In Brutalities: A Love Story, the debut memoir by Margo Steines, the author punishes herself continuously for her mistakes, laying bare her flaws and exposing the consequences of them, despite her near-constant hypervigilance. “Lazy, lazy, lazy,” writes Steines in a chapter on exercise addiction. “I heard this chorus in my head at most times of the day if I tuned in to that channel, breaking through the static to catch it like you can catch good college radio stations in between the dials, hidden between alt-country and the Jesus station, just peeking through.”
There are many profound takeaways from this memoir, a braided tale of past and present that spans Steines’ days as a professional dominatrix, a homestead farmer, a welder, an MMA fighter, and an expectant mother—each page a measurement of the author’s ability to withstand force, pain, and change. It’s one hell of a read, and well worth every page.
Image Via W.W. Norton & Company
