100 Best Human Sexuality Books of All Time
We've researched and ranked the best human sexuality books in the world, based on recommendations from world experts, sales data, and millions of reader ratings. Learn more
“Sex at Dawn irrefutably shows that what is obvious—that human beings, both male and female, are lustful—is true, and has always been so…. The more dubious its evidentiary basis and lack of connection... more
Noah KaganA few months ago, I was drinking a Noah’s Mill whiskey (cute) with my good buddy Brian Balfour and talking about life... During the conversation, we got on the topic of books that changed our lives. I want to share them with you. I judge a book's success if a year later I'm still using at least 1 thing from the book. (Source)
Esther Perel[Esther Perel recommended this book as an answer to "What are some [resources] for couples who want to explore having a more “monogamish” relationship?"] (Source)
In her 20 years of clinical experience, Perel has treated hundreds of couples whose home lives are empty of passion. They describe relationships that are open and loving, yet sexually dull. What is going on?
In this explosively original book, Perel explains that our cultural penchant... more
Researchers have spent the last decade trying to develop a “pink pill” for women to function like Viagra does for men. So where is it? Well, for reasons this book makes crystal clear, that pill will never exist—but as a result of the research that’s gone into it, scientists in the last few years have learned more about how women’s sexuality works than we ever thought possible, and... more
Susan QuilliamIt’s one of the best books ever written, in my view, for guiding women in particular through the minefield of their sexuality in today’s world. (Source)
The Ethical Slut discusses how to live an active life with multiple concurrent sexual relationships in a fair and honest way. Discussion topics include how to deal with the practical difficulties and opportunities in finding and keeping partners, maintaining relationships with others, and strategies for personal growth.
It contains chapters... more
Naval RavikantGetting into the more evolution, science kind of books, I really highly, highly recommend picking up [...] The Red Queen. (Source)
So begins the breathtaking story of Calliope Stephanides and three generations of the Greek-American Stephanides family who travel from a tiny village overlooking Mount Olympus in Asia Minor to Prohibition-era Detroit, witnessing its glory days... more
Lisa Feldman BarrettEugenides does a really nice job of illustrating the complexity of emotional life, the emotional life that doesn’t necessarily fall into neat categories. (Source)
Alex StojkovicI don’t. But I would. Books love to be used up. (Related: Middlesex is the best book I read in 2019. If you’re look… (Source)
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Maggie, a troubled 23-year-old in Fargo, N.Dak., recalls how her high school English teacher seduced her at 17 after learning she'd slept with a man twice her age. When he's named statewide teacher of the year five years later, she reports their affair to the police; townspeople quickly label her "a freaky slut." more
Gwyneth PaltrowI literally could not put it down. An unflinching dissection of female desire so poetically described, I forgot it was nonfiction. Lisa Taddeo makes a gorgeous, unabashed debut. Wow. (Source)
Elizabeth GilbertI can’t remember the last time a book affected me as profoundly as Three Women. Lisa Taddeo is a tireless reporter, a brilliant writer, and a storyteller possessed of almost supernatural humanity. As far as I’m concerned, this is a nonfiction literary masterpiece at the same level as In Cold Blood—and just as suspenseful, bone-chilling, and harrowing, in its own way. I know already that I will... (Source)
Esther PerelThree Women offers a fascinating excavation of the intricacies of love and desire, where they conspire and where they conflict. Read this book. You will forever rethink the erotics of women. (Source)
Shocked yet thrilled by Grey’s singular erotic tastes, Ana hesitates. For all the trappings of success—his multinational businesses, his vast wealth, his... more
A retrograde calculates, night and day, how to return the world to:
the Old Order of moral and sexual decency,
classical masculinity,
national sovereignty and national borders,
faith and hope and charity,
goodness and beauty and truth,
Christian civic liberty,
and most importantly, the social kingship of Christ.
In the words of Shakespeare, a retrograde is one of God’s spies.
The retrograde has the unique capacity for understanding the stark chasm between the degenerate,... more
Vanora BennettIt is. It’s about a girl named Nan who goes off to the Pantomime Theatre, which is on the South Coast of England, and sees a girl named Kitty, who is a male impersonator, on the stage and falls in love with her. You’re not sure if it’s a sexual love or a girlish crush but she does go off to London with her and it does turn into a love affair. They begin living together but it becomes complicated... (Source)
Based on an in-depth analysis of over 1,000 provocative stories of peak sexual experiences, The Erotic Mind offers clear, accessible guidance on how anyone can utilize his or her own peak encounters and fantasies as... more
Esther PerelI reread. (Source)
Tyler CowenHonorable mentions: Jonathan Livingston Seagull, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, and The Joy of Sex, all given to me by my mother. I believe they helped inculcate some of the 1960s-70s ethos of individual freedom into my thinking. (Source)
Kate FigesIt seems so innocent really now, all those daring explanations of S and M and positions, but it was before Aids and people were so optimistic. It was as though we’d discovered sex and free love. (Source)
Susan QuilliamThis was a seminal book. It not only reflected but created the sexual revolution. Even now, people who haven’t read it know what it’s about. (Source)
“You are a sexual deviant. A pervert, through and through.” We may not want to admit it, but as the award-winning columnist and psychologist Jesse Bering reveals in Perv, there is a spectrum of perversion along which we all sit. Whether it’s voyeurism, exhibitionism, or your run-of-the-mill foot fetish, we all possess a suite of sexual tastes as unique as our fingerprints—and as secret as the rest of the skeletons we’ve hidden in our closets.
Combining cutting-edge studies... more
In Wayward Lives, Beautiful Experiments, Saidiya Hartman examines the revolution of black intimate life that unfolded in Philadelphia and New York at the beginning of the twentieth century. Free love, common-law and transient marriages, serial partners, cohabitation outside of wedlock, queer relations, and single motherhood were among the sweeping changes that altered the character of everyday life and challenged traditional Victorian beliefs about courtship, love, and... more
The act of sex has not changed since people first worked out what went where, but the ways in which society dictates how sex is culturally understood and performed have varied significantly through the ages. Humans are the only creatures that stigmatise particular sexual practices, and sex remains... more
Sarah ParcakYou MUST order this book. I have learned and continue to learn so much from Dr Lister...and she makes scrolling a risky activity as you *never* know what content you’ll get on WoY 😲😳 https://t.co/PI6FecL24E (Source)
Young children are curious about almost everything, especially their bodies. And young children are not afraid to ask questions. What makes me a girl? What makes me a boy? Why are some parts of girls' and boys' bodies the same and why are some parts different? How was I made? Where do babies come from? Is it true that a stork brings... more
Don't have time to read the top Human Sexuality books of all time? Read Shortform summaries.
Shortform summaries help you learn 10x faster by:
- Being comprehensive: you learn the most important points in the book
- Cutting out the fluff: you focus your time on what's important to know
- Interactive exercises: apply the book's ideas to your own life with our educators' guidance.
A Time Top 10 Book of the Year • A San Francisco Chronicle Book of the Year
The author of the New York Times bestseller Cinderella Ate My Daughter offers a clear-eyed picture of the new sexual landscape girls face in the post-princess stage—high school through college—and reveals how they are negotiating it.
A... more
How does a baby begin? What makes a baby male or female? How is a baby born? Children have plenty of questions about reproduction and babies—and about sex and sexuality, too. It’s So Amazing! provides the answers—with fun, accurate, comic-book-style artwork and a clear, lively text that reflects the interests of children age seven and up in how things work, while... more
Now a Top 100 Amazon Bestseller and winner of the After Dark Book Lovers Shortie Award for Best Debut of 2016.
School psychologists aren’t supposed to write books about sex. Doing so would be considered “unethical” and “a fireable offense.” Lucky for you, ethics was never my strong suit.
After spending years trying to spice up my sex life, I gave up and took to my journal. Perhaps my gorgeous, cold, number crunching husband... more
Don't have time to read the top Human Sexuality books of all time? Read Shortform summaries.
Shortform summaries help you learn 10x faster by:
- Being comprehensive: you learn the most important points in the book
- Cutting out the fluff: you focus your time on what's important to know
- Interactive exercises: apply the book's ideas to your own life with our educators' guidance.
For two decades, this universally acclaimed book on sexuality has been the most trusted and accessible resource for kids, parents, teachers, librarians, and anyone else who cares about the well-being of tweens and teens. Now, in honor of its anniversary, It’s Perfectly Normal has been updated with information on subjects such as safe and savvy Internet use, gender identity, emergency contraception, and more. Providing accurate and... more
The scope of Discovering Human Sexuality... more
We're lucky that slut is such a great word, because it's safe to say that almost every woman will be called a slut at least once in her lifetime. Despite a slowly shifting sexual double standard, it's still taboo to be a woman who's openly sexual-let alone one who sleeps around. Now Vogue columnist... more
From BDSM classes, orgasmic meditation sessions, and "furry" parties to platonic tickling, interviews with porn stars, and lessons from a... more
Becky BerardiCalling all FOOT lovers & avid readers! Our #BadAssBabe & talented author Olive Persimmon just released her 2nd book yesterday & it even FEETures a chapter about me!! Be sure to give it a read :) https://t.co/Sumc8ybRjz https://t.co/Ib99fV8O2j #footfetish #feet #books #author https://t.co/HMti8RROp0 (Source)
Yes Means Yes will bring to the table a dazzling... more
New Directions in Sex Therapy: Innovations and Alternatives focuses on cutting-edge, therapy paradigms as alternatives to conventional clinical strategies. With each passing year, the treatment of sexual problems seems to emphasize more medical and pharmacological interventions. There is correspondingly less interest in the experiences of the individuals or couples involved. This book expands the definition of our field.
Part I highlights the major problems and criticisms facing sex therapy and... more
Clear, comprehensive, witty, and refreshingly realistic, The New Male Sexuality is destined to be... more
Don't have time to read the top Human Sexuality books of all time? Read Shortform summaries.
Shortform summaries help you learn 10x faster by:
- Being comprehensive: you learn the most important points in the book
- Cutting out the fluff: you focus your time on what's important to know
- Interactive exercises: apply the book's ideas to your own life with our educators' guidance.
—Eliot Fremont-Smith, The New York Times less
Our sexuality can be a beautiful and mysterious expression of what it means to be human. But it can also become distorted and sinful.
Perhaps no issue is as urgent for the church today, or confronts it with as many questions, as human sexuality: What does it mean to fulfill God’s will through our sexuality? To what extent should our sexuality define who we are? How can we navigate cultural trends around sexuality while being faithful to Scripture?
The Center for Pastor Theologians (CPT) seeks to assist pastors in the study and... more
For his groundbreaking sexual research, Alfred Kinsey and his team interviewed 18,000 people, relying on them to honestly report their most intimate experiences. Using the Internet, the neuroscientists Ogas and Gaddam quietly observed the raw sexual behaviors of half a billion people. By combining... more
In Trans Like Me, CN Lester takes readers on a measured, thoughtful, intelligent yet approachable tour through the most important and high-profile narratives around the trans community, turning them inside out and examining where we really are in terms of progress. From the impact of the media's wording in covering trans people and issues, to the way parenting gender variant children is portrayed, Lester brings... more
Regardless of your background or bedroom resume, someone or something has probably made you feel that way at some point. This was what Corinne Fisher and Krystyna Hutchinson discovered when they created the wildly popular Guys We Fucked: The Anti Slut-Shaming Podcast. What started as an outlet to interview—
You guessed it!—guys they'd fucked, quickly evolved into an enormous community of Fuckers around the world, and a place to share stories of kinks gone wild, trauma, assault, and the... more
Natural selection allowed for the adaptation of the human female to this environmental stress by reconfiguring her hormonal cycles, entraining them with the periodicity of the moon. The results, however, did much more than ensure our... more
Don't have time to read the top Human Sexuality books of all time? Read Shortform summaries.
Shortform summaries help you learn 10x faster by:
- Being comprehensive: you learn the most important points in the book
- Cutting out the fluff: you focus your time on what's important to know
- Interactive exercises: apply the book's ideas to your own life with our educators' guidance.
This practical guidebook will help women break free of the mold of traditional monogamy, without the constraints of jealousy, possessiveness, insecurity, and competition. The Smart Girl's Guide to Polyamory incorporates interviews and real-world advice from women of all ages in nontraditional relationships, as well as exercises for building self-awareness, confidence in communication, and strategies for... more
You'll learn... more
We talk about feminism in the workplace and we talk about dating after #MeToo, but women's own patriarchal conditioning can be the hardest enemy to defeat. When it comes to our sex lives, few of us are free of niggling fears and body image insecurities. Rather than enjoying and exploring our bodies uninhibited, we worry about our bikini lines, bulging tummies and whether we're doing it 'right'.
Flo broaches everything from faking it to consent, stress to... more
Grayson PerryEveryone has to go and buy this v funny and brilliant book by @FloPerry . I learnt a lot. Especially good for younger adults https://t.co/xI6qXQDS4M (Source)
This new paperback edition of Sex Trafficking... more
“I am able to have a difficult conversation with my partner about our relationship.”
“I can boldly and openly carry a tampon to the restroom in public.”
“I am totally comfortable being naked in front of a new partner.”
If you disagree with any of these statements (or all of them), you are not alone. You are one of many, many women who are feeling the effects of “sexual madness.” According to Jennifer Gunsaullus, PhD, sociologist and sex coach, it is time for women to break free from the... more
Don't have time to read the top Human Sexuality books of all time? Read Shortform summaries.
Shortform summaries help you learn 10x faster by:
- Being comprehensive: you learn the most important points in the book
- Cutting out the fluff: you focus your time on what's important to know
- Interactive exercises: apply the book's ideas to your own life with our educators' guidance.
Anne Boleyn flirted with courtiers; Catherine Howard slept with one. Henry VIII had both of them beheaded.
Catherine the Great had her idiot husband murdered and ruled the Russian empire with a long list of sexy young favorites.
Marie Antoinette fell in love with the handsome Swedish count Axel Fersen, who tried valiantly to rescue her from the guillotine.
Princess Diana gave up her palace... more
Originally published in the Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy, this book’s core argument quickly became the year’s most widely read essay on the most prominent scholarly network in the social sciences. Since then, it has been cited and debated by scholars and activists... more
In Girls on the Edge, psychologist and physician Leonard Sax argues that many girls today have a brittle sense of self-they may look confident and strong on the outside, but they're fragile within. Sax offers the tools we need to help them become independent and confident women, and provides parents with practical tips on everything from helping their daughter limit her time on social media, to choosing a... more
Don't have time to read the top Human Sexuality books of all time? Read Shortform summaries.
Shortform summaries help you learn 10x faster by:
- Being comprehensive: you learn the most important points in the book
- Cutting out the fluff: you focus your time on what's important to know
- Interactive exercises: apply the book's ideas to your own life with our educators' guidance.
When Babeland opened its doors in 1993 in Seattle, it filled the need for a "toy store" that made customers feel comfortable, and a non- threatening environment for asking intimate questions about sex. Fast- forward to the twenty-first century: taboos continue to fade, and Babeland has opened new stores coast to coast and online. Thousands of... more
What do Americans really want when it comes to sex? And is it possible for us to get what we want? Justin J. Lehmiller, one of the country's leading experts on human sexuality and author of the popular blog Sex and Psychology, has made it his career's ambition to answer these questions. He recently concluded the largest and most comprehensive scientific survey of Americans' sexual... more
In this third edition of the Handbook, 218 scales, complete with full descriptions and psychometric data, are made available, with additional information provided at the companion website for this volume. less
When an unexpected medical crisis sends Naomi Wolf on a deeply personal journey to tease out the intersections between sexuality and creativity, she discovers, much to her own astonishment, an increasing body of scientific evidence that suggests that the vagina is not merely flesh, but an intrinsic... more
Don't have time to read the top Human Sexuality books of all time? Read Shortform summaries.
Shortform summaries help you learn 10x faster by:
- Being comprehensive: you learn the most important points in the book
- Cutting out the fluff: you focus your time on what's important to know
- Interactive exercises: apply the book's ideas to your own life with our educators' guidance.
"This guide can help disabled people (and their partners) on their journey toward self-love, better communication, and confidence." –– Alice Wong, Founder and Director, Disability Visibility Project
All different kinds of bods want to connect with other bods, but lots of them get left out of the conversation when it comes to S-E-X. As explained by disabled cartoonist A. Andrews, this easy-to-read guide covers the basics of disability... more
When it comes to sex education, parents of adolescent girls often know just as little about where to start as girls themselves. Even the mention of sex education or puberty can make everyone feel uncomfortable, nervous, or insecure. In The Girls' Guide to Sex... more
The ideas of the Sexual Revolution did not emerge from the lived experiences of ordinary people, the government has been... more
• How to talk about sex and keep your relationships sizzling
• Orgasms--G-spot, female ejaculation, and multiple orgasms for both men and women
• "If you want the job done right, do it yourself"--Expanded section on masturbation
• NEW! Sex Over a Lifetime--Growing up, coming out, pregnancy, parenting, midlife cycles, and aging
• NEW! Teens Sexual Bill of Rights
• Real stories--Hundreds of real people talk... more
Don't have time to read the top Human Sexuality books of all time? Read Shortform summaries.
Shortform summaries help you learn 10x faster by:
- Being comprehensive: you learn the most important points in the book
- Cutting out the fluff: you focus your time on what's important to know
- Interactive exercises: apply the book's ideas to your own life with our educators' guidance.
Accessible and open-minded, compassionate and honest, American Hookup explains where we... more
With trademark frankness and humor, these popular BDSM/sexuality authors document their journey into the realm of transcendent kink and radical ecstasy. Here, they share techniques that join BDSM with tantric sex practices to create a state of transcendence during sexual practice. less
And that’s exactly what this book does! Instead of the tired “Don’t— because the Bible says so” rhetoric, Everyone Loves Sex uncovers what psychology and sociology reveal—and the results may surprise you!
Sexual faithfulness is about committing to one’s future spouse—in spite of what one’s sexual life has looked like in the past. The future can be different! It is about making the change... more
For every three orgasms an American man has, studies show, a woman has one. Up to 40 percent of American women experience the sexual malaise clinically known as low sexual desire. For too long, this deficit has been explained in terms of women's stress, age, or poor body image. In The Pleasure Gap, Katherine Rowland rejects the idea that women should settle for less. We should take inequality in the bedroom as seriously as we take it in the workplace and understand its causes and... more
Cecile RichardsI obviously wanted to pick a book that was about the work I do now, and I just think Cristina Page did a great job in this book. It’s a very accessible book and so I’d like to put it in for folks who think this may not be the topic that they know a whole lot about. (Source)
Don't have time to read the top Human Sexuality books of all time? Read Shortform summaries.
Shortform summaries help you learn 10x faster by:
- Being comprehensive: you learn the most important points in the book
- Cutting out the fluff: you focus your time on what's important to know
- Interactive exercises: apply the book's ideas to your own life with our educators' guidance.