Vicki and Dennis Covington, like many of their generation, "promised each other nothing" when they wed, and got more than they'd bargained for: drinking, infidelity, infertility, uncertainty. Gradually tumult gave way to sobriety, parenthood, and meaningful work, but a yearning remained. The triumph of this haunting book, which succumbs to neither sentimentality nor cynicism, is its portrayal of the unpredictable eddying of passion through the institution that enshrines but cannot contain it.