Sarah M. Wells had one degree in mind when she went off to college: to secure her Mrs. and become a stay-at-home mom. Ten years later, life does not look the way she expected. Instead of staying home, she’s the primary breadwinner while her husband raises their kids. Together, they’ve weathered miscarriages, job changes, role reversals, community shifts, family vacations, and even youth league recreational soccer. Now, in the midst of their tenth year of marriage, temptations saunter in and threaten to shake everything they’ve built together to the ground. In American Honey, Wells digs in deep to uncover the foundation of what made her and what it is that will help sustain her relationships. What keeps a marriage together? Could it fall apart? Through intimate details, vulnerability, humor, and love, Wells explores the depths of mercy and faith it’s going to take to weather the storms of married life.
Read “I Take to Drinking,” and excerpt from American Honey, on Salon.com.
“Sarah Wells writes with absolute beauty and unusual clarity about matters of faith, human yearning, and the complexity of marriage. American Honey is a rare memoir, filled with gentle humor, pain, intimacy, honesty, and the occasional bison. A lovely and loving book by a talented writer.”
Dinty W. Moore, author of The Mindful Writer, Between Panic & Desire, and To Hell With It, among other books, and editor of Brevity Magazine
“In a world fissured by division—in faith, in families, in politics—Sarah Wells offers an alternative: American Honey, a debut memoir that invites us to gather around the pool table, sticks and drinks in hand, and have a real conversation about the wounds we carry, the desires we feed, the work we show up for, the temptations we resist, and mostly, the humans we love—day after lucky day.”
Jill Christman, author of Darkroom: A Family Exposure and editor of River Teeth: A Journal of Nonfiction Narrative
“Sarah Wells brings a unique perspective to the domestic essay. American Honey radiates an honesty, candor, and vulnerability I find not just compelling but refreshingly rare.”
Robert Atwan, series editor of The Best American Essays
American Honey: A Field Guide to Resisting Temptation
ISBN: 978-1-6667-3365-5
Pages: 180
Publication Date: November 2021
Resource Publications, an Imprint of Wipf & Stock
Media, Reviews, and Articles about American Honey
- Reviewed by Dorothy Rice, “Finding Common Ground,” on Literary Mama, May 19, 2023
- Reviewed by Jessie van Eerden, “A Life, A Marriage, A Family—Intentionally Chosen,” on River Teeth, June 14, 2022
- A Fake Ring, Real Temptation, and a Golden Marriage on Our American Stories, April 13, 2022
- A Field Guide to Resisting Temptation, Episode 170 on the Crappy Christian Podcast, March 30, 2022
- Featured Paragraph of the Week, The Humble Essayist, March 11, 2022
- Review at Hippocampus Magazine, January 11, 2022
- The Memoir Cafe #13: Sarah M. Wells on Marriage, Memoir & Temptation, December 20, 2021
- “Reasons to Hope: Because Love Is Patient”, Root & Vine News, December 13, 2021
- IG Live with Kate Tucker on Reasons to Hope, Root & Vine News, December 13, 2021
- “I Take to Drinking” excerpt from American Honey published on Salon.com, December 11, 2021
Sarah Marie Wells 