Best Sex Writing 2013: The State of Today's Sexual Culture (4/16/2013)
Edited by Rachel Kramer Bussel
Each year renowned sex writer, Rachel Kramer Bussel, compiles the most provocative, challenging, and serious essays on sex. This literary and entertaining volume serves as a sexual almanac, mapping the ever changing topography of America's sensual landscape. This year's essays were curated by Dr. Carol Queen.
[jump]What Do Women Want?: Adventures in the Science of Female Desire (6/4/2013)
by Daniel Bergner
After synthesizing the latest research on female desire, as well as culling through interviews with scientists, sexologists, psychologists, and everyday women, Bergner created a collage of female sexuality that stands in contrast to the image most of us have of the "fairer sex." In particularly his model defies the notion that women are built for lifelong monogamy and that they are less sexual than men.
Night Terrors: Sex, Dating, Puberty, and Other Alarming Things (7/2/2013)
by Ashley Cardiff
This misanthropic collection of essays on “Sex, Dating, Puberty, and Other Alarming Things,” follows Cardiff’s growth as an awkward, sexual being in a culture that is still coming to terms with its sexual identity. Her stories include her first sex dream of Prince chasing her on a tricycle, being kicked out of Catechism class for “drawing pictures of Satan and the angel Gabriel sword fighting with their huge penises,” accidentally viewing her cousin’s sex tape, surviving “the time-honored teenage girl stage of dressing like a midrange escort,” trying to learn something as a 16-year-old at a community college study-session/orgy, fending off sexual advances with a glove-compartment dildo, and finding photos of her live-in boyfriend’s penis advertised online.
Plays Well in Groups: A Journey Through the World of Group Sex (5/16/2013)
by Katherine Frank
This book provides an overview of this subversive form of sexuality and its ever changing role in our societies. Frank reexamines the historical examples of group sex, from tribal religious rituals to the sex cults of ancient Rome. These are compared with modern day expressions of group sex that occur in bathhouses, BDSM and swinger parties, Craigslist casual encounters, and Tantra classes. Along the way, Frank discovers a diversity of reasons for participating in group sex, from sexual gratification to spiritual transcendence.
Masters of Sex: The Life and Times of William Masters and Virginia Johnson, the Couple Who Taught America How to Love (7/30/2013)
by Thomas Maier
Showtime's series, Masters of Sex, has reignited America's interest in this pioneering pair of sex researchers, William Masters and Virginia Johnson. The story of this couple's own relationship is set against the background of their groundbreaking research on sex and intimacy.
Testo Junkie: Sex, Drugs, and Biopolitics in the Pharmacopornographic Era (9/17/2013)
by Beatriz Preciado
Synthetic hormones have reshaped our lives in ways we have yet to fully comprehend since their introduction in the 1950s. In turn, these synthetic drugs have shed light on how important hormones are in creating our self-identities. Preciado pairs an analysis of how the pharmaceutical industry is shaping our gender and our desires with a personal account of how taking testosterone every day for a year impacted her body and mind.
Mating Intelligence Unleashed: The Role of the Mind in Sex, Dating, and Love(12/17/2013)
By Glenn Geher PhD., Scott Barry Kaufman PhD., Helen Fisher PhD. (foreword)
Mating Intelligence refers to the complex mating strategies that have arisen in our species as evolutionary tools to help propagate our species. This book demonstrates how we use a range of tricks, from creative pick-up attempts, to displaying aspects of our personality, to seduce potential mates.
Why Men Fake It: The Totally Unexpected Truth About Men and Sex (4/16/2013)
by Abraham Morgentaler
Harvard Professor, Abraham Morgentaler, invites readers into his office, giving them a candid look at the types of problems men come to him with in regards to sex and relationships. He pairs his clinical experiences with his own explorations of sexuality from the era of Masters and Johnson through the advent of Viagra and online porn. In the end, he forces readers to reconsider how we think about men and their desires.
Dollars and Sex (3/19/2013)
by Marina Adshade
Adshade converts the madness of sex and relationships into a sterile science that could be dubbed, Sexinomics. She applies economic principles, such as supply and demand, to sex, providing a new, and surprisingly functional, perspective on sex, dating, love, gender, libido, relationships, and marriage.