When Helen Andelin wrote Fascinating Womanhood in 1963 she had the right message at the right time. She provided an alternative voice to feminism, and she was in the right place to do it. This was crucial to huge numbers of women, particularly in the west where Andelin started out. Many women in this part of the country saw themselves as having been discounted and left behind by the very vocal but relatively small group of eastern educated elite who led the women’s movement. Andelin made sense to these women, and they wanted to listen to her. She had something important to say and she was articulate. Most importantly, she combined original thinking with the nerve to step forward in order to make herself heard in the discussion about the place of women in this country.

The following are highly recommended relationship books by Helen Andelin and her husband Audrey.

Fascinating Womanhood

This book is fascinating (pun intended). Reviews of it are mixed and often passionate for good reason. The ideas are as explosive today as they were when the book was first published.

Like any text, your reaction to this book will depend upon how you read it. It can be a joyful revelation, or a goad that drives you to fury, or a hilarious view into an antiquated perspective on gender relationships.

Manipulation in any relationship is deadly. But sincerely doing things that encourage others to be the best they can be is good from both a secular and a Christian perspective. It builds good mental health. Assuming that our gender makes us prefer certain kinds of behavior both in ourselves and in our mates, and that our ability to meet our own ideals of our gender affects our general happiness and self-esteem, it seems that giving and receiving gender-oriented encouragement is not a bad idea.

I look at this book not as a prescription for living — which is how the author intended it, without question — but as a sort of cook-book, full of good things to try. Or perhaps as a tool-kit to draw from to smooth over some rough times and make the good times more fun. Taken that way, I think Fascinating Womanhood is a work of genius. It is jam-packed with things to try. At the very least you will learn a great deal about yourself and about your husband as you experiment with behavior and responses.

Man of Steel and Velvet: A Guide to Masculine Development

Another book that enjoys immensely mixed reviews. This book reveals the long-lost secret of how human beings were meant to interact as mates. Along with its companion book, Fascinating Womanhood, it is much needed teaching on how to implement masculine (and feminine) traits in marriage. Without knowledge of the purpose for marriage, we poor humans are reduced to blind idiots stumbling around in the dark looking for the light switch. The instruction in Mr. Andelin’s book will not easy to put in to practice all at once, but if you use it as a marriage textbook, you will unlock the millennia-old secrets of how to fulfill our purpose in this life.

Date posted : September 29th, 2005 by Michael Haupt Last Modified : September 29th, 2007 / Filed under : Books, Relationships / Report a Concern Navigate : Previous post / Next post / Top of Page
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