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A review by shansometimes
More: A Memoir of Open Marriage by Molly Roden Winter
4.0
A few disclaimers:
1. I'm not in an open marriage and don't desire to be. I merely love memoirs and believe there's much to learn from other people's lives and decisions, even if they aren't ones I'd make for myself.
2. I consider myself sex-positive. I don't believe sex is taboo or dirty, and talking/reading about it in general doesn't bother me. (I'm not a romance reader and, therefore, have no dog in the smut fight.) I have no judgment for people with diverse sexual experiences.
I hadn't seen many books from a polyamorous perspective, and reading MORE made me think this lack of representation may be by design. The best memoirs require honesty, vulnerability, and a unique point of view. The unique POV here is obvious, but I can see how it'd be difficult to open up about open relationships, for one, because of the shame the author encountered at the beginning of hers.
My favorite parts were her therapy sessions and personal reflections on her struggle to accept certain parts of polyamory and discover her motivations. However, between self-discovery, there was a lot of self-pity and emphasis on her relationships. Although some details provided helpful context and pushed the story forward—especially when she discussed said details with her husband—I thought most of the explicit details didn't add much to the story.
I don't believe you can write a good memoir about an open marriage without some romantic and sexual particulars. But because of the level of detail she chose to include, I found myself waiting and wanting for her deliberation time. I wanted to know more about what she was learning about herself from these relationships and what her journey revealed about her thoughts on open marriage as a concept. I could've done with less detail about her sexual trysts to make space for more reflection.
However, a story about open marriage by a woman who discovered her parents were also in an open marriage is a book waiting to happen, and an interesting one at that. I appreciated and enjoyed MORE as an ambitious, fascinating memoir and Winter as an impressively open (no pun intended) and talented writer.
*Thanks to the publisher for a digital ARC!
1. I'm not in an open marriage and don't desire to be. I merely love memoirs and believe there's much to learn from other people's lives and decisions, even if they aren't ones I'd make for myself.
2. I consider myself sex-positive. I don't believe sex is taboo or dirty, and talking/reading about it in general doesn't bother me. (I'm not a romance reader and, therefore, have no dog in the smut fight.) I have no judgment for people with diverse sexual experiences.
I hadn't seen many books from a polyamorous perspective, and reading MORE made me think this lack of representation may be by design. The best memoirs require honesty, vulnerability, and a unique point of view. The unique POV here is obvious, but I can see how it'd be difficult to open up about open relationships, for one, because of the shame the author encountered at the beginning of hers.
My favorite parts were her therapy sessions and personal reflections on her struggle to accept certain parts of polyamory and discover her motivations. However, between self-discovery, there was a lot of self-pity and emphasis on her relationships. Although some details provided helpful context and pushed the story forward—especially when she discussed said details with her husband—I thought most of the explicit details didn't add much to the story.
I don't believe you can write a good memoir about an open marriage without some romantic and sexual particulars. But because of the level of detail she chose to include, I found myself waiting and wanting for her deliberation time. I wanted to know more about what she was learning about herself from these relationships and what her journey revealed about her thoughts on open marriage as a concept. I could've done with less detail about her sexual trysts to make space for more reflection.
However, a story about open marriage by a woman who discovered her parents were also in an open marriage is a book waiting to happen, and an interesting one at that. I appreciated and enjoyed MORE as an ambitious, fascinating memoir and Winter as an impressively open (no pun intended) and talented writer.
*Thanks to the publisher for a digital ARC!