This is a pop-science self help book on long-term sexual partnerships. If neither of those categories are non-starters for you, then you might have something here.

This is the second book I've read from Nagoski, the first being "Come as You Are." Apparently she and her sister wrote a book in between that I don't know much about called "Burnout."

Regardless of the content of the book, if you're picking up a book of this size on the subject of long-term sexual partnerships, then it demonstrates a commitment to inquiry, so regardless of whether or not you get anything out of the book, at least you're spending ten or twenty hours musing over the subject as you turn the pages.

There is a paradox is the book (which isn't inherently a bad thing): on the one hand, Nagoski unequivocally proclaims her support of self non-judgementalness in the first half of the book; "there is no normal," or "you are normal, no matter what you are," are two common refrains. The second half of the book then moves into an unequivocal takedown of gender norms, condemning and shaming those that identify with them. This may not come across well to those that identify with aspects of gender norms, as Nagoski, as an external authority, is telling the reader what they should think, as opposed to asking reflective questions that evoke self-reflection on the part of the reader. If we combine these two segments of the book, we might come away with a message like, "you are normal, but if there are ways in which your normality overlaps with societal norms around gender, that is a problem." In other words, part one of the book is focused on a developmental process of self-observation, and part two of the book takes on an expert paradigm where the reader should accept the authors words as rote.

One of the primary frameworks Nagoski employs in the book is that of the "emotional floorplan." This analogy takes a two-dimensional spacial configuration (an architecture schematic) and imposes it on the connectivity between our emotional spaces. Coming from the world of automatic energy, where people have little or no ability to shift their internal state, it tells them, "what is the probability I could move from an emotional state of, for example, upset to one of arousal?" This is useful information to know, and in some ways this reminds me of the "Blueprint of We/State of Grace" framework's approach of "Questions to Return to Peace." On the other hand, when we take a metaphor that comes with fabricated constraints (such as the fact that on a floor plan, you can't move from one end of a space to the other without crossing spaces in-between), self-sabotage can be the result. As a child, my father introduced me to the spiritual belief that we can have the ability to influence our emotional and energetic state. For example, when we're upset, we can ask ourselves the question, "do I still want to be upset right now; what is this state doing for me?" Sometimes the answer to this question is yes. Sometimes this questions might have us realize that what we really need is a hug, or to go running barefoot in the woods, or to lie down in the cold rain and let the droplets wash over us. In actuality, humans have the potential to move between any two energetic states; unfortunately, the metaphor of an "emotional floorplan" inhibits rather than enlivens this possibility.

There is one bright spot in the book for those interested in phenomenology and the numinous—towards the end, there is a brief segment on "magic and the field of self." This part is about practices associated with accessing higher levels of consciousness, and might be a transcendent elevator for those of us stuck in the cartesian coordinates of our emotional floorplan. Why is this chapter an afterthought rather than the core of the book? Maybe Nagoski feels this intuitive approach is too "woo woo" and wouldn't sell. Maybe we should ask her publisher. Maybe we'll need to wait for her fourth book.

Despite the hypocrisy and static/dead frameworks of the book, if you're taking the time with your partner to discern about your relationship together, good things will come. But in that case, you might not need this book to guide you. ( )