Book Review: WITHOUT CONSENT by Sarah Weinman

WITHOUT CONSENT: A LANDMARK TRIAL AND THE DECADES-LONG STRUGGLE TO MAKE SPOUSAL RAPE A CRIME by Sarah Weinman (Ecco, November 11, 2025) Paperback, 320 pages. ISBN #9780063480766

Synopsis on the Goodreads website . . . . .

From Sarah Weinman, author of Scoundrel and The Real Lolita, comes an eye-opening story about the first major spousal rape trial in America and urgent questions about women’s rights that would reverberate for decades.

In 1978, Greta Rideout was the first woman in United States history to accuse her husband of rape, at a time when the idea of “marital rape” seemed ludicrous to many Americans and was a crime in only four states. After a quick and conservative trial acquitted John Rideout and a defense lawyer lambasted that “maybe rape is the risk of being married,” Greta was ridiculed and scorned from public life, while John went on to be a repeat offender. Thrust into the national spotlight, Greta and her story would become a national sensation, a symbol of a country’s unrelenting and targeted hate toward women and a court system designed to fail them at every turn.

A now little-remembered trial deserving of close, wide, and lasting attention, Sarah Weinman turns her signature intelligence and journalistic rigor to the enduring impact of this case. Oregon v. Rideout directly inspired feminist activists, who fought state by state for marital rape laws, a battle that was not won in all fifty until as recently as 1993. Mixing archival research and new reporting involving Greta, those who successfully pressed charges against John in later years, as well as the activists battling the courts in parallel, Without Consent embodies vociferous debates about gender, sexuality, and power, while highlighting the damaging and inherent misogyny of American culture then and still now.

My Five-Star Review on the Goodreads website . . . . .

A compelling read about an important and too-long overlooked issue: marital rape. Weinman does an admirable job of investigation, detailing the long struggle to have courts designate this a crime.

With excerpts from news accounts as well as interviews, Weinman shows how progress was finally made with some landmark court decisions, and highlights how much work still needs to be done.

She devotes chapters to the decisive (and sometimes undecisive) court cases, most notably the multiple hearings regarding Greta and John Rideout, as well as the Bobbitt case. 

Spotlighted are general long-held beliefs that wives are property and thus husbands can't be convicted of raping their wives. Consent is always assumed. It took an especially long time to change public and judicial opinion on this matter, and Weinman also designates the trailblazers for marital rights, including Laura X and others.

What disgusted me and seems obvious is how despicable a person John Rideout is, and how he was able to evade conviction across several decades. 

One of the better true crime books I have recently read. I received a copy through a Goodreads giveaway. Thanks to the author and publisher for an advanced review copy, without obligation. My review is completely voluntary.