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Review: Reclaiming Eros (book)

eros1Reclaiming Eros: Sacred Whores and Healers has won an Independent Publisher Award in the New Age (Mind-Body-Spirit) category! Congratulations to the co-authors, Susanne Blackburn and Margaret Wade.

I picked up this book probably about two years ago, primarily because I recognized some of the names of the people it features work with the Body Electric School, which I’ve been involved with for about eight years now. The main content of the book are extensive interviews with and statements from healers who primarily work with sexual energy, like Betty Dodson, Annie Sprinkle, Rudy Ballentine, Joseph Kramer, and Alex Jade. They’re sex workers, kind of, but many identify as sacred healers, or sacred whores. The language conversation that threads through the book is definitely interesting – who are you, what do you do, and what do you call it? There is a long history of being sexual healers in this society, but it’s a profession that has been so heavily shamed and weighed down with our leftover puritanical ideals.

There’s a chapter at the end which also discusses how to get involved with a healer, what to expect, what you might want to do, what questions to ask, which I highly recommend. This whole book will give you a better idea about erotic energy work, right from the mouths and brilliant brains of many of the pioneers and trailblazers of the industry and movement. It’s beautiful, and I highly recommend it if you’re intrigued by sexual healing and if you want to know more about what is going on with this work now.

Visit reclaimingeros.com for more information about the book.

Published by Sinclair Sexsmith

Sinclair Sexsmith (they/them) is "the best-known butch erotica writer whose kinky, groundbreaking stories have turned on countless queers" (AfterEllen), who "is in all the books, wins all the awards, speaks at all the panels and readings, knows all the stuff, and writes for all the places" (Autostraddle). ​Their short story collection, Sweet & Rough: Queer Kink Erotica, was a 2016 finalist for a Lambda Literary Award, and they are the current editor of the Best Lesbian Erotica series. They identify as a white non-binary butch dominant, a survivor, and an introvert, and they live outside Seattle as an uninvited settler on traditional, ancestral, & unceded Snoqualmie land.

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