Title: Call Me Mary: And Do Call
Author: Evelyn Cole
Publisher: Westwood Books Publishing, LLC
ISBN: 978-1643611730
Pages: 220
Genre: Non-fiction / Memoir
Reviewed by: Christina Avina
Hollywood Book Reviews
If most of us were to put pen to paper to chronicle our lives I can’t imagine it would be fundamentally gripping. The same cannot be said about the main character in Evelyn Cole’s “Call Me Mary: And Do Call.” This is a fictional, page-turning account of sex addiction and the effects it has on the central character’s life.
The center of this memoir revolves around Mary, a woman plagued by a compulsion toward meaningless sexual encounters throughout her life. This leads her to have strained personal and professional relationships and an inability to truly know how to feel love. It also chronicles emotional family dynamics that many of us can relate to in our own lives. The author takes us through Mary’s life from childhood when she has a very early sexual awakening, through her turbulent teen years and young adulthood where we see the seeds of her addiction fully take hold. She suffers some big losses in her life and struggles to know how to mourn. It is clear by the end of the book that Mary has always had a story to tell and it is a story worth telling.
I wasn’t sure what to expect when I started this memoir after reading the first paragraph. Without giving too much away, the author does a great job of writing without pulling any punches here. She tells her story about a lifelong battle with sex addiction more openly and honestly than one could imagine. What stands out most is seeing the lasting affect sex addiction can have in one person’s life, and how it can effectively unravel everything around you without you realizing it. Author Evelyn Cole is adept of taking us through the decades of Mary’s life and ties in major world events along the way from World War II to the Vietnam war, as well of the assassination of JFK. We feel part of the story as a result of these references and it humanizes Mary for the reader.
Evelyn Cole has written a compelling memoir with ‘Call Me Mary: And Do Call.” I didn’t expect it to be the page-turner it turned out to be but was pleasantly surprised by the strong writing and no holds barred storytelling. The subject matter is not easy to take in but is definitely worth the read.