Ultimate Popsugar Reading Challenge discussion

A Book That Features a Married Couple Who Don't Live Together

I am totally flummoxed on this one! I cannot think of a single title. I'm counting on you-all again!😁

Listopia is HERE

The book I picked up for the 42 year old prompt this year fits this. A Grim Reaper's Guide to Catching a Killer. It's not a life changing book but entertaining enough if you like cosy mysteries.

Someone else pointed out in the Lady Astronaut books they are separated by space in one of them, but I can't remember which one.

Ellie wrote: "Someone else pointed out in the Lady Astronaut books they are separated by space in one of them, but I can't remember which one."

I believe the separation begins in book 2. One of the reviews I saw for The Fated Sky referred to their long-distance relationship, so I'm tentatively going with that.

War or military books- Little Women, March, Dinner with the Smileys: One Military Family, One Year of Heroes, and Lessons for a Lifetime

Job or hobby- Moby-Duck: The True Story of 28,800 Bath Toys Lost at Sea and of the Beachcombers, Oceanographers, Environmentalists, and Fools, Including the Author, Who Went in Search of Them

Probably some books on slavery where the couple is forcibly separated, but I'm not thinking of any at the moment.

The Pride of Chanur, but the husband isn't even mentioned until near the end.

Part of My Soul Went with Him, by Winnie Mandela.

The Lion in Winter, about Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine.

I have two on my TBR that I hope will work. Both are couples separated by a gulag or prison camp experience.

Hope Against Hope

Keith, A: Three Came Home

Jennifer W wrote: "War or military books- Little Women, March, Dinner with the Smileys: One Military Family, One Year of Heroes, and Lessons for a Lifetime

Job or hobby- [boo..."

Those are good suggestions. For a couple separated by slavery, "Uncle Tom's Cabin" would qualify.

Ellie wrote: "The book I picked up for the 42 year old prompt this year fits this. A Grim Reaper's Guide to Catching a Killer. It's not a life changing book but entertaining enough if you like c..."

Ooohhh, yes! That's true. I think the most recent release, The Relentless Moon is the one where Elma is separated from her husband. He remains on earth while she is in space. I *think* that's the one!

Laura Ruth wrote: "Jennifer W wrote: "War or military books- Little Women, March, Dinner with the Smileys: One Military Family, One Year of Heroes, and Lessons for a Lifetime
..."

Those are good suggestions. For a couple separated by slavery, "Uncle Tom's Cabin" would qualify.
Yes! That definitely works!

The Ruin of a Rake by Cat Sebastian has a couple that live in different countries.

I see someone added An American Marriage which definitely works and was excellent, IMO!

I think The Odyssey would also fit.

For the fantasy genre, The Adventures of Amina al-Sirafi features a main character who has been very deliberately avoiding her husband for *reasons* for years and is not happy when they are reunited for heist shenanigans.

Rachel wrote: "I think The Odyssey would also fit."

Definitely!

The Time Traveler's Wife - Audrey Niffenegger

Some of the Thursday Next books would work. Her parents don't live together for reasons explained in the books.

The Odyssey could be a road trip, too.

The Color Purple - there are a number of married couples who don't live together for a variety of reasons

Rachel wrote: "I think The Odyssey would also fit."

This made me think of Ithaca, which is about Penelope.

I have the last Penelope book to read but I think it's gonna be about her husband coming home, so won't fit. I'm a bit over Greek myths but I have been enjoying Claire North's take.

OH The Witch's Heart would work for this too.

L Y N N wrote: "Laura Ruth wrote: "Jennifer W wrote: "War or military books- Little Women, March, [book:Dinner with the Smileys: One Military Family, One Year of Heroes, and Lessons for a ..."

Cool, I've had that one on my radar for a long time.

The Bandit Queens, maybe? The synopsis says the main character's husband ran off but nothing about a divorce.

I'm reading The Will of the Many by James Islington now, and there's a prominent couple in it that qualifies for this prompt.

Upton Sinclair's Wide Is the Gate and Presidential Agent are books 4 and 5 of his Lanny Budd spy series, and part of the story is his secret marriage. Very easy read but VERY long books.

Black and Blue by Anna Quindlen is about a battered wife hiding out from her cop husband. (Also, there are multiple other books by the same title if you want to use it for the "2 books with the same title" prompt instead.)

After I Do by Taylor Jenkins Reid is my pick. The couple decide to live apart for a year.

Dubhease wrote: "Some of the Thursday Next books would work. Her parents don't live together for reasons explained in the books."

Thursday is also seperated from her husband in Lost in a Good Book. I think I'm going to pencil in Dark Reading Matter in case her parents show up in it.

Kenya wrote: "The Bandit Queens, maybe? The synopsis says the main character's husband ran off but nothing about a divorce."



Yes, they are not divorced and (view spoiler)[he's still alive - he shows up later in the book, but for most of the book they are apart (hide spoiler)] so I think it counts.

The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Bronte. Also works for "a classic you haven't read yet."

Maybe Enemies: A Love Story by Isaac Bashevis Singer - I don't recall how many years they live apart.

Would Miriam Margolyes autobiographical books work for this? I read that she and her wife had been together for decades but didn't live together until the last year or so. Her books would have been written and published whilst they weren't living together.

Just last week I was reading a short account of the lives of Abelard and Heloise, who would fit this prompt. Here’s a Book Riot article about them: https://bookriot.com/abelard-and-helo... and an excerpt from the article, for anyone who hasn’t heard their story….

“Abelard, the scholar; Heloise, the noble maiden, his student, raised in her uncle’s household. Abelard was hired to be her tutor because she quickly outpaced her Latin education, wanting more Greek and even Hebrew. Heloise was a precocious and highly intelligent young woman, and her uncle saw to it that she had an excellent education. She had some highly advanced, feminist ideas, radical for medieval times (and even for today, depending on how progressive one is). Heloise often said that marriage was contractual prostitution and that a person intent on studying philosophy wouldn’t be able to bear the crying and squalor of babies. She openly preferred “love to marriage, freedom to a bond.”
And of course Abelard and Heloise fell in love. But because they are human, they managed to fuck things up but good. Heloise got pregnant (she had a boy whom she named Astrolabe. No joke), her uncle had a fit, and Abelard sent Heloise to the cloisters where she had been raised as a girl to keep her safe from the fury of her uncle. He then eventually talked her into marrying him, though given her above-mentioned views on marriage, he must have had a hell of a time of it. She only consented to marrying in secret because a public marriage would have been bad for his academic career. Her uncle was appeased and made the announcement of the marriage to save his family and Heloise’s good reputation. However, Heloise denied the marriage, attempting to help secure Abelard’s career. I still cannot understand that. And I am right, because that turned out to be a Very Bad Idea. Her uncle thought that Abelard had discarded her and forced her into a nunnery, so he sent some thugs to Abelard’s room where they proceeded to castrate him. There went Abelard’s other future children, along with any thoughts he may have harbored of ever becoming Pope, because the Pope has to be in possession of at least one testicle, even if it’s in his pocket.”

I am reading Awake in the Floating City right now, and one of the side characters travels for work and stays in different places for several weeks or months, while his wife & son are back home (in Montana, I think). The book is not about him, and even when he is on the page he barely mentions his wife, so I wouldn't say this book FEATURES a married couple living apart (so I'm not adding it to the listopia), but it does PERIPHERALLY INOLVE a married couple living apart.


(Full disclosure: I am NOT enjoying this book, it's too slow and barely has a plot - but that sort of thing works for a lot of people, I expect this book to be popular ... just not for me!)

Hamnet would work for this challenge. There is a married couple in the story that lives apart

The Winter's Tale by William Shakespeare

The Gap of Time by Jeanette Winterson is a retelling of the play and it might work, as well.

I'm going to read An American Marriage.

The Lady Astronaut series by Mary Robinette Kowal features couples who live apart because one is living on the moon.

The Calculating Stars
The Fated Sky
The Relentless Moon
The Martian Contingency

We Solve Murders by Richard Osman would fit - the main female character and her husband happily live separate lives at the moment

I'm joining A Shakespeare challenge so A Winterls Tale it will be

Maybe military spouses would work for this since people get deployed and are separated from their families for god knows how long.

I'll try to think of other nonfiction topics as well.

Ron wrote: "Maybe military spouses would work for this since people get deployed and are separated from their families for god knows how long.

I'll try to think of other nonfiction topics as well."

I have a friend who had her husband go into a care home to deal with his complex medical conditions. I don't know if that kind of involuntary separation makes it into books.

Dea wrote: "The Lady Astronaut series by Mary Robinette Kowal features couples who live apart because one is living on the moon.

The Calculating Stars
[book:The Fated Sky|3308..."

For The Calculating Stars, the couples are together.

In The Fated Sky and The Relentless Moon, the couples are separated. Elma is going to Mars in The Fated Sky and Nicole is on the moon in The Relentless Moon. Their husbands are back on Earth.

The Martian Contingency is not out yet, but the teasers suggest Elma is the POV character and her husband is with her on Mars.

If you want to use this series for this prompt, it would have to be books 2 or 3. Book 1 will not count because Elma and Nathaniel are together.

Dubhease wrote:

I have a friend who had her husband go into a care home to deal with his complex medical conditions. I don't know if that kind of involuntary separation makes it into books.

That's certainly interesting and it's definitely not as talked about either. Maybe I could find psychology books related to voluntary or voluntary separation in mental institutions.

*****

UPDATE:

Cool found one that caught my interest.

Army Wives: The Unwritten Code of Military Marriage

Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel has Henry VIII living apart from Katherine of Aragon.

The Brother Cadfael series by Ellis Peters has the subplot of Queen Maud trying to become ruler of England in the background, but one of the books explicitly has her as a character, living apart from her husband. I think it's the last book, but it's been a while since I read that series

Desiree by Annemarie Silenko tells the real-life story of Desiree Clary who spends many years living apart from her husband, first because he's in the military, then when he becomes the appointed ruler of a faraway (to her) nation.

The Lost Queen by Norah Lofts tells the tragic story of Queen Caroline Mathilda of Denmark, married to an imbecilic and dangerously insane King Christian. Saying that they live apart eventually is almost a spoiler.

Queen Margot by Alexandre Dumas. Where to begin with the ascetic King Henri of Navarre (and later France) and his uber-sensualist wife, Margot? Well, living apart was the better solution for them until even that was too much to bear, LOL.

In fact, a long list of books about royalty will work for this prompt, because those couples frequently hated each other so much that they couldn't stay under the same roof for long.

I just stumbled over this book The Woman They Could Not Silence: One Woman, Her Incredible Fight for Freedom, and the Men Who Tried to Make Her Disappear by Kate Moore if you wanted something non fiction about this.

I knew about Elizabeth Packard who's father first had her committed when she was not insane and then her husband did the same. Her case made changes in women's rights and even after winning her freedom she does stay married but takes off to live in another state.

There's A Wrinkle in Time, by Madeleine L'Engle. Meg's dad has been missing for years, and she, her brother Charles Wallace and friend Calvin track him down and rescue him from where he is held captive.

I think some of the Patrick O'Brien books about Aubrey and Maturin would work. Aubrey is the captain of a British warship in the time of Napoleon and Maturin is the ship's doctor. Aubrey gets married to Diana somewhere during the series, but I'm not sure which book. Most of the action takes place aboard ship, and we only see Diana intermittently.

Chelsea wrote: "For the fantasy genre, The Adventures of Amina al-Sirafi features a main character who has been very deliberately avoiding her husband for *reasons* for years and is not happy when ..."

I LOVE this book and that is such a fun way to interpret the prompt!

Middle England by Jonathan Coe. I’m listening to it at the moment and although they’re not main characters, there is definitely a married couple who don’t live together.

I've chosen A Fate Inked in Blood for this prompt!