Satisfy!: A Relationship Repair Manual

Marshall Fine was Assistant Professor of Family Studies, University of Guelph, Ontario.

The Kaellises wrote this manual for the benefit of people who are attempting to maintain a healthy relationship, whether it be between husband and wife, parents and children, lovers or friends. In essence, however, it seems more cleanly focused on the marital relationship and appears to be based on their personal marital experiences.

The manual consists of three parts. The first part outlines what the authors call “principles,” which is a description of such relationship factors as love, humor, and blaming. Part two, referred to as “methods,” is the “how to” section. The authors discuss how to stroke, give criticism, deal with resentments, and form contracts for change. The final section outlines a game that the authors devised for couples. The game involves the giving of compliments and constructive criticisms. The authors augment the manual by giving examples of the kinds of feelings that they experienced in their own relationship.

Satisfy! is a self-help manual and, though I cannot fault the information in the manual, I have my doubts as to how useful this and other self-help relationship manuals are. The relationship information described in the manual is valid, though somewhat brief, and relatively well-adjusted couples might be able to gain something from it. However, it could be a bit simplistic for couples who are experiencing a good deal of difficulty. Finally, I found the board game directions to be confusing at first. The game does have some interesting features, if a couple is at the point where they are willing to deal fairly with each other.