The best books on monogamy

When I first went to Burning Man in 2004 I met some wonderful friends committed to Polyamory.

As I was in the middle of my own sexual journey I found their lives a real challenge to old ideas around monogamy. They recommended The Ethical Slut and I read it avidly – it seemed to open up a whole new way of loving, of living, and of self-acceptance. It’s now widely considered a classic, and this 20th Anniversary edition updates with particular emphasis on issues around consent.

If you are curious, dive in!

When I first came out – at 45! – this book became the whisper on every new gay friend’s lips – you must read this. You may not agree with it all, but please read.

Alan Downs explores the impact of growing up and surviving as a gay man in a society – he examines why we are both massive over-achievers in career and status, whilst simultaneously massively indulging in a hedonistic lifestyle that can be destructive. He’s particularly good at skewering issues around shame and anger, and the importance of primary relationships, for example with our Fathers.

I believe this book – a quick, vital read – can inform so much debate about self-acceptance and be genuinely empowering.

This one should be required reading for anyone with even a passing interest in non-traditional relationships. Therapist Jessica Fern clearly and thoroughly explains attachment theory—the idea that the way in which we form attachments to our parents in early life fundamentally influences our adult relationships. Whatever your relationship practice, even this part of the book alone can help clarify so much about what makes you feel secure or insecure in your romantic relationships. Fern goes on to explain how these foundation principles of attachment intersect with non-monogamy, jealousy, and trauma, as well as offering her unique HEARTS model for building secure attachment. I absolutely loved the practical and actionable HEARTS model—it’s worth the price of the book alone! 

This book offers a thorough analysis of monogamy in a variety of animals, including people.

It demonstrates biological justifications for why monogamy is a dynamic balance brought about by the conflict of interests between males and females with wry humor and excellent prose. This book is a must-read for everyone interested in the behavior and evolution of the mating system.

It is important for books that challenge established ideas in the popular science space to be fun, and Sex at Dawn has that nailed.

A fascinating tour through anthropological research, sociological conspiracy, and biological reality leads to the inescapable yet intuitive conclusion that monogamy, as a social institution, is at odds with basic facts about human behavior, and the effort that legal, religious, and other systems put into enforcing it is precisely because it is not something most humans can easily do on their own.

Sex at Dawn’s scientific rigor is questionable, but its conclusions hold and its style is unbeatable.

Because modern romance promises it all – togetherness, intimacy, and erotic desire for life, it makes it hard to want what apparently you already have. Security and adventure are incompatible, aren’t they?

Reading this book you can discover ways to reconcile the erotic and domestic. Esther Perel challenges our old habits and invites us to reinvent ourselves as mysterious, distant, maybe even uncertain. And that’s how to keep the candle of lust alive. 

Full of brilliant insights and perhaps a counterargument to The Ethical Slut.

The Ethical Slut is an evocatively titled primer on polyamory as a relationship model.

It is intentionally written as an introductory resource that is very enthusiastic about the possibilities it presents, which is useful in a space that often feels it must make constant apologies for existing or is full of higher-level works about niche sub-topics.

It addresses key topics such as consent, communication, concerns about raising a family, and more. Older editions suffer from ill-considered language around transgender people that feels dated at best, but more recent editions have been updated to reflect changing demographics and be more considerate to this and other minorities. 

Pearsall’s book is the sort that leaves a reader entertained, deeply informed, and unable to see the past the same way again. Polygamy, she shows, was at the center of the social and political systems of many Indigenous nations. As European soldiers and settlers attempted to trade with—or dominate—the people of these nations, they provoked violent reprisals. Opposition to monogamy drove Indigenous resistance movements. Europeans increasingly argued that their monogamous practices made them racially and religiously superior to the people they subordinated. The centrality of metaphors about monogamy and polygamy to American revolutionary political ideas is one of the book’s most enlightening—and entertaining—contributions in a book rich with surprises.

This is a brand-new Rowman and Littlefield book by Glen Olson and Terry Lee Brussel-Rogers, fresh off the presses in December 2022: Fifty Years of Polyamory in America: A Guided Tour of a Growing Movement. Both Olson and Brussel-Rogers have been involved in the polyamory movement for nearly half a century, and have been founding members of some of the pivotal polyamory organizations throughout the decades. They know this history both personally and politically, and know most of the key players and have interviewed them extensively for the book. 

Even though I have been involved in the polyamory community and movement for decades, I learned so much from this book! This is not a dry history book; it’s a very fascinating and lively read! The book chronicles the evolution of polyamorous philosophy and ideas, as well as the organizational development involved in taking this lifestyle from a very discreet experience… show more.

Mitra’s book centers on the colonial period in India, when European scholars, British officials, and Indian intellectuals, focused on sexuality, specifically the figure of the prostitute, in order to study and to understand the place of women in modern Indian society.

The specter of deviant female sexuality structured fiction and intellectual thought on topics ranging from caste domination to trafficking, to widowhood and inheritance, to abortion and infanticide.

Indian Sex Life compellingly illustrates the importance of female deviance in the imagination of scholars and writers, and how they used their ideas about women’s sexuality to solidify rigid gender ideals—and to blame women for the failures of modern society. Mitra’s accounting of this history is richly drawn and hard to put down.

I loved this book for its humanity and the language she used to pithily emphasize characters and situations. There was not an excess word employed. She compassionately realized every character and gave them wisdom, angst, and a tragic sense of loss. I found it utterly absorbing and have reread it several times.

This is quite possibly the funniest book I have ever read. I recommend it for that reason. It will have you laughing out loud. Brooks gives Chaucer’s larger-than-life, serial monogamist an opportunity to tell her side of the story. And fair enough! Created by Geoffrey Chaucer for The Canterbury Tales in 1392, the Wife of Bath is literature’s first feminist hero. The outspoken and exuberant Alyson (the wife’s real name) suffers immeasurably—physically, emotionally, and financially—at the hands of the men she chooses to marry, yet she never loses her self-respect and humour. Likewise, she is never broken, despite her husbands' best efforts to tame her.

Two Monogamous is the introduction to my first romantic suspense series the (Two Monogamous series).

It questions monogamy when Jarrah unknowingly falls in love with twin brothers, Dario and Dustin. One of the twins offers her romance, mental stimulation, and security, while the other offers her sensuality, adventure, and spontaneity. The two of them work together to be the perfect man for her.

This novel opened my mind to polyamory and made me question whether twins could share each other’s emotions, thus falling in love with the same person. I wrote this series to tackle issues that make relationships difficult. However, I demonstrate how creating a community can make relationships easier.

Check out the Two Monogamous series to explore poly relationships through a group of relatable characters.

Part manifesto, part archive of a fascinating and alluring sub-culture, Geoff Mains's book explores the possibilities of extreme encounters through pain/pleasure, BDSM, and role play in the leather community.

It’s not sensationalist although it examines ideas around sensation. It celebrates performance whilst honoring intimacy. It’s a book that would offer a reader of every sexuality an insight into some of their own fantasies and how to access them safely, and meaningfully.

I read it like I would read an exhaustive and tempting menu – picking out items I might like to taste myself and learning a great deal in the process. 

I absolutely love this book. The message within about finding yourself, despite all that is going on around you, or your current circumstances really resonates with me. Where you start doesn’t have to be where you finish. It’s a book that I could read repeatedly.

This novel is like my novel in the fact that her characters also overcome many obstacles to find their way in life. They had to learn to be strong in the face of adversity. If you are someone who likes a book that shows you women finding their way amid chaos it’s a must read.

Neil Strauss is a master storyteller and his book, The Truth, is a captivating follow-up to his controversial best-seller, The Game. In this candid memoir, Strauss takes readers on an emotional journey as he attempts to answer the question of whether monogamy is really for him.

The book begins with Strauss in rehab for sex addiction, a result of the success of his previous book and the world it threw him into. From there, he embarks on a relationship odyssey that leads him into all kinds of experiences from tantra cults to swinger’s clubs and beyond. His humorous and honest writing style had me laughing out loud at times as I read it at the airport and I deeply admire his vulnerability in bearing all.

The Truth is a fun and insightful exploration into relationships and commitment that will leave readers questioning their own beliefs about love and monogamy.… show more.