Posts Tagged ‘books’
“Tell Me What You Want” by Justin Lehmiller: book review
Tell Me What You Want:The Science of Sexual Desire and How It Can Help You Improve Your Sex Life by Justin Lehmiller, Ph.D. is the book we’ve all needed, even if we didn’t know it. We all have sexual fantasies, but we don’t usually share them with others, even our own partners. Many of us agonize about what our fantasies say about us, or we struggle (unsuccessfully) to repress them.
What Is a Sexual Fantasy?
A sexual fantasy is any mental picture that comes to mind while you’re awake that ultimately turns you on … Simply put, a fantasy is a conscious thought that makes you feel all hot and bothered, and maybe gets some blood flowing to your genitals, too.
In this barrier-smashing book, sex researcher Lehmiller surveyed more than 4,000 Americans, ages 18 to 87, who answered 350 detailed questions about themselves, their sex lives, and their sex fantasies. The result is a solidly researched book that answers questions you probably have, such as these:
- How common is my sex fantasy?
- Does my fantasy mean that I’m a bad person?
- What sorts of people have fantasies like mine?
- Should I tell my partner about my fantasy?
- What should I consider before acting out my fantasy?
- What do other people fantasize about?
- What are the most common fantasies?
My biggest problem reviewing Tell Me What You Want is that it’s so good that I don’t know how to narrow down what I tell you about it. Look at all these Post-Its! Instead of summarizing or interpreting Lehmiller’s points, here are some of them in his own words:
- Multipartner Sex: The results of my investigation reveal that the single most popular sexual fantasy among Americans today is — drum roll, please — group sex … perhaps the most normal thing there is to fantasize about because almost everyone has been turned on by the thought of it.
- Men and women are not polar opposites when it comes to their sexual psychology … most of the things that men fantasize about, women fantasize about as well.
- Our sexual fantasies appear to be carefully designed to meet our psychological needs — and because those needs change and evolve over our life span, it seems that our sexual fantasies naturally adjust in order to accommodate them.
- There’s a world of difference when it comes to what turns someone on at [different] life stages … older adults — especially those in long-term, monogamous relationships — are more likely to crave something fresh and new … like an orgy or an open relationship.
- According to my survey data, if there’s one specific person who’s likely to appear in your sexual fantasies, it’s your current romantic partner.
- When we feel ashamed or guilty about what turns us on, it can potentially lead to sexual performance difficulties … the more negative emotions [survey participants] reported — things like guilt, shame, embarrassment, fear, anxiety, and disgust — the more sexual problems they had.
- When the novelty of a new relationship has worn off, adding new and exciting elements to your sex life by acting on your fantasies can potentially prevent passion from subsiding and allow it to keep burning.
There’s more, so much more. Whether you’re interested in the world of sex research, or you just want to understand your own sex fantasies better, or you’re looking for tips for communicating better with your partner, I know you’ll enjoy and learn from Tell Me What You Want:The Science of Sexual Desire and How It Can Help You Improve Your Sex Life, as I did.
Vibrator Nation by Lynn Comella
I wonder if there are two types of seniors: those who love their sex-toy shops, and those who haven’t discovered yet how wonderful these stores are. If you’re in the second camp because you imagine (or remember from your youth) a dark, seedy, sticky-floored space with leering salespeople, customers wrapped in raincoats, and gaping orifices on the shelves, you’re in for a delightful surprise. In Vibrator Nation: How Feminist Sex-Toy Stores Changed the Business of Pleasure, Lynn Comella, Ph.D. has accomplished a rarity: a peppy, sex-positive history book chronicling the emergence and evolution of feminist sex-toy shops.This is a book about feminist invention, intervention, and contradiction, a world where sex-positive retailers double as social activists, commodities are framed as tools of liberation, and consumers are willing to pay for the promise of better living through orgasms.
Eavesdrop on the conversations and struggles about what a feminist sex-toy store should stand for, what the politics should be, whether or not to sell porn, and if so, how to choose it, how to be education-based and still sell products.
 Smitten Kitten, Minneapolis |
Learn Jennifer Pritchett’s “sweaty sex toy” story. In 2003, the owner of Minneapolis’s first feminist sex shop, Smitten Kitten, opened a shipment of toys that degraded and leached greasy, noxious chemicals. This led Pritchett to spearhead the anti-toxic-sex-toy movement. “That’s when Smitten Kitten’s mission changed from being just another sex-positive, educationally focused feminist sex shop to becoming a business committed to environmental justice and personal health”
Lynn Comella is an associate professor of gender and sexuality studies, a researcher and expert on the adult entertainment industry, a writer on sex and culture. She immersed herself in sex-toy retail culture while researching Vibrator Nation, including selling sex toys at Babeland to get the inside experience. I’ve had the pleasure of hearing her speak several times, and she’s smart and sassy, a delight. This attitude and liveliness is as strong in her writing as in her public speaking.
You’ll not only learn about sex-toy stores, you’ll also get some cool sex-education quotes. For example:
“A sex-positive person appreciates that human sexuality is endlessly diverse — there is no right way to have sex and no singular definition of normal.” – Lynn Comella
“In those days, when we were discussing vaginal and clitoral orgasms, we used to say that the only people who reliably have vaginal orgasms are men.” – Joani Blank, founder of Good Vibrations.
“When women talk about sex, it changes the culture.” – Carol Queen
“Doing what ‘comes naturally’ for us is to be sexually inhibited. Sex is like any other skill — it has to be learned and practiced. When a woman masturbates, she learns to like her own genitals, to enjoy sex and orgasm, and furthermore, to become proficient and independent about it.” – Betty Dodson
“The worst sexual problem we have — our worst sexual dysfunction… [is] our inability to talk about sex.” – Joani Blank
I love today’s feminist sex-toy shops. They curate their products carefully for our health and pleasure. They provide sex education to their customers. They believe that sexual pleasure is everyone’s right, whatever the age, gender, sexual identity, orientation, kink, needs, desires, abilities, relationship structure, and whatever else should be in this list.
Some of these stores hire me to speak, proving that they agree with my assertion that sex has no expiration date. They advertise on this blog, voting with their wallets to support my educational mission. Please support them in return! You’ll find them in the right-hand column of this blog, and yes, you can purchase from them online.
Opening Up by Tristan Taormino
Opening Up by Tristan Taormino
Reviewed by
Mac Marshall
I’m a heterosexual man in my early 70s who’s spent my entire adult life in two monogamous marriages. My wife died recently, and suddenly I found myself a widower embarked on a voyage of self-discovery while adrift in a tumultuous sea of relationships. I don’t wish to remarry, but I definitely do want sexual intimacy and joyful connections with women. How to find these?
I’ve discovered Tristan Taormino’s Opening Up: A Guide to Creating and Sustaining Open Relationships. Her book provides a wealth of helpful background on the full range of non-monogamous relationships, and is at once both informative and inspiring.
Taormino covers all genders in all combinations with many examples. She discusses the myths surrounding monogamy (myths I understand only too well), the pros and cons of open relationships, and the range of such connections from partnered non-monogamy to swinging, to polyamory, and polyfidelity. All of these styles of non-monogamy share the basic premise that “one partner cannot meet all their needs and they may want to have sex or a relationship with someone other than their current partner.” Instead of hiding it, they “bring this fact out into the open.”
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| Tristan Taormino |
Taormino emphasizes that open relationships only work when these significant elements are present: self-awareness and self-discovery, mutual consent, good communication skills, clear boundaries, honesty, trust, fidelity, and commitment. She addresses issues of possessiveness, control, and jealousy—widely associated with monogamy—emphasizing the importance of relinquishing and overcoming these for non-monogamous relationships to succeed.
She devotes an entire chapter to the idea of compersion as the flip side of jealousy: “compersion is taking joy in your partner’s pleasure or happiness with another partner.” Taormino notes, “Jealousy is a learned behavior. The first step to achieving compersion is to work on unlearning jealousy—letting go of feelings of insecurity, possessiveness, and fear.” While compersion may not be crucial to a functional open relationship, she argues that it is “bound to enhance your relationship.”
I have sufficient self-insight in my 70s to recognize that non-monogamy offers me a path forward toward sexual closeness, non-possessive happiness, and mutual commitment without the encumbrances of marriage and exclusivity. My challenge is to find others who share this perspective and who possess the requisite maturity, self-awareness, communication skills, and commitment to honesty to make a consensual non-monogamous relationship work. Like me, I think that others of you will find Taormino’s Opening Up of great help in charting a course as we venture forth on this journey.
Mac Marshall, PhD is a retired anthropology professor, researcher, and author who is delighted to explore sexuality studies at this time of his life.
Free Fall: A Late in Life Love Affair, an erotic memoir
11/1/17: I’m reminding you of this October 2010 book review because I think Rae’s book is brilliant, engrossing, and passionate. I want to be sure you know about this sexy memoir. — Joan
“Where are the books by and for women over 50 that deal honestly with sexuality?” I’ve asked myself for years. Dozens of self-help books for our age group have appeared in the past four years, thank goodness, but where are the sexually honest novels and memoirs that talk about our lives, our passions, our desires, our sexuality, our inner lives? Finally — Free Fall: A Late in Life Love Affair by Rae Padilla Francoeur arrives with honesty and sizzle.
Free Fall is an erotic memoir and much more. Rae Padilla Francoeur, age 58, begins a love affair with Jim, age 67. It’s hot, very hot, explosively hot. Rae describes the passionate details — how he touches and controls her body, how her passions smolder, build, and erupt. As graphic as her details are, I’m pleased that she uses language our generation is comfortable with — penis, vagina — instead of the edgier language that characterizes most contemporary erotica.
And, oh my, this book is beautifully written:
I am shameless. I will slide over every inch of him, kissing him back, wrestling in all that sweat to stay on top. I am sure I will never get enough of him. He will find this out and, being the man he is, he will revel in trying to find the outer limits of my stamina and prowess. He never will.
…
I’ve become so still and quiet and deep in the zone where my brain is one massive sensor hooked into the places he touches and the places I touch. There is nothing else. I’m all body.
…
We’re kissing each other like the end of time is on the other side of the door. We kiss like this for ten or fifteen minutes until suddenly Jim stops it all. He steps back. He pulls my skirt over my hips. He takes my hand and places it on his penis.
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| Rae Padilla Francoeur |
Free Fall: A Late in Life Love Affair 