Customer Reviews

The Chosen Lives of Childfree Men

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I waited on whether or not to get this book as the price is way too high. I found it on half.com for nearly half the price. Anyway, I am very glad that I made the purchase. I am 29 years old now and I have known for a long time (over 10 years now) that I was not someone who wanted kids. It was so refreshing to read the stories of other guys and why they did what they did. I feel like an outcast so much of the time because of my decision, but reading this book made me feel like I was perfectly justified in my feelings. These men have so much going on in their lives! They keep busy, yet they are able to drop any of the activities and just chill out and enjoy some quiet time if they want. They are flexible, less stressed-out, and have more time and money for their own personal hobbies and interests. I wish there were more books on this taboo subject as I feel that men get the raw deal when it comes to decision making in a marriage/relationship. Too often we are passed over as just breadwinner and nothing else. We have visions of what will make our life positive as well, and a lot of the time, most of the time, it gets overshadowed by what the woman in the relationship wants. I really recommend this book to anyone, especially men who are interested in why this child-free choice is a good one.

This book is possibly the only one of its sort currently in print. As a voluntarily nulliparous heterosexual female, this book provided an important source of information for me regarding how men make and live the decision not to have children. Such information about men's reproductive choices, and the thought that they have put into those choices is far from easy to find.

This book is done in a "stories of the persons" style with men having similar reasons being grouped by chapters. The author provides some basic, yet extremely valuable, insight into what the roles of men are becoming in reproduction and child rearing in the western world and the clearly demonstrates why some men are making the choice not to have children at all.

Lunneborg occasionally points out some differences between men and women as they go through this decision making process. This is, in my opinion, one of the most valuable contributions of this book because the question of children is viewed predominantly as being the prerogative of females. The men interviewed often seemed to have reasons that appeared different from women's on the surface but were, at the core, similar desires.

This is a valuable book, a resource for finding the opinions of others like oneself if one is considering living a childfree life. It could also be a instructive work for those who want to understand the choice. For those persons, I cannot see how one could read this book and still maintain the stereotype that the childfree are immature, selfish, or have been so impulsive to have given only momentary thought to a choice far less life altering than the decision (usually by default!!) of having a child.

I've done a lot of reading on child-free lives as my husband and I decided not to have children, and this was the only book I found just about men. So it is good. There are other great similar books - where the author/researcher does qualitative research where they really hear people's real stories (as opposed to having people fill out surveys and then add up the stats) - and some have men's and women's stories. And then there are books who just interviewed women. But I liked the unique focus of this book just on men. It's been a while since I read it, but I remember that it was good, and very similar to other researchers who interviewed men and women or just women, but this is just men.

I liked her study and she really knows her stuff, and it is nice to hear the male perspective on choosing not to have children. It seems a little expensive though compared to the other book I bought on the subject.

"The results [of this book] hold substantial interest, for they tell us not only about men's experiences of childlessness, but also about the great gap between the experiences of 'childfree' men and women. . . . For the social scientist the study provides an eye-opening look at an underexamined subject and suggests a wealth of hypotheses to guide future research."

From Jerry Steinberg, Founder of the non-profit social club NO KIDDING! "There is something in this book that every man can relate to, and every man should read it--with or without his partner."