Reviews

The State of Affairs by Esther Perel

brunadrv's review against another edition

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informative reflective slow-paced

3.0

The author brings interesting ideas, but she spends too much time on detailing patient’s lives and sessions with them, and repeats concepts many times. This book could’ve been 50% shorter with a little more thoughtful editing.

vacantbones's review against another edition

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5.0

i first stumbled upon the work of Esther Perel as a young college student, deep in the trenches of human sexuality studies. her work was revelatory for me. in the time since (and boy does that clock keep ticking) my own ideas about sexuality and what i want in life have kept on swinging like a pendulum. even with the seasons of my own life coming and going, changing and shifting as i continue to grow, Perel's writing has continued to speak to me. as a brief example: while Perel's framing of polyamory worked more for me as a younger adult than it does now, i still read what she has to say with full interest.

this one, admittedly, also challenged some of my preconceived ideals regarding infidelity all while soothing my need to read about other people's mess.

wish i would've read this one sooner!

bluepeng04's review against another edition

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challenging emotional informative fast-paced

4.5

sarina_z's review against another edition

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5.0

Fascinating and interesting to read about our expectations of relationships

mirindashi's review against another edition

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3.0

3.25

tobyw's review against another edition

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3.5

Interesting stories and observations, but the book could have been significantly shorter without losing the content. When I finished it, I just felt glad to be done with it.

grace_ann's review against another edition

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5.0

Perel fearlessly breaches the foreign but familiar, too close to home topic of infidelity and has given us an invaluable resource and tool for our relationships.

peachyytyy's review against another edition

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informative slow-paced

4.5

yashoda1's review against another edition

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4.0

Intriguing perspective on the equity of gender roles in infidelity. I guess I never thought about what compels someone to cheat on their lover and the book reveals multiple psychological factors on the question of why, which were quite fun to ponder on. Esther is excellent at storytelling- nonfiction sometimes leaves me with only a few takeaways and not an interconnected set of messages so it was refreshing to read this book and experience the latter. All the anecdotes and cases were very amusing.

ktns12's review against another edition

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challenging hopeful informative medium-paced

4.75