I feel I owe any potential readers of this review two disclaimers: 1) I’m recently (heterosexually) married 2) I’m a pretty emotional softy who loves a real-life story with a happy ending. And with that out of the way, here’s the basic thing you should know about this book: it’s awesome! I absolutely loved it. This 400-page new Seal Press anthology edited by Audrey Bilger and Michele Kort is a veritable page-turner, which includes essays, as well as poems, comic strips and pictures. I had real trouble putting the thing down and had “something in my eye” on more than one occasion.

The book is what the title claims it will be – reflections on lesbian love and marriage – and more. Between the covers are dozens of stories of real women, real drama, real love and real sadness. It gripped my heart and made me think seriously about some of the issues concerning marriage equality, which I have never given much thought before. This book is more than just love stories with a happy ending – there are also stories of divorce and essays by women who do not want to get married to their life partners. For the first time, I seriously considered the arguments of LGBTQ activists who claim marriage equality is a “political red herring” which draws attention away from other important issues such as health and immigration. It made me think about what marriage actually really means to me, and what a privilege it was to get married so easily in a pretty homophobic country.
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