A Marriage Carol : A Review

A Marriage Carol

by

Chris Fabry and Gary Chapman

A Review

I have long been impressed with Charles Dicken’s A Christmas Carol. I first read it when my own marriage was going through struggles - and it contributed to the healing that my wife and I experienced 20 years ago. Earlier this year I was privileged to read an Advanced Copy of Jacob T. Marley by R. William Bennett. Bennett’s book was a retelling of the original story. The Marriage Carol may best be described as a parallel narrative.

Jacob and Marlee’s marriage was at an end. They both knew it. They had not yet told the kids, but today was to be the end. They were due at the lawyer’s office to sign the papers for a no-fault divorce. It was time, but the weather would not cooperate. To save time they take a shortcut that leads to the accident.

In the hours that follow as Marlee finds help and looks for her husband, she is also faced with her own life - her life as it was, her life as it is, and her life as it might be. It was a long night - a night that did not end the way she had expected. On the other hand … well, you will need to read the book to find out about that other hand.

As Marlee writes, in the first person, “... it is a dangerous thing to have your eyes opened. It is dangerous to see. It is dangerous to love … There is no barren place on earth that love cannot grow a garden. Not even your heart.”

The Marriage Carol may be written as fiction, but it is not fiction. It is my story, it is my wife’s story. But not ours alone - it is many stories of people who have found themselves hurt, lost, and confused. And, just as my wife and I discovered, it is a story that offers hope. It was hope that Dickens offered in 1843 when he wrote the original; it still offers hope for us today.

This review is based

a free electronic copy of the book

supplied by the publisher

for the purpose of creating this review.