Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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29 of 32 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Quite adequite, although possibly excessive., April 12, 2003
This is quite an interesting book. Its central basis surrounds the clit but also describes it as the central pleasure point to pretty much everything else. It provides all the information necessary along with many anatomical and entertaining hand-sketched pictures, describing all the various muscles and functions and spots of the entire female genetalia. On this, I could not complain or ask for anything more.Indeed, the author has done her homework in writing this book, but I say excessive in the title because of how the material is presented along with the many accompanying details. Many a page are filled with backround information on the "Adventure of the Clitoris!"(no, they don't actually word it like that in the book). Strongly written in the female perspective, although it doesn't demean usefulness for the male readers, it gives the history of the clitorus all the way back to greek times as well as various stories and such. Although it does give the book some color, ideas throughout this 200-page book are often revealed slowly. I believe the same effect could have been established with half the space. The chapters, from female ejaculation to beyond intercourse, do cover quite a bit. I stand firmly by my 5-stars. Choose as you wish: Fulfilling/excessive, colorful/cumbersome, but I thoroughly enjoyed the book myself, though.
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141 of 172 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Dr Ruth she's not., July 24, 2002
Suffice to say this book comes across as more than a bit harsh toward heterosexual males like myself, and thus it is difficult to give a truly unbiased review of it (or to formulate an unemotional opinion on it for that matter). But the bottomline is the book falls far short of it's promise. The author spends too much time and energy bashing all manner of feminist favorite targets, and too little truly attempting to create an equitable model of sexuality that both genders can embrace. In truth her repeated references to penis in vagina intercourse as the apogee of male sexual experience does little to advance the argument that maybe there is a better model of sexuality out there for all of us. The book obviously does provide an extensive review of female genital anatomy; although, I found it ironic that after maligning all modern sex manuals as showing "cartoon genitals" for women, that the author chose a cartoonist (Fish) to provide the book illustrations. The real disappointment though is that there is very little is the way of detailed information about sexual practices. Ms Chalker may "mention" masturbation and outercourse but truth be told she does not "discuss" them in a fashion sufficient to educate the reader to any degree. As a case in point she repeatedly makes mention of women using vibrators to enhance their sexual pleasure, yet never does she describe their most appropriate application or model choice in the way Betty Dodson has. Similarly for many other "mentions", the reader must already understand the mechanics of the topic or be left to pursue further research. So it is really quite a stretch to describe this as a sex workshop in book form - it is not. It is as much as anything a book on sexual politics, which is fine, if only it had been marketed as such. So I would caution the heterosexual male population to not be misled by the appealing nude female torso on the cover or the jacket notes suggesting this book is intended for a mainstream audience. Recognize this book for what it is and proceed at your own risk. Personally I found Felice Newman's "Whole Lesbian Sex Book" to be far more sex positive and inclusive, even though I am obviously not the intended audience in that case. Go figure! Postscript (9/6/02)
Upon further review it would appear that this author has made a rather basic error in her purportedly updated anatomy - namely she classifies the clitoral body (or shaft) and crura (legs) as spongy tissue analogous to the male corpus spongiosum surrounding the urethra, and distinct from the corpus cavernosa that they are more obviously analogous to. She further identifies the vaginal bulbs as cavernosa when in fact they are spongy erectile tissue. While this may seem like a minor point to some, it certainly confuses the issue of male/female homology. Interestingly this was easily cleared up by a quick reference to the online version of Gray's Anatomy, which would seem to invalidate a very basic premise of the book, that the information on the clitoris is simply not available. While "marriage manuals" may indeed lack a good anatomical foundation, this information has not been "lost" by the medical community, and the tissue in question is clearly identified as erectile which would suggest a sexual function. So one is left to wonder whether this author is suffering from some sort of self-serving myopia when it comes to her interpretation of what the medical establishment knows and doesn't know. Finally having now seen the original drawings from Suzann Gage's book, A New View of a Woman's Body, (in Betty Dodson's video Viva La Vulva) I can certainly say the diagrams in this book are truly poor, being as I indicated earlier, of cartoon quality. A shame Ms Chalker could not negotiate use of the original drawings from her friend and coworker, and had to rely instead on a longwinded reference to Ms Gage's work to give the vague impression they were included.
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26 of 30 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Mixed review, June 12, 2001
By A Customer
I purchased this book because I was searching for information on orgasm. My opinion of this book is mixed. The first chapter is an excellent source of info on female anatomy. This chapter, in my opinion, is the only part with outstanding in-depth information of relevance. Chapter two is about the history of sex. The author goes back to Freud and elaborates on views of sex over the years. As another reviewer commented, this chapter contains quips about how women's sexauality has been repressed. Chapter three deals with female ejaculation (was not impressed with this part). Chapters four & five are about self exploration. The book is a quick read. The valable information in this book is contained in chapter one and also in the extensive list of resources in the back.
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