70s Intimacy Guides Before Algorithms Knew You

The Happy Hooker — Xaviera Hollander

The memoir that made "sex work" a dinner party topic before anyone called it sex work. Hollander's 1972 bestseller wasn't just scandalous — it was funny, self-aware, and unapologetically mercenary about desire as transactional theatre. The prose is breezy, the anecdotes are vivid, and the politics are messier than anyone wanted to admit at the time. Dell printed millions of these; finding a copy with intact spine lettering is the real hunt. Explore our current copy of The Happy Hooker or browse more Science books at Patina.

The Sensuous Couple — Robert Chartham

The married-people version of the "sensuous" craze, minus the winking innuendo. Chartham's guide reads like a hybrid of Masters & Johnson clinical research and a very patient older cousin explaining what actually works. It's earnest without being preachy, specific without crossing into instructional diagrams, and refreshingly free of the "spice up your marriage!" desperation that plagued 80s equivalents. The tan covers on these paperbacks fade to a perfect burnt sienna. Explore our current copy of The Sensuous Couple or browse more Science books at Patina.

For Each Other — Dr. Lonnie Barbach

The feminist sex therapist's handbook that treated female pleasure as a research problem worth solving. Barbach's 1982 guide is technically post-70s, but it distils a decade of clinical work with women navigating desire in the wake of second-wave feminism. The tone is warm, the case studies are disarmingly specific, and the advice is grounded in actual longitudinal research rather than Cosmo-style speculation. Later editions softened the cover design; the early printings have a clinical authority the newer ones lack. Explore our current copy of For Each Other or browse more Science books at Patina.

Men in Love — Nancy Friday

The companion to My Secret Garden that asked men to submit their fantasies and actually got thousands of responses. Friday's 1980 follow-up is rawer and stranger than the women's volume — partly because male respondents had fewer cultural scripts for articulating vulnerability, partly because Friday lets the contradictions sit unresolved. The fantasies range from tender to disturbing, and Friday's framing commentary threads a line between empathy and clinical distance. Mass market paperbacks like this one are harder to find intact; the spines crack easily. Explore our current copy of Men in Love or browse more Science books at Patina.

Penthouse Letters — Edward Springer (ed.)

The published reader submissions that turned a magazine column into a genre unto itself. Springer's compilations of Penthouse reader letters occupy a weird space between erotica and anthropology — they're performance, sure, but they're also a record of what people in the 70s thought counted as transgressive or worth sharing. The prose is purple, the scenarios are formulaic, but the mass-market format and newsstand distribution made these ubiquitous in a way digital erotica never replicated. Explore our current copy of Penthouse Letters or browse more Science books at Patina.

How to Drive Your Man Wild in Bed — Graham Masterton

The heteronormative advice book that at least skipped the euphemisms and got specific. Masterton's guide is dated in its assumptions about gender roles, but it's also surprisingly direct about mechanics, communication, and the gap between fantasy and logistics. The tone veers between cheeky and clinical, and the mass-market paperback format meant it lived in bedside drawers across suburban Australia. The cover art on these is hilariously earnest. Explore our current copy of How to Drive Your Man Wild in Bed or browse more Science books at Patina. These paperbacks thrived in the decade between the pill's normalisation and the AIDS crisis — a narrow window when desire felt like a frontier worth mapping rather than a risk to be managed. The spines are creased, the pages are foxed, and the advice is half-obsolete, but the willingness to treat sexuality as a subject demanding seriousness, humour, and research hasn't aged at all. Shop all Science books at Patina Paperbacks →

Where can I buy secondhand 70s intimacy guides in Australia?

Patina Paperbacks stocks rotating preloved copies of 70s-era sexuality and relationship guides, including titles by Xaviera Hollander, Nancy Friday, and Dr. Lonnie Barbach. We ship Australia-wide from Sydney, and the current selection lives in the Science collection — most copies retain original cover art and spine wear from the decade.

Are 70s sex advice books still relevant today?

Honestly? The mechanics are mostly timeless, but the gender politics are a relic. Books like For Each Other and Men in Love hold up because they were grounded in actual research and anonymised testimony, not trend-chasing. The Penthouse Letters compilations are more historical curiosity than practical guide, but they're a fascinating snapshot of what counted as transgressive in the pre-internet era.

What's the difference between The Sensuous Woman and The Sensuous Couple?

The Sensuous Woman (1969, by "J") was aimed at single women and leaned heavily into performance and seduction. Robert Chartham's The Sensuous Couple is the married-or-partnered version — less focused on novelty, more interested in communication and sustained intimacy. Chartham's tone is warmer and less instructional-manual than the original "sensuous" books.

Did Nancy Friday's books influence modern conversations about fantasy?

Absolutely. My Secret Garden (1973) and Men in Love (1980) created a template for talking about private desire in public — the anonymised testimony format became the blueprint for later works like Betty Dodson's sex ed workshops and even early internet forums. Friday's insistence that fantasy wasn't pathology was radical at the time and still echoes in contemporary sex-positive discourse.

Why are these old paperbacks so foxed and yellowed?

Cheap pulp paper from the 70s wasn't acid-free, so it oxidises beautifully over time — that's the foxing (brown spots) and yellowing you see on most mass-market paperbacks from the era. It's part of the charm. If you want pristine pages, buy a modern reprint; if you want a book that smells like 1974 and has someone's dog-eared favourite pages, you want the preloved copy.