Sorry to hear of your sitch, Nivirtz. As others have said, focus on the 180's and GAL. She sounds like she's still sorting through her feelings. I agree that she should leave if she wants the separation, but be as kind as you can muster in working something out.
Your mentioning the erotic/romance novels is interesting. I think diving into these is very common in women. There's even a good book on why women go for these and men go for porn (A Billion Wicked Thoughts, if you're interested). In a nutshell, women are hard-wired to have to sort through many clues for whether a man is good mate material, in a similar way that men are hard-wired to certain female visual stimuli. I don't think women reading these is necessarily harmful. However, to calibrate you, I also don't think it's harmful to look at porn. Both have the danger that they can skew your view of reality. Both exist because they excite our interest in erotic variety. sandi's description seems right on how they can aid in things going off the rails in a M.
So, this is probably the wrong time to explore this, but, if you do get things sorted with your wife in the future, you might look at this as a very good clue as to what turns her on. Sure, you can't be the bare-chested pirate from the novel, but it might help with ideas that will allow you to connect with her. Just a thought.
In the meantime I hope you have the patience to deal with the difficulties of today. Good luck.
H: 38 xW: 38 M: 16 T: 18 S: 9 BD: 2/2012 W moved out 4/2012 D: 11/2012
Thanks for the advice on the "who moves out" situation. It seems like a logical and well thought out response on why she should leave if space is that important to her. We'll probably have the discussion this weekend and I'll let you know how it goes.
