The Secret Lives of Men: What Men Want You to Know About Love, Sex, and Relationships

What a title, right?  I immediately knew I wanted to review The Secret Lives of Men:  What Men Want You to Know About Love, Sex, and Relationships, by Christopher Blazina, because I live with, you know, a man.

What I liked:  A thorough explanation of the man code. I've missed out on the man code, since I a) am a woman and b) have no brothers.  I have observed that men seem to feel emoting makes them somewhat less of a man, but I had no idea it was so deeply ingrained in their psyches. Blazina writes for an audience of women who are spouses, mothers or sisters to men, so the book is geared toward explaining why those men might be so, well, dense, and how to help the men in their lives feel more comfortable about opening up.

Some choice quotes:

• The commandments provide a way to mask the results of socially sanctioned forms of negative aggression, such as vulnerability, emotional hurt and humiliation ... Ultimately masking emotions can be confusing to everyone involved.  As a partner or friend, you want to be able to decode what he is actually feeling when he is aggressive.
• For most men, the emotional prerequisites for growing up health and happy in the areas of work and love are not linked to fulfilling the stereotypical notions of manhood. Having a good life is not about following someone else's model, but rather involves carving out one's own signature way of living.    

What I didn't like:  As with many self-help books, this one has a summary at the end of the chapter, which I found off-putting.  Also as with many self-help books, hokey metaphors abound, such as the emotional shoe box and the shadow parent.  The explanations behind these metaphors are sound and make a lot of sense -- Blazina is a working psychologist -- but I kept getting distracted by the cheesiness of the shadow-parent visual.

Overall, I recommend this book for any woman fed up with the man code.  I actually learned something.