Overview

"In this follow-up to his first relationship guide, SMART Love, Vincent Fudge II takes a personal approach to offering advice for men about divorce. In STUPID Divorce, the narrator explores the reasons for his divorce, laying bare his emotions while providing a helpful and insightful approach to separation. Fudge's narrative suggests that divorce is STUPID-selfish, time-consuming, unnerving, painful, inconsiderate, and debt-inducing. He confronts his and his wife's flaws and regrets and mines from them not only hard-won wisdom about love, communication, pride, and acceptance but also practical advice about mediation, amicable separation, child custody, money, lawyers, and more. Presented as a quasi-fictional memoir punctuated with poignant scenes at a funeral, the author shares his journey to accepting the failure of his relationship and how he worked through his grief, navigating the dissolution of his marriage in unsparing detail. In a deft blend of practical advice plus emotional impact, Fudge provides men with the essential educational guide to divorce. ""STUPID Divorce is an educational narrative that focuses on navigation through the dissolution of marriage; detailing how it feels to undo a marriage, and distills reflections into lessons learned. A companion piece to SMART Love, ""Edward"" (the narrator and main character, ) describes the journey through which he worked through the stages of grief to reconcile with the loss of his wife after they failed to improve their relationship. With chapters established to describe who they were, why divorce happened, what happens in divorce, and how it felt. Each chapter is transitioned into with a revisits to a funeral wake where Edward has conversations that provide context to how he and his wife wound up where they were at the end of their marital journey. Key instances of rationalization of grief and deconstruction of thoughts and emotions ultimately driving to reconciliation and acceptance inspire Edward to accept the failing to make his marriage work. Conceptually, STUPID Divorce is designed to do two things: 1. Tell a story about a man's grief journey to accept the failing of his relationship and describe very vividly what that experience felt like, and 2. Share a realistic visual of what the dissolution of marriage looks like."" -Vincent Fudge II"

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9781087957562

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Reviews

STUPID DIVORCE is a humane guide to the structure, psychology and pragmatic processes underlying divorce based on the author's personal experience. Vincent Fudge II's STUPID DIVORCE introduces readers to Edward. While sitting pensively in a chapel at a funeral for his ex-wife Ebony, Edward talks to an old woman, a young man and his own mother. These constructed conversations - elsewhere in the volume with a therapist, attorney, his father and Ebony - are Edward's jumping-off points. These conversations lead the author, through Edward, into a thoroughgoing inquiry about the dissolution of his marriage: inflection points, regrets, missteps, implications of legal involvement and the persistence of love. His goal here is to help readers understand divorce, and, as he says, to find truth in my truth. Fudge applies what might loosely be called systems thinking well in this volume. He articulates patterns and categories that resonate. He typifies the reactions of people separating. He categorizes the dissolution of marriage from least to most contentious. His description of the legal system interactions with divorce is not original, but his critique is cogent and detailed. The STUPID in the book's title is an acronym for Selfish, Time-consuming, Unnerving, Painful, Inconsiderate and Debt-inducing. He magnifies these clarifications and categories by unsparingly applying them to the particulars of his own story. There is an unintended poignancy in this: for all his profound, diligent effort, at times he reveals himself - through his wife's comments - to occasionally be a better thinker than listener. That said, Fudge musters consider ability to see and describe overarching patterns clearly in a way that will help readers. Wholly different from systems thinking, but equally moving and valuable here are Fudge's honesty and compassion. He does not make himself out to be a hero, just a soul who is trying very hard to understand, fix, love and get it right. Nor does he make Ebony out to be evil; mistaken sometimes, yes, but in an understandable human way. There is great courage in writing about something as complex and fraught as divorce without rancor. Fudge lays bare the love and stumbling of two people stuck in their own trouble with considerable sympathy. This, in conjunction with his observation of process elevates his work. STUPID DIVORCE is full of empathy and practicality. The territory of divorce - the complex passage of some relationships marked by love and the inevitability of character and habit - needs any and all available signposts. An experience-based, honest, thoughtful appraisal such as this allows Fudge to honor himself, his ex-wife, as well as to guide his readers through this difficult process. Vincent Fudge II's STUPID DIVORCE is an intelligent, well-intentioned, fair-minded and sincere interpretation of divorce by a Christian writer whose systems thinking and introspective honesty illuminate the work. Ellen Graham for IndieReader

Author Information

A high school dropout with a criminal record, Vincent Fudge II spent eight months homeless before joining the military. He used educational benefits from the military to earn both a bachelor's and master's degree in communication, then ventured across the country with his wife and first child to finesse his way into one of the nation's top military financial services associations. He built a house for his family, had two additional children, and wrote his first relationship improvement book inspired by his marital missteps. After facing marital adversity and re-evaluating his life goals, he started a life coaching business. He worked for sugar water and used life's lemons to make lemonade. He currently lives in San Antonio, Texas, with his three children.

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