Open: An Uncensored Memoir of Love, Liberation, and Non-Monogamy

There's a new book I am looking forward to reading. It is Open: An Uncensored Memoir of Love, Liberation, and Non-Monogamy, by Rachel Krantz.

Krantz is a journalist and one of the founding editors of Bustle, where she served as senior features editor for three years. Her work has been featured on NPR, The Guardian, Vox, Vice, and many other outlets. She's the recipient of the Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award, the Investigative Reporters and Editors Radio Award, the Edward R. Murrow Award, and the Peabody Award for her work as an investigative reporter with YR Media. She's got cred!

I like that Open is not a book about how to do polyamory. Open is a memoir, a story about a person's journey. Like all journeys I expect there will be mistakes, missteps and wrong turns. Open is on that too short list of contemporary polyamory literature that includes work by other great writers (mostly women) like Gracie X's Wide Open and Sophie Lucido Johnson's Many Love(s). I hope more titles become available and more stories are told in the small but important genre of contemporary polyamory literature.

In my opinion, the superpower of stories is how they build on the imagination of what's possible to be. That's why the genre of contemporary polyamory literature matters so much to me. Sometimes knowing who you are is contingent on knowing what it's possible to be. 

Love Without Sex by Sophie Lucido Johnson, Review

I have just finished this awesome Audible Original: Love Without Sex by Sophie Lucido Johnson. It really explores the relationship of love and sex by looking at folks in both the polyamory (many+love) community and the asexual community and exploring the Venn Diagram of where those circles intersect. This raises lovely questions about love, sex, platonic relationships and friendships and the assumptions we make and how we experience and value all these beautiful human experiences. I highly recommend this!

Camel Trips

“The two important things that I did learn were that you are as powerful and strong as you allow yourself to be, and that the most difficult part of any endeavour is taking the first step, making the first decision.”
― Robyn Davidson, Tracks

Tracks, the book by Robyn Davidson, was the right book at the right time in my life. It prepared me for my own camel trip (seemingly impossible task) when suddenly my life changed in a flash. It also taught me about the power of manifestation, about how you can be as powerful as you allow yourself to be, something I now call "being the witch." I did not have those words for it then, but it was a lesson I had to learn damn fast!

Camel Trips is a term I use for doing that really hard thing, like a woman's solo trek across 1700 miles of Australian outback. It can also be hiking the PCT (Pacific Crest Trail), or loosing weight, or leaving a bad relationship, or suddenly becoming a working single parent, or changing your gender identification, sexual or relationship orientation, coming out of the closet or leaving a bad job or facing the devastating loss from your life of a dear love.

My inspiration was Robyn Davidson's book Tracks. Wild, the book by Cheryl Strayed, is another such story. I am sure there are many many more.

Camel Trips are important. I believe we should not shy away from them. They are the stories of our lives that define us. Camel Trips are the forge. We emerge from them changed from iron to steel. They teach us we are as strong as we allow ourselves to be. A bit of a warning though, Camel Trips never end, they merely change form.

Book Review: Many Love, A memoir of Polyamory and Finding Love(s)

Many Love, A memoir of Polyamory and Finding Love(s)
Sophie Lucido Johnson
ISBN: 978-1-5011-8978-4

What I love most about this book is Sophie Lucido Johnson's holistic approach to polyamory. What she offers is not just polyamory as a way to structure relationships, or even polyamory as a relationship orientation. Her book (to me) offers polyamory as a way of being, living and loving. Her book's holistic approach expands the concept of "many love" to encompass the loving intimate space we call friendship, and the loving intimate space we call romance and also the loving intimate space in between.

My first wife and I opened our marriage in the late 70s. There was no Internet. There was not any narrative for what we did (that we knew of anyway.) Lacking rules, there were some negative experiences as we experimented and found things that didn't work. But, there being no rules was also a positive. We explored the "loving intimate space in between" as well as having other sexual partners. There was nobody to tell us we were "doing it wrong." There were no poly police. We went outside of the box and found things that worked that would have been unconventional even in the poly community that emerged much later. Over time we rolled our own version, our own way, of what has since come to be known as polyamory.

Decades later, as I learned about this thing called polyamory, I still found little out there regarding that space in between. Now there were rules: there were friends, and there were partners; and those were two totally different buckets. In a podcast years ago (2016 I think, not sure which episode) I recall the folks at the Multiamory Podcast referring to the "separate buckets" with friends being one bucket and "partners" in another bucket. I said, "I need more buckets."

Gracie X (author of Wide Open) spoke about it (and wrote some about) what she called emotional polyamory. She contrasted this to what the mono-normative community sometimes calls "emotional affairs." But, mostly it has seemed to me, many in the polyamory community then heavily privileged sexual relationships. The good news is the community seems to be evolving, incorporating more concepts from relationship anarchy. That's a very good thing!

So, I especially appreciated Johnson's chapter on "Just" Friends. It's nice to now look back and feel that those loving intimate "no label" relationships in between, that I so fondly still treasure, are finally being seen as something as amazing as they were. Sophie Lucido Johnson did that!

Many Love: A Memoir of Polyamory and Finding Love(s)

I have finished reading Many Love: A Memoir of Polyamory and Finding Love(s) by Sophie Lucido Johnson. I have yet to review it. I will have more to say. In short, I loved it. It's not just a poly book. It takes a different perspective on polyamory than many books I have read.

It's about love, infinite love. It's a book about how love (and poly) transcends sex and even romance and embraces, and fills the gaps between, other forms of loving emotionally intimate relationships even friendships.

I get that. I really get that!

Book Review: Coming Out Like A Porn Star, by Jiz Lee

Jiz Lee's book is an excellent anthology of over 55 short stories written by people in the adult-film industry. It's about their lives and experiences "coming out" to the significant "vanilla" people in their lives.

Sophia and I first heard about this book at the 2016 CatalystCon West Conference where Jiz Lee was giving a presentation about the book. Lee's presentation included several of the authors of stories in their book. This presentation changed forever our perception of porn stars and the adult-film industry.

The thing that most impressed us is how educated, intelligent and well spoken they are. The common misconception that all porn stars are either trafficked or do porn out of desperation was quickly obliterated. These porn stars are smart cookies all who do porn by choice as part of their sexual expression as well as as a job. They love their work.

Porn stars are a sexual minority. In my opinion, this book matters for more than porn stars. This is a really important book for all sexual minorities. The consequences the writers wrote about that many suffered as a result of coming out points to the fact that there still are legally unprotected sexual minorities beyond those currently defined and protected as LGBTQIA. That's why this is such an important book not just for porn stars. For example, folks who are in consensually non-monogamous relationships do not currently have legal protections from discrimination.

The biggest question I had in reading this book, and meeting these authors, though, was; why can't people in our society just let people be who they are and accept other people as they are? I mean really; why should there be this much agony about people being open about their work, gender expression, sexual and relationship orientation?

Until that happens; in the real world, all sexual minorities need legal protection from discrimination in their housing, financial lives and employment.

This is an excellent and important book. I highly recommend it!

My Review of Wide Open, by Gracie X

Almost a year ago I wrote about starting to read Gracie X's excellent book. Not only did I read it, I read it twice; within about six month's. I never do that. I never reviewed it on this blog (an oversight) after I finished it. The following review was actually written about six months ago (after my second reading) for another venue. Sorry for the delay, but this is still true. Gracie is a smart visual writer and she continues to inspire me:

This is my favorite polyamory book...

I think Gracie's memoir can be compared to The Price of Salt, the book that inspired the movie Carol. The plot of Wide Open is similar in some respects to the plot of Carol, but in a more contemporary setting. If you look over time at the arc of change from the 1950s (when The Price of Salt was written) to now, our culture has been through a change from rigidity and non-acceptance to more flexibility, more tolerance and greater acceptance. I think that's a good thing. But, we have a long way to go.

No matter where you stand on ethical non-monogamy; the ideas are important here. Just as it was for same sex couples in the 50s, the rights of people to define their relationships and their own lives and shape their families need to be respected.

When done with the best interests of the children in mind, polyamorous families are good families. This is that story. Gracie X is a great mom and an excellent writer. This book is very well written and her intelligence shows. I recommend this book.

My review of The Price of Salt, by Patricia Highsmith

This was one of the best books I have ever read. The quality of writing is rich and layered like a glass of fine red wine. It is intelligent and full of passion in and of the story.

Salt, as I read it, is a metaphor for passion, love and companionship - the kind person who normative people often call "the one." So the title translates to, the price of being with the one.

This book is an important book on so many levels. I think it is a story that poly people need to pay attention to.

According to Wikipedia:

The Price of Salt (later republished under the title Carol) is a 1952 romance novel by Patricia Highsmith, first published under the pseudonym "Claire Morgan".

At the time homosexuality was a crime and just being a lesbian could be enough to cost a woman custody of her child. The topic was so sensitive the author had to use a pseudonym (as so many of us, myself included, do in Polyland).

In the book, Carol Aird and a woman named Therese become lovers. While, at the same time, Carol and her estranged husband Harge are going through a divorce. Carol and Harge have a young daughter, Rindy. The book is about Carol's relationship with Therese and how that romance is used as a weapon by Harge, in their divorce, to take Rindy away from Carol.

The Price of Salt is a wonderful love story, and so much more. In terms of same sex relationships, it also tells the story of how bad things were for same sex couples, how far we have come and how cultural values can destroy, instead of reinforce, loving families that are not culturally normative.

We can look back on history and say, "shame on them then." But, these kinds of attacks still go on involving people who love differently.

Gracie X, an excellent mom, went through a similar court battle as chronicled in her book Wide Open. Like Harge in The Price of Salt, Gracie's partner Oz's estranged spouse went after Oz and tried to block his custody rights because of his relationship with Gracie. This kind of stuff still happens.

Knowing what Gracie and Oz and their kids went through and knowing that this kind of story is not just history, but in other contexts is political science, made The Price of Salt especially poignant for me.

I see a real similarity in the plot behind both of these books. They are both love stories with lovers, who are good parents, battling a sex negative culture. I strongly recommend both books!

My review of A Life Less Monogamous, by Cooper S. Beckett.

Ryan and Jennifer are a couple who’s monogamous marriage is growing sexually stale. They meet a swinger couple and decide to do something bold. In the process they discover themselves.

This is the story line in A Life Less Monogamous – a novel about swinging by Cooper S. Beckett.

When people ask me about opening up their marriage, I advise them to imagine what it’s going to be like; then be prepared for the experience to be unlike anything they have imagined.

For Cindy and I, like Ryan and Jennifer in the book, ethical non-monogamy was an amazing journey of sexual as well as almost spiritual discovery of others and of ourselves. For me, it continues to be.

Cooper’s book is very human. It touches on the raw feelings and yes, emotions, that are often brought up by the various forms of non-monogamy. If you are already ethically non-monogamous, read this book and be prepared to ask yourselves new questions about your experiences. I know I did.

If you are monogamous, considering non-monogamy, this is a must read. It’s a great book even though it’s not a how-to manual.

If I have one minor nit is there seems to be an emerging narrative of non-monogamy stories embracing non-monogamy as a cure for relationship bed death. Yes, it can be that. I am concerned that this may emerge as building a use case for non-monogamy as a prescription, rather than non-monogamy being seen as an opportunity for fulfillment and discovery and authenticity as I believe non-monogamy can be.

Thank you Cooper S. Beckett, this is a great book. I think we need more ethical non-monogamy fiction. Stories like this build a case for ethical non-monogamy not only being possible, but also for ethical non-monogamy providing an opportunity for growth.

I may have to get Cooper to sign my Kindle, again.

The Price of Salt by Patricia Highsmith

I'm reading The Price of Salt by Patricia Highsmith. The book, written in 1952, is elegant. This is an example of lesbian literature and gay fiction that I think illustrates the potential power of narrative. It is a compelling story of love up against a hetronormative culture. This book was recently made into the movie Carol. It took awhile, but love prevailed! I'd like to see poly novels written like this. I'd like to see examples of poly fiction that illustrate the potential power of narrative to tell compelling stories of love up against a mononormative culture.

The power of narrative

I am very interested in the power of narrative and how it shapes our enculturation and our perception of the possible. One example of a novel that changed the way people perceive reality, and the possible, was Upton Sinclair's 1906 novel The Jungle.

The poly memoirs that have been coming out are great; but the ability of an author to build a story in a memoir is constrained by details of history. Details can get in the way of the greater narrative. Plus, some of the recent memoirs are a little focused on "how to".

So far, Dr. Maria Pallotta-Chiarolli is the only person I know who has published a good real contemporary poly novel with her unique Young Adult book, Love You Two. The field seems to me to be open (pun intended) for some more "good" poly novels.

I am reading Wide Open

I am reading Wide Open, My Adventures in Polyamory, Open Marriage and Loving On My Own Terms by Gracie X. This book is the compelling memoir of Gracie X. It is very, very well written.
This may be the best of many, many books I have read about polyamory, though I see it as much more than a book about poly. To me Wide Open is a book about respect. Respect in this case means to me respecting and being true about who you and others are and building a life built around consent and workability that honors that. Respect also means living that life without shame despite what the shifting winds of nomativity cultures (and/or subcultures) may cast upon us.
The introduction is by Carol Queen. That alone would have sold me on the book. I had the wonderful privilege to meet Carol at a book signing awhile back and we had a delightful conversation.
Based on what I have read so far the narrative Wide Open tells a great truth. It resonates with my own narrative and what I have found to be true in my own life of over 60 years. Thank you Gracie X for writing this book. I hope I get to meet you some day.
Poly people, we need more real life memoirs like this!

Review: The Game Changer: A Memoir of Disruptive Love by Franklin Veaux

I really enjoyed Franklin Veaux's memoir. It was well written and intelligent. I would like to see more memoirs like this. Veaux takes us trough his journey toward Polyamory. I think Veaux is like a lot of us who did not turn to poly as something to try, but found in poly a description of who they already are. The principle of the book is that all people in relationships have rights. This includes those we would call "secondaries." The concept of spouses/partners having veto rights over secondaries is hurtful and demeaning and I totally agree with Veaux. I am so glad to have found this book. It's exciting to see these kind of poly memoirs being published. Veaux makes the case for poly being more than just an alternative lifestyle choice. In this book Veaux makes the case for poly being a respectable relationship orientation. Thank you Veaux for writing this book.