by Heather Corinna

Need a place to start in building your sexuality canon? Start at the bookstore or your local library, and get your read on with these books we suggest as cornerstones for a holistic, informed sex education!

Sex, Gender, Body and Identity

Shere Hite's studies were, and still are, groundbreaking and enlightening:

• The Hite Report: A National Study of Female Sexuality and The Hite Report on Male Sexuality by Shere Hite

Starter guides for younger guys and girls:

• The Guy Book: An Owner's Manual by Mavis Jukes
• Deal with It! A Whole New Approach to Your Body, Brain, and Life as a gURL by Esther Drill, Heather Mcdonald and Rebecca Odes

Two great explorations of how gender can impact us negatively -- and what can be done to counter it -- as we come of age, and one awesome book to help figure it all out for yourself:

• Real Boys : Rescuing Our Sons from the Myths of Boyhood by William Pollack
• Reviving Ophelia: Saving the Selves of Adolescent Girls by Mary Pipher
• My Gender Workbook: How to Become a Real Man, a Real Woman, the Real You, or Something Else Entirely by Kate Bornstein

Issues particular to how culture and media impacts young women's sexuality:

• Dilemmas of Desire: Teenage Girls Talk about Sexuality, by Deborah L. Tolman
• Slut! Growing Up Female with a Bad Reputation by Leora Tanenbaum
• The Beauty Myth: How Images of Beauty Are Used Against Women by Naomi Wolf

Solid GLBT Youth Guides

• GLBTQ: The Survival Guide for Queer and Questioning Teens by Kelly Huegel
• Am I Blue?: Coming Out from the Silence by Marion Dane Bauer
• Free Your Mind by Ellen Bass

Complete Sexuality Guides

Two great basics for men and for women:

• Our Bodies, Ourselves: A New Edition for a New Era by Boston Women's Health Book Collective
• The New Male Sexuality by Bernie Zilbergeld

Sexclopedias:

• Sex for One: The Joy of Selfloving by Betty Dodson
• The Good Vibrations Guide to Sex: The Most Complete Sex Manual Ever Written by Cathy Winks and Anne Semans
• Sex Toys 101: A Playfully Uninhibited Guide by Rachel Venning and Claire Cavanah
• The Whole Lesbian Sex Book: A Passionate Guide for All of Us by Felice Newman
• The Joy of Gay Sex, Revised & Expanded Third Edition by Charles Silverstein and Felice Picano
• The Ultimate Guide to Sex and Disability by Miriam Kaufman, Cory Silverberg and Fran Odette
• The Survivor's Guide to Sex: How to Have an Empowered Sex Life After Child Sexual Abuse by Staci Haines
• Last, but not least, we obviously endorse S.E.X.: The All-You-Need-to-Know Progressive Sexuality Guide to Get You Through High School and College, by Heather Corinna, our very own sexuality guide. Written with you in mind, in the same tone and approach you're used to at the website, but loaded up with far more information than you'll find here, we hope this is THE sexuality reference guide that'll serve your needs for now and for years to come.