Product Description

A breakthrough in sexual literature, this work is a complete, comprehensive user-friendly guide to and tour through the world of alternative sexual lifestyles. While the topics are exotic and erotic, the authors handle each one in a sensitive, thorough, analytical, and fascinating way and manage to explain a secret world to those who might wish to visit.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #143041 in Books
• Published on: 1996-01-13
• Released on: 1996-01-13
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 560 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9780679769569
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
• Click here to view our Condition Guide and Shipping Prices

From Publishers Weekly
Although the authors insist this tome "is not an apologia for sadomasochism," it often reads like one. Rejecting theories that explain S&M in terms of low self-esteem or regressed sexuality, they portray sexual dominants, submissives and fetishists "as they see themselves: loving and compassionate individuals" for whom pain is pleasure and physical bondage is psychologically liberating. However, it is hard to reconcile this formula with the interviewees' graphic accounts of whipping, spanking, "golden showers" (urination), the use of hot wax and clothespins, depersonalization fantasies (being treated like an animal or a chair) and so forth. The wife-husband Brames (she is a poet, he a novelist) and freelance writer Jacobs also devote sections to genital piercing, scarification (cutting one's body with a knife), tattooing, female wrestling and transvestites and transsexuals who engage in S&M. Author tour.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Kirkus Reviews
Few books come with warning labels, but this one does: ``Readers should not attempt any of the activities described in these pages.'' Why not? Because the outr‚ sexual practices described by the Brames (she: a former therapist; he: a former archaeologist) and Jacobs (a freelance writer) in this bold report carry psychological and, often, physical risks--though that hasn't stopped the two-hundred-odd practitioners whom the authors interviewed, nor the millions who share their passion for sexual dominance and submission (D&S). All D&S, the authors explain, involves a ``power exchange'' in which one partner ``tops,'' or dominates, and the other ``bottoms,'' or submits--whether through bondage, wrestling, whipping, body-piercing, etc. After running through the history of D&S scholarship--with expected nods at Krafft-Ebbing and Havelock Ellis--the Brames and Jacob present an overview of the practices themselves, which range from infantilism (the bottom often wears a diaper and sucks on a bottle) and depersonalization (the bottom may act like an object, perhaps a footstool, or an animal, most often a pony) to spanking, cross-dressing, foot fetishes, enemas, branding, and so on. The authors discuss the methods, psychological bases, and historical backgrounds of the practices, each of which is illuminated by interviews with practitioners who speak with great seriousness (``Deliberate, ritualized infliction of what we call pain can change the relationship of the body and that which lives in the body,'' says Fakir Musafar, who likes to dangle from trees by way of ``fleshhooks''). And as for the risks, nearly all of these sexual outlaws identify with the ``Scene'' (the vast D&S underground that's highly self-aware: Two thousand infantilists, for example, belong to a ``Diaper Pail Fraternity'') and with its credo of ``Safe, Sane, and Consensual.'' The definitive guide to the sexual styles of those who walk on the wild side. -- Copyright ©1993, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

From the Inside Flap
A breakthrough in sexual literature, this work is a complete, comprehensive user-friendly guide to and tour through the world of alternative sexual lifestyles. While the topics are exotic and erotic, the authors handle each one in a sensitive, thorough, analytical, and fascinating way and manage to explain a secret world to those who might wish to visit.

Customer Reviews

The truth about those of us in the Life.
I been involved in a true 24/7 BDSM Lifestyle for the past 25 years. Most of the books written on the subject were either pornographic in nature and/or lacking in the true understanding of the proper dynamics in a healthy consensual BDSM Lifestyle. This book is WONDERFUL. I completely agree with every aspect of this book. It is so well written and so informative and accurate.
I usually do not read BDSM books because so many books are filled with fantasy/nonsense. This book was refreshing. My slave and I read a chapter at a time and discussed the topics. I enjoyed the authors interviewing REAL people in the Life. You may not like/enjoy all the activities in each chapter (who does!) but it is worth reading about and expanding your mind. I give this book an extremely high rating and feel that the novice out there would do her/him self a service to take the time to read this book. Even for those weekend warriors out there.......you can learn from this book. Pleased in Texas

Great for people who are worried about themselves!
This book is fun to read and extremely informative to people who know little about alternate styles. A lot of good, rational people harbor some kind of S&M fantasies and beat themselves up about it (pardon the pun). This book can be a real godsend to them.

It describes many different things including spanking, bondage, domination, etc.

Is it informative for people who have lived the BDSM lifestyle for a long time? Well, I don't know. But I would STRONGLY recommend it for a person who harbors fantasies that he/she is uncomfortable about.

INSIGHTFUL COMMENTARY ON R/T D/s
This book was my first introduction into D/s. I had always felt I was somewhat submissive..and this book confirmed it for me. The authors use real-life couples and D/s-ers at every level to paint a vivid picture of what THE LIFE is all about on so many different levels. You will find yourself identifying with many of the things said in this book. If you have ever wanted to satisfy your curiousity concerning BDSM or D/s, this book is a great place to start....a very easy read, and a great reference for the future.