Three Martini Afternoons at the Ritz - Book Review

 

Three Martini Afternoons at the Ritz: The Rebellion of Sylvia Plath & Anne Sexton by Gail Crowther
Publication date: April 20, 2021
Pages: 304 pages
Rating: 3 out of 5 stars ☆☆☆
Strengths: Interesting subjects
Weaknesses: Not a lot of overlap (thought it would include more of their interactions)

I admittedly didn't know much about Sylvia Plath or Anne Sexton other than who they were (female poets who later committed suicide). I certainly had not contemplated them as contemporaries or especially drinking buddies. I thought the premise that a class they took together left them to hanging out regularly after class, probably sharing similarities in their lives and their struggles was intriguing.

While the parallel descriptions of their younger lives, their courtships and marriages, motherhood, their careers, and their deaths were a great way to set up the book, I was a bit disappointed that the descriptions of their interactions were primarily just possible imaginings of how they may have related to each other. I also thought I read that someone really liked the photo section,  but my NetGalley copy didn't have that. I hit Google up to fill in the gaps in my imagination the morning after I finished reading it.

Overall, I liked reading about these two fascinating women, but putting them both in the same book seemed distracting. I did get what feels like a solid overview of both though, and I'd give Three Martini Afternoons at the Ritz 3 out of 5 stars.

Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for my copy of this book on my Kindle. Receiving the book for free did not influence my review.