Many Love is an illustrated memoir of Johnson’s experiences with love writ-large (including family and friendships) and how exploring polyamory has shaped her views and made her who she is beyond just her sex/dating life. I think it’s just as much about friendship as it is about romance. Johnson is bisexual, and while other memoirs I’ve read (such as TSR/TSB) are written by non-monogamous people, I chose this book for my list because it’s really ~about~ that set of identity and relationship issues.
I really enjoyed it and read it in only two nights. Interspersed throughout Johnson’s memories are also many citations of interviews, data, and other external sources that have informed her understandings, that she includes for the benefit of her readers too. She includes several helpful hand-drawn charts of different terminology, even gender and sexuality words not directly related to the content of the book.
In the beginning, she acknowledges that she is a cisgender bisexual white woman, and isn’t that a perspective that’s fairly well represented as far as LGBTQ memoirs go? Her response to this is to include one such chart that represents information that others she spoke to (particularly trans people, I think) asked her to include for her readers’ edification. This is where she explains things like cis, trans, genderqueer, nonbinary, etc. I think this and the citations to other perspectives are good things to do, but I don’t feel like they fully answer the recurring question of memoirs.
On the one hand, everyone should be allowed to share their experiences! And with memoir, you only have the perspective that is yours. On the other hand, as Juliet Jacques discusses at length in her own book, the publishing markets aren’t infinite. Only so many writers get contracts, and while anyone can self-publish, there are lots and lots of benefits — both writerly and financially— to having a contract.
However, I don’t think Many Love is self-indulgent, even though it is about her self. Each chapter has a very clear broader message that she wants to discuss and impart to her readers via telling about her own experiences. Particularly: how a very close friend who you are not dating or having sex with can still be your Significant Other that you primarily structure your life around, the role of jealousy and how to deal with it with a loved one, etc.
I have already lent my copy to friends.
It’s been awhile since I read a book that is for adult audiences, primarily text, but also illustrated. I think there should be more books like that. The last one I read was To Timbuktu, which was also a memoir, this one co-written by a couple (one who is a writer and one who is an artist).