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A review by audaciaray
Best Sex Writing 2012: The State of Today's Sexual Culture by Rachel Kramer Bussel
3.0
If I were allowed to retitle this book, I would call it "Best Sex Writing 2012: Essays for People Who Don't Read Everything on the Internet About Sexual Culture." Spoiler: I read Everything on the Internet.
I appreciate seeing authors I know and admire, who frequently publish online (or at least, that's where I read them), anthologized in this dead tree way. It lends a sense of permanence to the conversations that happened about sexual culture over the past year, which is a good thing.
However, as a Reader of the Internet, I know that many of these essays were part of much larger conversations, conversations which are pretty impossible to capture between two covers, on pages without hotlinks. I love books, but representing the best sex writing in this way feels flat to me. The best and worst parts of the state of today's sexual culture is that it plays out complexly, through links and online bitchery and critique, and that just wasn't happening here. For example: an essay about SlutWalk without a lot of dialogue, quotes, and argument with other sources of thought and rage is just not right-sized.
That said, the book is worth picking up for the pieces by Joan Price, Amber Dawn, and Lydia Yuknavitch, which are shiveringly good and make my skin tingle with sadness.
Thomas Roche and Tracy Quan's pieces on sex work totally have my heart. However, I was not so impressed with Marty Klein's piece on circumcision (thesis: getting cut is no big deal!) and the lack of regard for the concepts of consent and bodily autonomy, and Rachel Rabbit White's piece about trans latinas was a mess, mixing the LGB with the T in a bad and clunky way.
I appreciate seeing authors I know and admire, who frequently publish online (or at least, that's where I read them), anthologized in this dead tree way. It lends a sense of permanence to the conversations that happened about sexual culture over the past year, which is a good thing.
However, as a Reader of the Internet, I know that many of these essays were part of much larger conversations, conversations which are pretty impossible to capture between two covers, on pages without hotlinks. I love books, but representing the best sex writing in this way feels flat to me. The best and worst parts of the state of today's sexual culture is that it plays out complexly, through links and online bitchery and critique, and that just wasn't happening here. For example: an essay about SlutWalk without a lot of dialogue, quotes, and argument with other sources of thought and rage is just not right-sized.
That said, the book is worth picking up for the pieces by Joan Price, Amber Dawn, and Lydia Yuknavitch, which are shiveringly good and make my skin tingle with sadness.
Thomas Roche and Tracy Quan's pieces on sex work totally have my heart. However, I was not so impressed with Marty Klein's piece on circumcision (thesis: getting cut is no big deal!) and the lack of regard for the concepts of consent and bodily autonomy, and Rachel Rabbit White's piece about trans latinas was a mess, mixing the LGB with the T in a bad and clunky way.