It's not as... opinionated? as I would have believed from reading other reviews of this book - it seems like other reviews and the material from the publishers emphasizes the more controversial ideas in the book, but the book itself is well reasoned, and more a collection of case studies and things you can learn about them then specific "one-size-fits-all" advice. The core idea is that both partners in a relationship have their own sexuality and sexual expression, and denying that / treating them as one ends up killing eroticism. I went into it skeptical, by page 15 I was convinced that the author knows what she's talking about, and read the rest of the book very quickly. Highly recommended. ( )

A mild sneak peek into "erotic intelligence" ( )

This book was not what I was hoping for. I read "State of Affairs" and it really made me think. This on the other hand was very dry and hard to stay interested in, the cases sounded familiar at least. But I thought this was more about getting to know your potential partner and things to discuss or talk about, because that's how it was explained to me in an interview by Perel herself.... as she was basically advertising her discovery card game.... so this was rough. It ended without a closer and I didn't really leave with anything for me to think about and discover about myself... let alone someone else. ( )

Insightful, echoes many of my thoughts on the subject. We do need to take ourselves out of the cage. Liberation! T’was once, now forgotten?

The unstated and unexamined assumption behind this book is that the only way for a long-term relationship to be healthy is if there is a lot of sex. Perel never addresses the fact that some people just don't want to have sex all that often and that's okay. Perel thinks that sex is more important than any other aspect of a relationship, and so it's okay to sacrifice other things that are great about a relationship - including a sense of safety and security - to make sure that there's lots of sex.

The premise of the book is that it can be hard to keep sex exciting in a long-term relationship. Perel thinks this is because sex thrives on a sense of novelty and exploration and even danger, and after you've been with someone for a long time, the novelty wears off. Her solution to this is of course to do some experimentation, but also to distance yourself from your long-term partner so that the sex feels new again. Which is fine if frequent and exciting penis-in-vagina sex is the only goal of your long-term relationship, but if you value a sense of closeness and security over sex, then this book will not be helpful. ( )