sex writers

Rachel Kramer Bussel, Janet Hardy, and Michelle Perrot Reading at Elliot Bay Books Tonight

Tue, 2010-02-23 14:44

Head’s up for Seattle-area readers: Rachel Kramer Bussel will be appearing with friends at Elliott Bay Book Company tonight, Tue, 02/23/2010, at 7:00pm. They’ll be reading from Rachel’s new anthology Best Sex Writing 2010

February being a month when eros is on the calendar, if not in the air (Valentine’s Day, Carnival, and more), editor Rachel Kramer Bussel being here to read from and discuss the anthology, Best Sex Writing 2010 (Cleis) is particularly apt. She is senior editor at Penthouse Variations, is the former “Lusty Lady” columnist for The Village Voice, and runs a New York City erotica reading series, “In the Flesh.” She also did the hard work of putting together an anthology that embraces many different takes on sex and sensuality—which adds to the pleasures of this book. Reading with Rachel Kramer Bussel tonight are two local contributors to the anthology, Michelle Perrot and Janet Hardy.

The Elliott Bay Book Company
101 S. Main St.
Seattle, Washington 98104

I like Rachel’s “Best Sex Writing” series. There’s nothing wrong with erotica either, of course, and Rachel’s no slouch when it comes to editing those. This series covers more of the nuts and bolts of sex, of coping with, say, complications of sex while pregnant or nursing, the contradictions of sex education in purity ball culture, the commonalities of political sex scandals, or the factors condom manufacturers must juggle to make their products safe, effective, and marketable.

Janet Hardy, who will be reading with Rachel, is co-author of the classic (and recently-revised) The Ethical Slut: A Practical Guide to Polyamory, Open Relationships & Other Adventures.

Michelle Perrot is a pen name for Kerry Cohen, a therapist, writer, mother of an autism-spectrum child, and author of Loose Girl: A Memoir of Promiscuity.

If I can possibly make it I will. I hope you can make it too.

Update: I’ll be there. I’m looking forward to it.

Why We Need More Sex Writers

Mon, 2008-04-07 10:53


Photo by Flickr user peterpunk777. Used under a Creative Commons license.

Lux Alptraum of BOINKOLOGY answers whether the world needs more sex writers.

The issue here, as far as I’m concerned, is not so much how many sex writers there are, but what kind of discourse we’re conducting about sex. The truth is, there’s only room for so many Carrie Bradshaws (ideally, none, or close to it): but Carrie Bradshaw is not the be-all, end-all, of sex writing.

To assume that writing about sex means writing about our own relationships, or writing solely about relationships, period, is to see sex as a limited, boring, sad little topic. That’s not the case, as far as I’m concerned: far from it. Sex is a vast, diverse, fascinating topic; an expansive area that’s ripe for exploration, discussion, and commentary (insightful and otherwise). The problem isn’t that we have too many sex writers; it’s that we have too limited an idea of what sex writing is.

Sex is everywhere, sex permeates everything. Sex shapes our movies, our music, our sports, our literature; sex drives our science and frames our political agendas. Sex is a huge part of our lives — and if we could just own up to that, and respect that, well, we could start having discussions about sex that are anything but tired, boring, or played out.

She said it here.

Agreed. The real question isn’t why write or blog about sex. I always say the real question is why aren’t more people doing it?

You see this a lot with people who fret that they’d be a bad sex blogger because their own sex lives aren’t that exciting, or because they don’t want to blog about their own sex lives, or because they haven’t had sex often enough (or, even, haven’t had it at all, or, even, don’t intend to have it till graduation or a certain age or marriage, or, even have no intention of ever having it at all.) Because there’s… look, there’s just more to sex than having sex!

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