Lisa Faulkner is an award-winning author; the forty-year-old author of novels that span various literary genres, including fantasy, science fiction, and horror stories; as well as the forty-year-old author of A History of Sixteen Tons, which examines American nationalities and ethnicities through the ages. Faulkner is also associate editor for The New York Times and has been writing since she was a young woman, first writing scripts for television, and then doing copywriting for various companies. Ms. Faulkner is very familiar with America’s changing demographics, has lived in the New York City area most of her life. As such, one of the topics that she covers in her book, Age of Nationality, is how the rapid growth of the twenty-first century will affect our landscape as a whole, and how family background and ethnic background will continue to influence us as we continue our nationalistic lifestyle. In Partner, Faulkner tackles the question of how nationalities differ by age, as well as how the roles of gender and ethnicity continue to be defined, how we deal with the changing face of business and work, and how the definition of success differs by social status and economic status.
In Partner, Faulkner presents a variety of opinions on the subject of marriage and divorce, and how the rules of our society have changed in response to changing cultural mores. The book begins by examining the age-old concept of matrimony as something that only happens between a man and a woman, with the couple subsequently being betrothed or pledged to be husband and wife for life. The authors question this definition of marriage, and question whether there are any exceptions to the rule, particularly in today’s culture where one gender is increasingly seen as the default, often due to biology.
The second major theme in Partner is how people react to the redefinition of marriage, especially in light of increasing age-old presumptions about marriage and marital status. The author rightly points out that when an older generation retires, and younger generations take on their responsibilities, traditional gender roles are sometimes threatened. For example, traditionally the mother was the primary wage earner, responsible for the family and household; fathers were not breadwinners and were relegated to jobs outside the home. These days the situation has changed. The author goes on to describe how this trend has affected the way people interact, both at home and at work, and how this has affected family finances.