The Marriage Act - John Marrs

Reading Challenge Category: Free ARC from NetGalley

Official Blurb:

What if marriage was the law? Dare you disobey?
Britain. The near-future. A right-wing government believes it has the answer to society’s ills – the Sanctity of Marriage Act, which actively encourages marriage as the norm, punishing those who choose to remain single.
But four couples are about to discover just how impossible relationships can be when the government is monitoring every aspect of our personal lives, monitoring every word, every minor disagreement . . . and will use every tool in its arsenal to ensure everyone will love, honour and obey.

My Thoughts:

Well, this book certainly opens up a lot of thoughts and questions!
I’m happily married and very secure in my relationship, so would I want to upgrade to a smart marriage to be able to claim all of the benefits? Or are the ‘big brother’ style surveillances just not worth it? I asked my husband what he thought, and he looked at me like I’d gone crazy! I still don’t know his thoughts on the matter!
So, the book was very intriguing, and I love this alternate future Marrs has developed, along with the Match DNA and driverless cars. I say alternate, but we are very close to some of the things he has in his books.
It didn’t grip me as much as I expected; I wanted to get stuck in and enjoy it, as he doesn’t bring that many books out. However, I did find it quite hard to get into, to begin with, and I found it hard to remember who the characters were. I don’t think it helped me that there were two characters whose names started with an A - Arthur and Anthony. Jeffrey didn’t feel like a Jeffrey to me, either. So the names didn’t help me remember who was who.
As I progressed through the book and came to terms with the characters, I found myself settling down into the story much more. Jeremy and what he was doing to poor Lucas and Noah had me angry, and I was rooting for Corrine to come out on top, but I wasn’t a big fan of Roxi and her family. So, overall I enjoyed the dystopian feel of the book, and it gave me a topic for discussion with people. What would you do? This was a solid four-star read for me; it was as gripping as others I have read by John Marrs, but it was still excellent.