Here is a book recommended by Fine Homebuilding entitled: Gutted : Down to the Studs in My House, My Marriage, My Entire Life. Amazon says: ‘LaRose…and his wife, Susan, have just bought a “small toenail-yellow Cape Cod” on Long Island. The “hapless victim” of decades of “punishing” remodeling, this ruin of a house needs full-blown CPR, not TLC. As the couple navigates the Kafka-esque local planning commission’s permit process, they begin demolition�tearing off siding, pulling out asbestos and taking out walls.
Short on funds, LaRose signs onto a series of construction crews, not because he’s got carpentry skills, but because he hopes to gain a few. As LaRose’s days become increasingly blue-collar, married life morphs unexpectedly. Half the people they’d invited to their wedding seem to have disappeared from their lives completely. Free time is spent razing sections of their house, wandering the aisles of Home Depot, or wallowing in “home porn”�Trading Spaces or This Old House�on TV. As the bills and stresses pile up, this once-carefree couple contemplates divorce, but decides to stick together, which is a good thing, since not long after, Susan finds herself pregnant…’