Three Women

Without the sparkle of Animal, but just as well written. Reading Taddeo is like being dragged into a dark hole, exploring the rawest parts of the female experience with a rare, non-judgemental clarity… not romanticised, but so beautiful.

2.5/5. Triggering w/ no satisfying resolutions.

It only took me so long because I didn't want it to ever end. Thank you Lisa Taddeo for your service. Forever indebted.

I didn’t like the book. I just finished it because I wanted to know what happened in Maggie’s story. The other two didn’t get my interest. This book talks about the “sex” life of three women. “Sex” because one of them I don’t consider it her sexual drive. She was groomed by her teacher. Also, the three women are almost all from the same backgrounds. There’s not much difference between them. With a little exception on Maggie’s side.

Reread. Just as impactful second time around

not sure if it’s because of my age and life experiences but the only narrative i found particularly compelling/moving was maggie’s. huge respect for the amount for the work that went into this in terms of speaking to so many women for such a long time, but it just didn’t live up to the hype for me

2.5

Surprised by how divided the crowd is over this one because I have to say I thought it was pretty spectacular. So much sex! But also some really insightful moments about men and women and relationships and love (or lack of) and it just spoke to me sometimes in unexpected ways. Definitely recommend as a quick, addictive read — I absolutely raced through this!

I thought this was a really powerful book, telling different tales of three women. Although I found the topics important and interesting, I struggled with the writing and delivery of the book. Feel like there’s some areas that could have been developed more.

Coming to it without any prior knowledge, I didn’t know I was signing up for a lot of harlequin-esque sex tales. Yes, it was a page-turner and objectively well written one. Some women will find familiar stories here. But what it lacks is any deeper analysis of desire, especially in an intersectional manner.

juicy and compelling portrait of three women's sex lives ✨️

This book was not what I was expecting at all. Where I expected a deep discussion and analysis of female desire by examining 3 individual women, I got intimate and personal diary entries of sexual events and feelings relayed by the author. I can’t say that I disliked the book but it didn’t captivate or engage me the way I was hoping. I did thoroughly enjoy Sloan’s parts of the book as I felt they were the closest to an honest, introspective look into female desire that I was expecting. Her story showed that a woman’s desire is often equated with accommodation of male desire instead of a true celebration of her own sexuality. Her story was complex and raw and so self-aware. I truly enjoyed it and would recommend this book on her section alone. I did feel the epilogue had some redemption as it collected some overall thoughts on desire and the female experience based on the three women’s stories, but overall, I was a bit disappointed. It didn’t quite live up to the anticipation I had built up.

I couldn’t put this down, this book is raw, beautiful, layered and covers so many aspects of the complexity of being a woman and women’s sexuality. Thanks to the women for sharing their stories. What a powerful voice brings them together through Lisa Taddeo.

This book was well written and you can tell the author did in fact spend nearly a decade with these women by the way she describes their inner thoughts and feelings. All three women have complex stories and I felt for them all. However, there didn’t seem to be a real point to this book. I felt disappointed at the end of all 3 women’s stories as there was nothing to wrap it up with.... no moral of the story, no broad statement regarding female desire. Just felt unfinished.

This book feels important because it looks at women and sex and their relationship to it in a way that is rarely done in books, fiction or otherwise. But I didn't enjoy the experience of reading it, or take anything away beyond just the reinforcement that women at sexual beings and that there's often a double standard that doesn't allow us to acknowledge that.

If I could give it more stars I would. A stunning representation of women and their complexity. I shared sadness, joy, anger and love for all of our experiences and deep gratitude for Lisa Taddeo bringing some of the beautiful nuances of female experience into the light.

3.75 Similar to the other reviews, this book doesn't quite hit the mark as a time series study discussing the desires of women across the United States. Based on the title of the book, it's obvious that the sample size was small, 3 to be exact.. so I was expecting more of a case study type read, but that's not really the case either. So if you're going in expecting any sort of real research or analyses, you will be quite disappointed. BUT If you can let those ideas go out the window and read it for what it is, which is a juicy non-fic novelization of 3 women's sex lives, then the book is so much more enjoyable. I love some good goss and drama so I was enthralled in reading about the details and emotions of these 3 women's sex lives. I think it also paints a good picture on the power dynamic of some heterosexual sexual relationships and the effects they have on the non dominant partners.

I thought this book was really good. More graphic than I could have imagined but it wasn’t so overwhelming I couldn’t enjoy the book. The ending was a little underwhelming but I guess that’s real life?

I really enjoyed three women because it explored the sexuality of three individual women and their lives. This book showed women in their sexuality and all their flaws. Lisa did well with this book. She followed these women through their lives for a few years and wrote about them, their desires, their pain, happiness, etc. The writing does get me because of the weird analogies and puns that just do not make sense. I also hate flipping back and forth between character, but that’s just a preference. I included trigger warnings at the bottom because this does cover dark topics and how that affected these women’s sexualities and their desires. It also does not wait until the middle or end. The prologue its self is a disgusting topic. I was not quite prepared for it, so if you can not handle any of those topics, skip. I was fascinated throughout the book by how vulnerable and flawed the women were, they spoke their truth. I felt bad for them because they felt trapped and encased in a world of misogyny. Certain chapters angered me for Maggie and I wanted to scream for her. She got involved with her teacher and thought she loved him. She went through everything to try and claim the truth and she was slut-shaming, called ugly and a liar. The Narrator in the audiobook also wasn’t great for her character. I felt the pitch was just way too high. Lina, I felt awful for, but at the same time, I hate cheating. If you want to leave, leave but do not cheat. At the same time though she was so starved for the basic need we want, to feel loved and to kiss your spouse. My only issue is I felt like she was cutting her self short for the affair with a married man. She could have done so much better and found someone who would cherish her and love her the way she needed. Sloane was an eye-opener for me honestly. I’ve always heard of Men being turned on by letting their wives have sex with other men in front of them. I really felt bad because to me she felt like she loved her husband but was also trapped because all she wanted was him. Her story was just heartbreaking to me, they all were though. All of these women were being used by men whenever they called. Both Maggie and Lina just wanted to be loved and were there for married men at there every call and need. Sloane was being used as sex object for her husbands pleasure. These women were being used by these men and controlled. These men made it feel like these women are beneath them and it didn’t matter how they felt or how it affected their lives. Overall this is four stars for me. What killed it was the analogies that do not make sense and the fact that this is eight years of research. I felt like there just should have been more for being eight years worth. Trigger Warnings - Rape, Talks of Suicide,
 Slut Shaming, Statutory Rape, 
 Fat Shaming, Anorexia, Graphic Sex

Three Women follows the accounts of three women's very different sexual experiences.

The writing of this book is almost story-telling in the way I had to keep reminding myself it was a non-fiction and these experiences actually happened to these women. The writing is direct and raw, and as it carried the accounts forward, you cannot help but feel as these women do, even if your experiences are nothing like the ones being portrayed.

I went into this book expecting it to be an account of women nurturing their own sexual desires. However, it is more retelling how these women had no control over their desires as they were fully under the influence of males in their life, which left me with a feeling I can't quite describe.

DNF. I’m so upset because I wanted so badly for this book to blow me away. First off, I’m really not a non-fiction reader, but I figured I would branch out and try it with such an interesting topic. Recently I read an interview with the author, and Three Women sounded so intriguing and I was instantly attracted to it. I paid some absurd amount of money to attain my copy, and I didn’t even finish it. The Good • I hate to be so negative, but not much The Bad • POV switches- I know it was kind of the premise of the book to switch between POV, but I found it a little hard to keep up with the different switches • Character building- I may have felt sympathy for some of the characters, but I really didn’t like any of them and it’s hard for me to keep going with a book and not like a single character Overall, I’m really disappointed with the book as a whole. I DNF it at around 80 pages after trying for 2 months.

ah i finally got to finish it but i am also a little bummed bc i could have gone on and on

It's been really hard for me to accept that this is a work of non-fiction. Everything about this book deserves a 5/5 rating, except for the heaviness that rained on me. I think the writing is spectacular, and I think these women's stories are told so wonderfully -- including the lack of bias that a work of fiction might have. This book didn't portray 'perfect' or flawless women that didn't see themselves as such; it portrayed normal women in normal society and the struggles that shape us and our sexualities. Please keep in mind that this book does deal with heavy topics, and while I loved the book I cannot suggest it without reading up on trigger warnings before you commit to it.

It was a really good book, I just wish their stories were separate. I didnt like the fact that we jumped from on person to the other each chapter, it got me confused at some points. But I still really enjoyed. :)