Emily Parker spoke with author Dorothy Littel Greco about the ups and downs of married life, and how to build a strong relationship.

Emily: Why did you write this book?

Dorothy: I wrote 'Making Marriage Beautiful' for a number of reasons. My husband and I have been doing pastoral care work for almost 20 years and that involves pre-marital classes and marriage counselling. We've officiated dozens of weddings, including our son's three years ago, which was probably our favourite.

We have a clear sense of why marriage is so challenging and because we've been on the ground level with so many couples, we wanted to offer some hope, encouragement and a theologically robust strategy to help couples work their way through some of the challenges that they face.

Emily: If anybody wants to find out more, and get hold of a copy of the book, how can they do so?

Dorothy: Go to my site dorothygreco.com. There's a page that says 'my book' and you can read reviews, and download chapter one. It's also got links to buy at various places. I'm working on two other books right now, one is about misogyny and the other one is on 'marriage in the middle', which is looking at what are some of the unique challenges and joys and surprises that those of us who are in the 40 to 65 year age range can expect to encounter.