The title of the book is slightly misleading, as it’s more of a discussion of celibacy and the varying levels of sexual intimacy in lesbian relationships, rather than a text that highlights the existence of asexual lesbians and their relationships. I would’ve really appreciated a book about the latter, but I somewhat enjoyed reading lesbian theory from the early 90s when terms like asexual, aromantic, platonic soulmates, and queerplatonic weren’t passed around as frequently as they are now.  

I will say, for a book that ends with a comment about maybe deprioritizing the importance of sex to define “legitimate” lesbian relationships, this book spends a lot of time despairing at being engaged with a person romantically when there is a lack of sexual intimacy. And, even more so, there is a tone of surprise at the notion that two women can be involved and connected with each other so deeply even when there is no romance or sex involved at all. 

Although I can appreciate the desire to find vocabulary (in English) that accurately defines the various complex relationships that lesbians find themselves living in, I think that intersectionality regarding queer identities on the asexual and aromantic spectrum would be beneficial to the thoughts outlined in this book. I also think deeper research into other non-white platonic and familial structures would help, as there are often words and dynamics that exist in other cultures that white folks don’t know anything about.

I didn’t mean for this to write out so formally, but here we are I guess. I hope that made sense.