Prime: Adventures and Advice on Sex, Love, and the Sensual Years

By Pepper Schwartz

Book Overview

"Sex can be just gorgeous--and sometimes it is the most beautiful thing that can happen between a man and a woman. But don't you also think that it can be just practical? Like when you're hungry and don't want a three-course meal with wine, music, and ambience; you just want a sandwich. You don't love the sandwich. You don't hate the sandwich. You just want to eat the sandwich and feel satisfied."

Dr. Pepper Schwartz has always encouraged women to embrace their sexual appetites. After three decades of answering people's questions about their emotional, sexual, and romantic lives; after writing several books on sex and relationships; after thirty-five years as a sociology professor at the University of Washington, she has formed firm opinions about sex and relationships. However, when her own situation changes, when she becomes a single woman after twenty-three years of marriage, she has to reevaluate and discover how sex and dating can work for her at this unique time in her life.

Masters and Johnson, the famous sex researchers concluded that you can have sex, and want sex, way into old age, if you never stop doing it. And Pepper is very sure that she never wants to stop doing it. Now, she must make the effort to put herself in the running--getting in shape physically, emotionally, and spiritually--and figure out ways to meet worthy and available men. Ideally, she would like to have a serious relationship, but if that isn't in the cards, she still wants sex and companionship. And while she may feel as sexually alive as she did when she was twenty-five, the number and availability of men has changed.

So, how do you look for a life partner after fifty and enjoy sexual adventures along the way?

Prime is Dr. Pepper's response to this question. It's her story of exploration--sex, adventure, and romance--spread out like a road map for women of every age, because even as she is telling her own tale, she doesn't forget to exercise her talent for advice. Whether you're looking to wake up a tired sex life, start a new relationship, explore cyber-dating, indulge in a four-hand massage, flirt with gigolos on vacation, or commit to the love of your life, you can find tempting tips and genuinely helpful guidance.

The prime of life has lengthened and as Dr. Pepper's experiences show, it would be wrong not to live every moment to the fullest. Calling for a brave and creative reevaluation of what is possible in the second half of women's lives, Prime invites every woman to relish her sexuality, take risks, and go after what she really wants--whether it's a sandwich or something substantially more satisfying. . . .

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0061173584
• ISBN13: 9780061173585
• Release Date: June 2007
• Publisher: William Morrow & Company
• Length: 272 Pages
• Weight: 1.08 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 6.3" x 9.3"

Customer Reviews

Tom Jones grows up and changes gender

In a world where men and women both tend to be dishonest or silent about their sexual lives, it's refreshing to read such an honest and self-searching book. This book is zestful and sensitive at once--more Tom Jones than Jane Eyre, thank god, with Dr. Pepper playing a female Tom Jones. Yes, there are sad parts. And accounts of the kinds of emotional mistakes we all seem prone to. It's much more personal than academic, and that's great. It's not so easy to be frank (and vulnerable) about the volatile and rather mysterious mix of lust and love that moves us all into our relationships, and while you may or may not identify with Dr. Schwartz's gregarious and wide-ranging sexual and social style, there's so much in this book that's life-affirming, brave and supportive of female efficacy and freedom, that I highly recommend it to any women who's in transition, or facing growing older and all the limiting messages we get about that, or simply wanting to make sure she keeps her mojo in good working order.

Not Just for Women in their Prime!

As soon as my wife finished reading her copy of Prime, with that luscious cover, I grabbed it and starting reading. What a remarkable book!! What a remarkable woman! Dr. Pepper Schwartz, a highly regarded academic sexologist takes off her professorial robes (literally) and shares her most intimate experiences, discoveries, and evolving wisdom as a single woman exploring sex and love in what she comes to view as the prime of her life. This is a great read,not just for single women in their "prime," but for men and women of any age.

Thank God We're Not Young Any More

If you were (safely) married when the sexual revolution began and went back into the dating world as a divorced woman in the years that followed, you know how difficult it was to ignore all those messages from the Fifties about how 'nice girls don't." Most of us who are single in this stage of our lives did anyway, and still do, but in case any of those messages are still holding you back, a few pages of this terrific book will convince you not to waste any more time before you make the most of the opportunities for sexual adventure and sensual gratification that are all around you. And while you don't have to go to Bali (although who wouldn't?) to get what's yes, still coming to you, it's lucky for us that Pepper Schwartz did. There will be critics caviling that what the lady really wanted was love, not sex, but as the onlooker in the classic scene in "When Harry Meant Sally" said of Meg Ryan's restaurant orgasm, "I'll have what she's having." Brava, Dr. Pepper!

I love a good story!

Prime is delightful, entertaining, encouraging. I have recommended it to women in my life from age 21 to 70. As Debbie Siegel describes on her blog, it defines one (wonderful) end of the lust continuum. I'm all for it.

Hurrah for Pepper

Prime is a good read with accurate information and advice woven into it. The concept of "two handed massage" and a get-away to Bali reads like friendly advice over coffee, but in reality it is also sound couples counseling. The theoretically advice is cloaked in wonderful erotic adventures that can be a guide book for any women who wants to continue to be sexually responsive. When I turned 60 everyone was saying it was all over. Pepper has confirmed my belief that a fulfilling sex life is not just for the young of age, but the young of heart as well. For women, love and sex go together like pie and ice cream. Pepper tells us that ice cream can be great all by itself .