Two weeks ago we announced that we were a stop on Violet Blue’s blog tour promoting her new book The Ultimate Guide to Sexual Fantasy. We were thrilled to be presented with an exclusive excerpt and are even happier to bring you this review! The Ultimate Guide to Sexual Fantasy says that it will teach you “how to have incredible sex with role play, sex games, erotic massage, BDSM play and much much more”. Does the book live up to it’s claims? Read on to find out!
So, working in an adult store and being a sex educator, a lot of books cross my desk each year. An astoundingly high number of them tout “Have The Sex You Want”, “Awesome Orgasms In Three Simple Steps”, “Have A Great Sex Life Without Communication” (pro tip – not gonna happen). What all of these books have in common is that they often fall far short of what they say they will teach the reader. The tips and info contained within many books are not rooted in reality; often they are discouraging, derogatory, and sometimes, downright dangerous. I say the previous to let you know that I had a feeling of trepidation when The Ultimate Guide to Sexual Fantasy arrived. I have loved Violet Blue’s writing for some time but the scope of this book seemed like it couldn’t possibly work. I didn’t believe that Violet could cover all the topics she had laid out with more than a cursory glance. I’m happy to report that I was dead wrong!
What struck me immediately about this book was how the forward (by the phenomenal Carol Queen) sets a wonderful tone of exploration without judgement. Carol addresses the fear of being ‘weird” or “bad” and does her best to assure the reader that they are perfectly normal.
“There’s another thing that can step on people’s tails and put the kibosh on sexual exploration: the thought that there might be something wrong with us sexually, that we’re not normal. For a society that is as fascinated with sex as we are, we certainly have a funny way of showing it; it’s like we have to express as much disapproval as necessary to prove we’re not too pervy, and then we get to get down to watching pervy porn. We’ll never know how many people have been denied the sex life and identity that would have made them happy because they couldn’t get over this fence …”
Carol is absolutely right. Books so often have titles that include words like “forbidden” “dirty” “bad” or “guilty” in them. We think that it is titillating but all it does is set the reader up to feel that perhaps their personal sexual proclivities make them a freak. This book does a great job of taking what society often deems off or odd and normalizes it. I’m not going to lie, we need WAAAAY more books like that.
Anyone else feel like this is all society ever tells us?
So what does The Ultimate Guide to Sexual Fantasy cover? A whole lot! The book is set up to be a guide for couples to open up the possibilities in their sexual relationship by finding new activities that feel exciting and authentic to them. Readers get to explore the idea of fantasies, role play, multiple partner activities, dirty talk, stripping, hiring the services of a sex worker, sex in public, fetishes, S/M, games and an ever important chapter on safer sex practices. Whew! It seems like a lot to take in but each chapter is broken down into easy to read / easy to understand segments and is then followed by a short erotic story that deals with the topic just discussed. For example, the chapter on multiple partner sex covers the idea of having a threesome (or moresome), how to handle jealousy, how to add someone new, where to find that person, how to break the ice, and some awesome sex positions for groups of three or more (sandwich, anyone?) It also happens to have my favorite quote in the whole book:
“Add a person and you’ve got a threesome, couple up and you’ve got a foursome, add more than two to your twosome, and you’ve got … quite a party.”
In addition to Violet’s no-nonsense approach to each topic, she continues to implore the reader to be gentle with themselves and to not feel bad about what they desire (or don’t desire) sexually. She reminds us that we don’t all have what society tells us is the perfect body – and that’s ok! Sexually fantasies that may disturb us don’t make us bad people because they are just that, fantasies. All of us say the wrong thing some times, we all rip a stocking while getting ready to strip for a partner, we all trip while trying walk in our killer heels and we all sometimes feel silly trying role play for the first time. As Violet says again and again:
“… this isn’t about “good” and “bad”, it’s about understanding what turns you on.”
The Ultimate Guide to Sexual Fantasy would be a wonderful book for any couple – regardless of how long they have been together – to have on their shelf. From sexual scenarios, fantasies and ideas for costumes to lists of common fetishes, how to respectfully navigate a peep show, and a great Safer Sex Chart, this book truly has something for everyone. As an educator, I wish more books like this were available. It gives readers the chance to really feel empowered to take hold of their sexuality and explore all of it’s possibilities without judgement or fear – and to be able to do so gracefully, consciously, and safely. I give this book my highest recommendation and I hope that you will find it as enlightening and fun as I did. Many thanks again to Cleis Press for asking us to be a stop on Violet’s blog tour. 1
What: The Ultimate Guide to Sexual Fantasy
Author: Violet Blue (forward by Carol Queen, Ph.D.)
Publisher: Cleis Press
Rating: 5 of 5
- The Ultimate Guide to Sexual Fantasy was provided to us, free of charge, in return for an unbiased review. ↩
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