pretty much all he talks about. Or maybe he is a really interesting guy because he has such knowledge of his topic. Make up your own mind. Or perhaps that is unfair as he also has an interest in yachting, and an interest in Nina of course, and their daughter Louise (although there are not that many memories with her in which is perhaps a surprise).
So a fragmented story although well-written and quite a quick read too.
She flits from one memory to another before maybe going back to the same time of the previous memory before moving on again, in a sort of stream of consciousness way. For me this made it a rather fragmented book with the best bits being when a memory was expanded in full before she moved on to the next recollection. (This approach means that if you put the book down you may forget characters by the time they reappear.
Memories mainly focus on their times spent abroad, notably in Paris. In fact this is where they met and there are lots of little bits in French so a passing knowledge of French would be useful (Italian and Spanish also feature but not to the same extent). There are also a few imagined scenes where Nina fills in the gaps, for example Philip's time spent with a woman called Sofia.
Lastly there is a lot of mathematical talk. Maybe Philip is a really boring guy as Maths is pretty much all he talks about. Or maybe he is a really interesting guy because he has such knowledge of his topic. Make up your own mind. Or perhaps that is unfair as he also has an interest in yachting, and an interest in Nina of course, and their daughter Louise (although there are not that many memories with her in which is perhaps a surprise).
So a fragmented story although well-written and quite a quick read too.
February 16, 2016
Perhaps Nora married for happiness (as in, "I got a nice proposal from a naked man on the beach and he seems nice and the sex is good and he is really smart and has a solid career and I can indulge in my hobby of painting cause I have no other goals, but I don't really love him, and I can have an affair on the side, but one can't have everything anyway.") Perhaps Phillip married for happiness (as in, "I'm proposing on the beach to a lovely and almost naked woman and she's nice and the sex is good and I'm a white collar mathematician and she's a freedom loving artist, so we won't compete career wise and we'll both have our own lives, we're opposites, we'll be stable, we'll be happy, but I don't really love her.") And they were relatively happy. This story is told in random flashbacks with lots of math and quantum physics discussions (opposites attract, we are a good match on paper) but that point is made early and is reiterated often. An okay and easy read, perfect for me right now as I'm taking a break from the literally and physically heavy "City on Fire". And still, even though the "Happiness" hardcover ends at page 190, it would have been fine at about 150 pages, as many conversations and memories are repeated and the quantum/math discussions are interesting here only for a few times instead of dozens of times.
May 3, 2023
È un pomeriggio come tanti e Nina sta cucinando la cena per lei e per suo marito Philip, tornato da poco dal lavoro, che sta schiacciando un pisolino al piano di sopra; quando Nina sale per chiamarlo però qualcosa non va, Philip non risponde, non si muove, non reagisce: Nina capisce immediatamente che il suo compagno di vita se n’è andato ma invece di farsi prendere dallo sconforto e dalla disperazione si stende nel letto al suo fianco, vuole stargli accanto ancora per un po’, come se ancora dormisse. La telefonata a loro figlia può aspettare fino a domattina. È così che passa la sua ultima notte con Philip, riportando alla mente tutta la loro vita insieme dal loro primo incontro al matrimonio, alla nascita della loro figlia..tra litigi, segreti, insicurezze, dubbi ma anche gioie e momenti preziosi. In un turbinio di flashback tutto il tempo che è passato le scorre davanti come un film al cinema: una storia d’amore fatta di alti e bassi, semplicemente una storia di vita normale.
Si legge senza dubbio molto velocemente, devo ammettere però che mi ha deluso perché i flashback sono troppo dispersivi e discontinui cronologicamente e si perde spesso il filo del discorso. Non posso dire che mi sia piaciuto.
2 stelle
⭐️⭐️
Si legge senza dubbio molto velocemente, devo ammettere però che mi ha deluso perché i flashback sono troppo dispersivi e discontinui cronologicamente e si perde spesso il filo del discorso. Non posso dire che mi sia piaciuto.
2 stelle
⭐️⭐️
November 9, 2011
In a steam of conscious style that mimics the way our thoughts jump through the continuity of life, a wife finds her husband dead lying in bed just before dinner. She spends the night reviewing their marriage with all its ups and downs. She is an artist, her husband is a math professor. We see their lives through her artistic perspective and his love of mathematical principles. I loved the way she stops listening to him when he explains complicated math theories and begins thinking about what to cook for dinner or something else more practical. It rings true to life. She appreciates his personal obsessions but does not share them.
I wanted her to be a more likeable character. She is hard-hearted and self absorbed. But give her a break. This is the story of the night of her husband's death and we are all up inside her head. The writing is beautiful.
I wanted her to be a more likeable character. She is hard-hearted and self absorbed. But give her a break. This is the story of the night of her husband's death and we are all up inside her head. The writing is beautiful.
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