Same-Sex Marriage by Tricia Andryszewski

The issue of same-sex marriage has been an incredibly politically-charged issue in the United States. Should a legal marriage include two men or two women as well as a man and a woman? What happens when religion and the government intersect like this? How have views of same-sex marriage changed over the recent decades? This book takes a look at the history of the same-sex marriage movement and the challenges that it has faced in America.

I admit that I was quite skeptical of this book before I started reading it. I run the risk of exposing my biases here, but I think I was focusing on the subtitle of the book and was anticipating a book that argued against same-sex marriage. Instead, the book reads more like an account of what has happened legally and socially around same-sex marriage. While information is included on the differing opinions, it comes as more to explain the context of the political division. The text is accompanied by news articles from USA Today and there's a timeline and a glossary at the end of the book, along with resources for where to look for more information. It's a book that takes what is still a very contentious political issue and makes it accessible for youth to understand (particularly those who are looking to use it for a school assignment). Still, I am optimistic that the day will come where students will look back on a book like this and wonder why such a debate was needed at all.

I received a review copy from NetGalley courtesy of Lerner Books.

Find an earlier version at IndieBound or the updated version from Lerner.

Read it with:
Gay Rights by Tricia Andryszewski
Courting Equality by Karen Kahn, Patricia A. Gozemba, and Marilyn Humphries
Green Energy: Crucial Gains or Economic Strains? by Matt Doeden
Gay Power! by Betsy Kuhn