Since the beginning of the twentieth century, thirty years have been added to the normal human life expectancy. In "September Songs," the follow-up to her bestselling "Intimate Partners," Maggie Scarf investigates the surprising and profound evolution marriage has undergone in these "bonus years." In a series of intimate and provocative interviews, she delves into the lives of couples married for more than two decades and uncovers the welcome news that most couples are more satisfied in their marriages today than in their early years together. By giving voice to both their struggles and their triumphs, these husbands and wives reveal how they've balanced their emotional and physical needs with those of their partner's, and how the lessons they've learned over time have helped them find new opportunities to love, cherish, and live alongside each other in the extra years they have together.

"Anyone involved in, embarking on, or yearning for, an intimate relationship should buy, borrow or steal Intimate Partners."
-New Woman
What goes on in our intimate attachments? What patterns of relationships do couples tend to follow, and why? The bonds we create affect every aspect of our lives, and yet our grasp of them is limited by our emotional reactions and learned responses. Now, in Intimate Partners, bestselling author Maggie Scarf gives us the classic book on marriage-on how love relationships are formed and how they change over the course of the marital cycle. Here you'll discover
- how to understand one's inherited emotional history-and how fits with a partner's
- the fascinating ways in which power and control, and intimacy and autonomy exert strong effects upon the kind of partnership two people create
- surprising observations on the role of sex and the impact of children on marriage
- why change can be experienced as a form of betrayal-and how to ensure that a relationship matures with, and is not impeded by, each individual's growth
- simple exercises that couples can do to resolve tensions and change the nature of the world they share
- verbal and physical techniques to cope with sexual difficulties and enliven a couple's connection during sex
- straightforward methods for how to engage in healthy-not dysfunctional-quarrels
Intimate Partners is a book that changes not only how we view love relationships, but also how we live them.
"Every marriage contains a story, and it begins long before the wedding, Maggie Scarf tells us in her ambitious, thought-provoking . . . ultimately compelling study. . . . Read it and feel consoled."
-USA Today
"Listen to Maggie Scarf . . . and you'll come away thinking that yes, marriage can be tough, living long-term with another person is one of the greatest challenges there is, but it's well worth the effort."
-Chicago Tribune
"Provocative . . . Scarf writes lucidly and convincingly."
-The Washington Post Book World

Reading Maggie Scarf's groundbreaking new book could change your life. In Secrets, Lies, Betrayals, the bestselling author "of "Unfinished Business, Intimate Partners, and Intimate Worlds brilliantly explores how the body holds on to painful episodes from the past--including secrets we may be keeping even from ourselves--and how we can release them to live freer, healthier lives.
The body has a unique memory system, in which early trauma and deeply buried feelings become woven into the fabric of our physical being. Certain events can trigger these body memories, which may then manifest themselves symptomatically--as persistent anger, mood swings, headaches, muscle tension, and fatigue. These echoes from the past also cause destructive patterns in our lives and relationships.
Why does a beautiful, successful woman like Claudia seek out abusive, explosively tense relationships in which she is forced to hide the truth about herself? Why does the presence of a strange woman's name in her husband's cell phone directory make Karen feel physically ill, to the point where she cannot get through her daily life? And why does the author herself experience painful physical symptoms when she wrestles with contradictory memories of her mother? Exploring these and other personal narratives, Scarf reveals how the body, through its neurobiological systems, retains some of life's most important experiences--and describes how new power therapies, such as reprocessing and psychomotor, have had immediate results where traditional therapies have had a lower success rate.
Grounded in recent breakthroughs in mind/body science and drawing on Scarf's personal experiences, this book is a masterpiece of research, analysis, and insight into the human psyche, and into human life.

"From the Hardcover edition."

"Scarf knows the intricacies of the family structure and, even better, knows how to write well about them. In Intimate Worlds, as in most of our lives, family is riveting, white-knuckle stuff."

--The Washington Post Book World



In Intimate Worlds, bestselling author Maggie Scarf takes on the most important, and most universal, subject of her distinguished career: the family. As the first social organization that we each encounter, the family is where we learn the most fundamental and enduring lessons of our lives. Yet for too many, those lessons turn out to be painful, perplexing, and emotionally crippling. In this luminous, beautifully written book, Scarf brilliantly examines the complex ways in which families create their own intimate rules and patterns of interaction, and how by understanding these dynamics we can each improve the quality of our own family life.



At the book's core are the stories of four fascinating families and the very different ways they enact the central issues of family life: power and intimacy; conflict and love; individuality and group identification. Spanning the spectrum of family health from dysfunctional through optimal, these families grapple with serious substance abuse, sexual problems, difficulties with attachment and nurturance, eating disorders, and buried resentments that surface generation after generation. As Maggie Scarf probes the motives and meanings of these compelling dramas, she reveals the essential truths of how families shape human identity. Combining lucid analysis with warm human understanding, Intimate Worlds is a major work that both clarifies and deepens our knowledge of family relationships.



"Wrought with care and commitment, it is meticulously researched and will, I think, serve as a valuable resource for families struggling to understand themselves."

--Los Angeles Times