Customer Reviews

Cleaving: The Story of a Marriage

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I'm Vicki and Dennis Covington's daughter. I think that "Cleaving" is a truthful, beautifully written book. My parents had incredible courage to write this book and I'm very proud of them.

Since "Salvation on Sand Mountain," "Bird of Paradise," and "The Last Hotel for Women," are among my favorite recent books, I was surprised by how much I disliked "Cleaving." Another Covington fan warned me against reading the book, but I was curious, in the same way one cannot help but pick up those grocery store tabloids when one is waiting in a long line.

While the Covingtons repeatedly evidence dishonesty in their relationship, they insist that they must be honest in writing about their relationship. Why is honesty in writing valued so highly by the Covingtons when it was so easily dismissed in their relationship? And there is something self-congratulatory in their tone that made their revelations more characteristic of exaggerated fish stories than of honest personal reflection.

I can understand, perhaps, the value to the Covingtons of writing these experiences together and reviewing them together; I cannot see the value of publishing them. If you must read this book, for goodness sakes, check it out from the library. (Sorry, amazon.com.) This book isn't worth the money or aggravation.

This book should have been subtitled "Everything That's Wrong with the Baby-Boom Generation." Read it if you're interested in: endless rationalization of horrid, self-involved behavior; willful disregard for the emotional health of two little girls; and self-righteous religious fervor (but only when it's convenient, and only the parts that don't require any work to follow). CLEAVING nauseated me in about fourteen different ways.

I've read all of Vicki Covington's novels and think she is a great writer. My book club really enjoyed BIRD OF PARADISE. And Dennis's book about snake-handling churches was fascinating so I read this story of a marriage hoping to find kindred people. I admire honesty but I was very disturbed by this couple and their obessions. I'm not a prude and I've always been a Christian( even though some youthful love affairs) but I don't understand raising two daughters and continuing in the way the Covingtons have. I also don't understand having an abortion because you can't tell who the father of the fetus is. Again I believe that abortion is very necessary but not for the reason Vicki gave. "What kind of marriage do you have?" was the question the wife of Vicki's lover asked and it's a valid question. We all have our definitions of marriage and we all lead lives that call for forgiveness but we're also called to repentance. I didn't see much of that in CLEAVING. Sometimes the honesty is too much.

Few readers are likely to come away from CLEAVING unmoved--some to anger (as initial public reaction in the authors' hometown of Birmingham, Ala., demonstrates), others to hope, sadness, spiritual reflection, an abiding sense of shared experience with two erstwhile strangers...or, all of the above.

Dennis and Vicki Covington, both successful writers/teachers with 7 previous volumes between them--one a finalist for the National Book Award--were originally commissioned by a publisher to jointly write an inspirational book about the ups and downs of marriage and the importance of the spiritual dimension in that struggle. Its title was to be LIVING WATER, a metaphor based on their church mission work in South America, helping to drill wells for underprivileged communities.

With the book deadline looming nearer and nearer, there was only one problem: their outwardly "model" suburban marriage was in serious disarray, and they found that they couldn't, in good conscience, create a work of spiritual platitudes with themselves as examples. Instead, they did what many people would have found unthinkable: they told the truth.

The result is a powerfully honest, blunt, and yet graceful memoir...writing that is disturbing, fascinating, incandescent in its unadorned style, and ultimately redemptive.

For decades, gifted authors such as John Cheever, John Updike, and Richard Yates have written unforgettable fiction about American marriages. CLEAVING is a worthy addition to that list. It's also true, in every sense of the word.

Dennis and Vicki Covington are accomplished novelists, but in Cleaving they leave fiction behind to present a candid, revealing account of their marriage which has endured and survived alcoholism, mutual adultery, and antagonistic abortion. They spare neither themselves nor the reader from their lapses of faith, failures, betrayals, and addictions to alcohol and drugs. Cleaving is a mesmerizing biography, a lot like driving past a literary car wreck. Totally fascinating reading, and a testament to what the human spirit can cause, endure, and occasionally triumph over.

I really enjoyed this book. Yes, it is very honest and sometimes painful to read, but to me, that's what good writing is about. In everyday life, a pretty gloss is always painted on things, and it seems that writers tend to look beneath the surface and reveal truths that need to be told about themselves and society. I'm a writer myself, I have a book in the Birmingham library system, and I know how hard it is to write. In fact, writing is the hardest thing that one will ever do. I think Vicki and Dennis Covington have done a pretty fair job with this one. If one ventures to read this, they should approach it with an open mind and heart as well. Vicki Covington still has a way with words and can weave them nicely in her own fashion. Although this is non- fiction, if you liked her four novels, you will enjoy this greatly.

I live in Birmingham also, and I loved this book. It takes a lot of guts to air your secrets in this town. Most Southerners like to hide behind their pretentions. Kudos to the Covingtons for writing such an eloquent and genuine story. In some eyes, maybe the Covingtons will temporarily fall from grace, but they will probably go on to achieve something higher than a "public reputation". That something higher is simply the truth, plain and unadorned, and well worth the read!

These Covingtons are skillful writers, but the tale they tell of betrayal and compromise, self-indulgence and thrill-seeking is a self-serving one masquerading and soul-cleansing confession. No matter how carefully you spread their behavior across a grid of pop songs, psychobabble, scripture and contemporary sociology, it still amounts to a single conclusion: these people are good at constructing fictions. This so-called breast-baring is just another one of them, casting seriuous doubt on their ability to write non-fiction with any genuineness of purpose.