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Masters Of Sex: The Life And Times Of William Masters And Virginia Johnson, The Couple Who Taught America How To Love (2000)

by Thomas Maier(Favorite Author)

3.6 of 5 Votes: 5

ISBN

1597772518 (ISBN13: 9781597772518)

languge

English

genre

History & Biography

review 1: I would probably never even have heard of this book, except it popped up on the front page of a list of recommendations, and I remember learning about Masters & Johnson and their research in college, and I knew they had recently started a TV show of the same name. So I took a chance.A disclaimer, obviously, is that much of this book is sexually explicit in the description of their research. If you can look past that, it is a fascinating biography of how two people, one of whom was a woman never trained as a therapist or a researcher, began studying sex in conservative 1950's America. I was so interested in Virginia Johnson's role in the book, in their research, and in American culture and history. How she went from being a divorced housewife without a college degree to bei... moreng on the cover of TIME magazine and one of the most famous researchers at that time, in an era that was known for being anything but feminist, kept me fascinated, and wanting to discuss the book the whole time I was reading it. Unfortunately, due to the subject matter, it doesn't make for an easy conversation with just anyone. :)I only had three complaints about the book, which kept it from being one of my 5-star books for this year. First, it was too long. Way too long. Second, I felt like the author would stop the narrative periodically to extol the virtues and significance of Masters' and Johnson's research. Yes, it was groundbreaking and tremendously important. But we don't need an entire chapter devoted to this concept every 3-4 chapters. Third, my Kindle version contained pictures in the middle of it which revealed some major plot points from later in their lives, which were unwanted spoilers for me. I know that it's really common for biographies to have pictures of their subjects in the middle of them, but I was sort of disappointed to know how Masters and Johnson's relationship turned out, when as a reader, I wasn't even close to that point in time in the story.But, overall, a great book that I'd recommend to anyone who thinks they might be interested in reading about this subject matter.
review 2: I wanted to read this book after watching the television program by the same name. I was curious as to what was fictionalized and what was not. After three months, I made it to page 116 (of 375). The writing was a bit scattered; I was often confused as to who was who and was often looking back through the pages to find an introduction of the person who appeared. Perhaps I will try to read more after I watch another season of the show. less

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