This is much more an intelligent compendium than a porn-inspired smut-fest, but that's not to say you should read it on the train. Unless, of course, you don't mind being caught mid-ogle at a full range of genital diagrams, pictoral descriptions of the key variants of heterosexual sex, portraits of phallic gods, Kama Sutra positions, and 18th-century lovers copulating.
Oxford-educated stud-muffin James McConnachie has written a comprehensive, fearless book, part socio-history and part manual. But while his good-spirited, intelligent approach makes for an engaging read, anyone with even the faintest aversion to the graphics of sex should probably look away – or cherry pick carefully.
Of course, McConnachie is right that anatomical understanding is the basis of good sex (oh, to be his wife), and no matter how experienced you are (or think you are), it's always good to review the complex specifics of the sex organs and the hormonal chemistry that drives them. Indeed, as the Rough Guide ardently shows, those who look genitalia in the face have a better chance of having great sex than shirkers. It's worth looking at those images carefully.
One of the most refreshing, and valuable, aspects of the book is its feminism. Female genitalia are unusually prominent, intricately explored and celebrated (even a shade more than the male apparatus). And McConnachie is emphatic that women experience better orgasms than men, are capable of more of them and in a greater number of bodily places, and explains why.
The topic of sex is vast and chaotic. McConnachie makes a valiant stab at imposing order on it, but the end result is inevitably rather chaotic. It's a juggling act between the socio-historic long lens and the very short here's-how-it-is lens. A history of courtly love jostles with Samuel Pepys's masturbatory diary, lesbianism through the ages, how to choose a dildo and the merits of plastic vaginas. And who knew that one in five penguins is gay, or that in third-century India straight men received fellatio from other men? The whir of facts, stories, eras, oddities, myths and practical advice makes your head spin dangerously. But on the whole, sex is contextualised here with great flair and variety, and it's a work that is well worth reading. Just make sure you bring another book for the train.
