John Irving, Family Life at 158 ​​Pounds

Irving focuses on the complex, tangled relationships of two married couples. It is in relationships with loved ones that a person truly reveals themselves. Past wounds, fears, and self-doubt—things that are successfully concealed behind a mask of outward well-being in public—are laid bare in family life. There's no need—or even possible—to hide them here.
Irving's characters undertake bold sexual experiments. But, of course, they are driven not only—and not primarily—by a thirst for intense erotic sensations.