The Lesbian and Gay Book of Love and Marriage: Creating the Stories of Our Lives, by Paula Martinac; Foreword by Roberta Achtenberg; Broadway Books; 286 pages; $18.00.

Together Forever: Gay and Lesbian Marriage, by Eric Marcus; Anchor Books; 348 pages; $23.95.

At the same time, politicians fell over each other to condemn the Hawaiian ruling and to introduce legislation that would make same-sex marriage illegal for all time. The ironically-titled Defense Of Marriage Act (DOMA), which was passed by Congress and signed by President Clinton (in the dead of night) in 1996, was only the federal echo of similar laws that sailed through state legislatures during the last five years.

Even "liberals" who don't hate gay people and who oppose discrimination against us were quick to express their opposition to "homosexual marriage" as the enemy of all that's great and good and holy. Queer pundits could almost be forgiven for declaring same-sex marriage to be "the most important issue facing the gay community today."

I beg to differ.

Though I am happy to be part of a 13-year old relationship, I do not think that gay marriage is that big of an issue - though I support the rights of lesbian and gay couples to marry. At a time when sodomy laws are still on the books, gay and bisexual men continue to die from AIDS complications, lesbian and gay teenagers are victims of antigay violence and suicide, and queer people everywhere continue to be arrested for victimless crimes and expelled from the military, the Boy Scouts and other institutions, "gay marriage" should not be paramount. Besides, since most straight folks get apoplectic whenever the issue is brought up, it might be a good idea to put same-sex marriage on the back burner, and push for domestic partner benefits instead.

Having said all that, the fact remains that gay men and lesbians have created and maintained stable relationships for over a century, and will continue to do in spite of all the DOMAS in the world.

Thus it does not surprise us that books about same-sex relationships continue to be written, or that they are made best sellers by grateful men and women who want information on how to start a relationship (if they are single) or how to maintain a relationship (if they are committed).

The three books I discuss in this essay deal with lesbian and gay marriage from different but equally supportive perspectives - all three authors are in long-term relationships themselves.

The Lesbian & Gay Book of Love & Marriage: Creating the Stories of Our Lives is the "basic book" on same-sex marriage. Paula Martinac, a Lambda Award-winning novelist (Out of Time), relied on her own experiences as well as those of other happily-married lesbian women and gay men to write this basic resource.

"This book is a celebration of lesbian and gay marriages and a reclaiming of that word to describe our unions. It's a chronicle of the ways in which lesbians and gay men have negotiated and maintained relationships without the benefit of societal recognitions or legal marriage. ... [I]f the Defense of Marriage Act remains on the books for a thousand years, lesbians and gay men will still fall in love and 'marry,' in the truest sense of the word."

Gay people, especially gay men, are usually portrayed as inveterate loners who are incapable of sustaining long-term relationships. On the other hand, Martinac notes, "a 1992 survey found that 56 percent of gay men and 71 percent of lesbians were in steady relationships." Though that survey was probably biased in favor of couples, I agree with therapist Vanessa Marshall that "There are more lesbian and gay men in long-term relationships than people realize."

Whatever our numbers, the fact remain that many of us look for partners when we are single and want to keep our partners when we are in a relationship. In both cases, The Lesbian & Gay Book of Love & Marriage should help the process along.

Martinac, her subjects and contributors offer tips and advice on "Meeting Mr. or Ms. Right," dating, "Popping the Question," settling down, having children, and even D-I-V-O-R-C-E. There is also personal testimony from Martinac herself and from the likes of Roberta Achtenberg (who wrote the "Foreword"), Craig Lucas and Cris Williamson. Those who want to look further into the matter will appreciate the "Appendix," which features "An Annotated List of Organizations and Resources for Lesbian and Gay Couples and Families".

The Lesbian & Gay Book of Love & Marriage has a chapter, "I Do! I Do!," that deals with same-sex commitment ceremonies. Recognizing Ourselves: Ceremonies of Lesbian and Gay Commitment is all about lesbian and gay "weddings".

In this new volume of the Columbia University Press's "Between Men~Between Women" series of gay studies, author Ellen Lewin explores the ways that lesbian and gay couples confirm, celebrate and sanctify their relationships, from private ceremonies to the mass "Weddings" held as part of the 1987 and 1993 lesbian and gay Marches on Washington.

Lewin knows what she's writing about. "[I]n early 1992, I found myself planning a commitment ceremony with my partner, Liz Goodman. Though our relationship was only a bit over a year old and we had both been in other serious relationships, something about our connection felt deeper and more permanent. ... [I]t seems that we longed to share our discovery of one another with the world, or some little part of it; we wanted to make the fact of our relationship public and official, even though there seemed to be nothing that required us to do so." The other couples, male and female, the Lewin profiles in Recognizing Ourselves would surely agree with her.

Commitment ceremonies, of course, are not for everyone. Some couples view them as a waste of money, while others consider them to be a waste of time as long as same-sex marriage is against the law. The forty couples Eric Marcus interviewed for Together Forever: Gay and Lesbian Marriage are of various minds on the issue of commitment ceremonies. In fact, Marcus's couples are of various minds on practically everything, except for the fact that they happy to be in their own particular liaisons.

In any case, what makes Together Forever worth reading is the fact that the couples in this book are so different from one another. The only thing they have in common is that they've been together for more than nine years; a criteria Marcus adopted from The Good Marriage, a study of heterosexual couples by Judith S. Wallerstein and Sandra Blakeslee.

Marcus, like Wallerstein and Blakeslee, feels that a nine-year plus couple got over the "seven year itch" and is in it for the long haul. (Though Marcus's own nine-year marriage ended badly, he has since embarked upon a new, and hopefully lasting, relationship.)

The 20 lesbian and 20 gay male couples in Together Forever deal with such issues as courtship, differences, monogamy, communication, commitment, family and sex. Some of the couples had their pictures taken, while other couples had their names changed to protect the guilty. They are all equally interesting. Lesbian and gay marriage is an issue in which the proof is in the pudding. If you want to know how to make commitments work, look no further than the couples in Together Forever. They know what to do.