It was Henry David Thoreau, in Walden, who remarked, "The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation." This statement appears to be just as true, today as it was then. Perhaps it is even more valid today, considering the pressure and frequent monotony of modern society. The majority of today's men and women live in an overcrowded, competitive, noisy world. Most are put into slots and walk on a treadmill - going to boring jobs, living in carbon-copy houses, socializing with the same people. Their desperation is reflected in the rising rate of divorce, alcoholism, drug addiction, and at times...

At some point in life, almost everyone rebels against something. For children it may be their parents who become targets; for others it may be a spouse. For still others, it may be any number of people or institutions who are singled out for wrath and anger. For Carol, the young woman in this story, her husband became the target of her anger, a scapegoat for her continuing sexual frustration. What she doesn't know, however, is that the man she needs doesn't exist. Thus she soon finds herself looking everywhere for fulfillment, going deeper and deeper into a perverted tailspin that threatens...

Normal. A frequently used word, yet a word whose exact meaning is as elusive as the term perversion. What those two words imply seems to vary from nation to nation, from community to community, from person to person. Among one African tribe it is considered obscene to expose one's back to others. In many Eskimo communities it is the height of hospitality for a man to offer his wife to a guest. The characters in the book appear to be average Americans. Yet they behave in ways that many others would consider abnormal. But who is to say whether these characters are normal or perverse? SHEILA...

Psychologists have long noted that man is a gregarious animal whose need for approval and affection is as real and basic as his need for food and shelter. This social need is reflected many times over in our everyday lives. There is the teenaged boy who frequently smokes marijuana, though he dislikes it, because he fears being branded a "straight" by his friends. There is the wife who turns to illicit affairs because her husband, totally dedicated to his business, cannot or will not give her any affection. This is the story of one of those wives, Karen Brandon. A young attractive woman who...

In many cases today's marriage is seen as a business and/or social arrangement between consenting adults rather than a continuing expression of love. The results are obvious: casual, promiscuous infidelity; a lack of concern for the partner and the children; the breakdown of the nuclear family, and the use of others for thrill-seeking - and often deviant - purposes as an end in itself instead of as a means of showing devotion and affection. Too often a loving veneer masks a core of, at best, unconcern, at worst, depravity. THE SUCK WIVES is the story of two young wives, outwardly normal,...

Today, what with the continuing rise of the divorce rate, many people seem more surprised when a marriage holds together than when it breaks up. Yet despite many dire predictions about the gradual death of matrimony, the trend seems to be toward changing the internal structure and workings of that institution, rather than abandoning it. We see an increasing number of books on the market which dispense advice on how to make a marriage more "open." Increasing numbers of married couples are trying everything from sensitivity sessions to mate-trading in an attempt to make their marriages more...

Things are never what they seem to be - a well-worn saying that proves its worth through many examples round us. There is the seemingly honest and highly placed government official who is, in actuality, involved in the cover-up of his aides' wrongdoings; the Army officer who orders and takes part in the massacre of innocent civilians; the "nice man down the block" who sexually abuses young girls before brutally murdering them. So, too, Sally Winters. As a "typical" suburban housewife married to an ambitious husband with a bright future, she would seem to be the last person one would expect as...

The passions and desires that most people only dream about fulfilling are usually kept bidden beneath a veneer of respectability and outwardly normal appearances. Mostly under unique circumstances - on a psychiatrist's couch, in a place far from family and acquaintances, on an occasion where alcohol and the relaxed inhibitions of others lend an air of recklessness and experimentation - are those desires ever expressed or experienced. This is a story about married adults who, while still in love with their respective mates, find themselves getting bored. Then an unusual set of circumstances...

How many married people realize only after a number of years have gone by that their "partner for life" is to them what the albatross around his neck was to the Ancient Mariner? According to divorce statistics, the answer is simple: too many. Those we least suspect may often be the most probable candidates for a break-up. Living outwardly normal lives, partying with friends, attending the local PTA meetings together, hosting backyard neighborhood barbecues, their inner lives a sham. Initially refusing to admit their marriages are a mistake, or simply too tired to go through life on their own,...

The end justifies the means. A maxim embraced by individuals and groups throughout history as a convenient method of obtaining their goals. Wars have been waged, whole nations have perished or been born, millions of people have lost their lives, fortunes have been won or lost, all with his maxim as the root cause. It is a philosophy that is blind to everything but a desired goal, regardless of whether the goal is good or bad, regardless of the fate or fortune it may hold for those affected. Tom Jamison is a successful salesman who has worked his way near the top of a large company, but finds...