Three Women by Lisa Taddeo Review

This summer I’ve been reading up a storm and loving it. Going outside for a few minutes is fun but when the heat and sweat overpower me stepping inside for some much needed mind stimulation works every time. My brain and unburnt skin are happy.

Expressing our wants, needs, desires and thoughts is something most women are told to freely give to other women. The wrench comes when it involves men. They don't know what they want or are afraid to express it. It took until I married my husband for him to ask for certain things he was afraid I would scoff and run away from him if uttered.

This is only one example of many.

All of the women in this book are in heterosexual couples but anyone can feel this kind of disconnect from one person to another. I know I've felt it when someone I know does something incomprehensible. How could they? you grumble quickly returning to your own problems and woes.

I don’t like to recommend books as “the book everyone must read” but if I did this one would be climbing to the top the further I plunge. In Three Women by Lisa Taddeo the plot is loosely based around three different women and their desires. This seemingly self contained universe rapidly expands to encompass everything in their collective lives with overlapping similarities. My life is fairly different to each woman in this book but I’ve found a similarity in each of them even if only for a sentence or two.

I can relate to the lingering effects of all encompassing love in high school and when it, inevitably, turns sour you feel like life is over. This relates to Maggie and Lina’s stories who have hang ups and obsessions with the past that strangle the present and possible future of their lives. Lisa excels at describing and deciphering the seemingly undefined and almost impossible to describe. There are so many instances I would be quoting the whole book if I tried to find one, let alone the “best” one.

Sloane may be the hardest for most to relate to since she comes from a privileged background. There are still kernels of truth to be found in her story. Even though she wants to seem self assured, very image conscious, she’s often searching for an identity that feels authentic to her. She finds one eventually even though it adds to the problems in her life.

I recommend this book to any person who wants to understand the mindset of people more deeply. I was going to recommend it to every heterosexual man and women but I feel like the gender binary doesn’t matter in the context of these stories. Wanting to understand someone on a deeper level even if that person is a stranger isn’t easy. This shows the power of storytelling and writing where honesty is prized above comfort which make the best stories to me.

Also recommended from my summer reading hustle is City of Girls by Elizabeth Gilbert, it is giant but worth it!, and You Deserve the Truth by Erica Williams Simon for anyone who wants to change their story and her narration makes it even better! I never thought I would be an audiobook person but having the authors narrate their books makes it so much better with extra points if they have a soothing or interesting voice.