What's He Really Thinking? by Paula Rinehart

After having read many books on the subject of men for the betterment of understanding them, I found this one to be one of the better ones. While most of this centers around marriage relationships, she does include some about any male relationship: fathers, brothers, friends, etc. My first thought though about getting a book about a man written by a woman was somewhat doubtful. However, as someone who's worked in the field of counseling many relationships, she gives really great advice.

At the start of her book, she describes different types of men such as the fighter, the adventurer, the builder, etc. What I wished more of was that she went in to more detail about it other than the descriptions she gave. However, I liked the way she mentions how we should question, "how is this guy meant to bless and bring life? (p. 14). Each personality has his good and bad points. But once a person figures out which one the man in your life qualifies as, the woman can then proceed to understand him more.

I liked the section about men's drive to do work and his reasons for wanting to be respected. I think that a lot of times, women have a hard time understanding her husband's focus of work. Rinehart spends a great deal of time discussing how God puts this desire in men to do well. I appreciated her thoughts on the subject and it definitely was an eye-opener.

In addition, I enjoyed her views on conflict with men and why men hurt. Men very much want to be respected and when they feel threatened, they feel hurt and conflict can begin. At the end of the book, the author includes a section on understanding men which I think can be very helpful. She lists questions that the woman can ask the man to develop a closer relationship. After that, there are discussion questions for each chapter making it an ideal book to use in a group. I would also like to add that I liked that this wasn't a book to bash men in any nature. Instead, the author writes from a woman's perspective to look at ourselves and how we are responding to men versus pointing our fingers at them for everything we don't understand. She puts great emphasis on God creating men and women to be different for a reason. I appreciated her opening the book with the story of God creating Adam and Eve. Overall, I enjoyed this book and would recommend it to others.

*** I reviewed this book for free from Thomas Nelson's book reviewer program called Book Sneeze. Thanks Thomas Nelson!