The Practical Seductress

Sue Camaione is a rebellious young woman in pursuit of physical pleasure and sexual equality during the second wave of feminism—the 1970s-80s, a time when gender double standards rule. Throughout her adventures she doggedly resists the virgin-whore dichotomy at every turn and learns that the road to freedom is a minefield paved with passion, danger, and love.

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In this sexually charged memoir, Sue Camaione sets off on a rebellious course to make her way as a young woman determined to live on her own terms despite societal mores. Full of a precocious curiosity about sexuality, Sue questions her religious education, challenges her school dress code, sets herself on a quest to lose her virginity, and, as she grows older, encounters challenges that at times leave her broke, sick, and homeless. She flees upstate New York, embarking on romantic adventures across the country. She discovers orgasmic joy in the Rocky Mountains, falls in love in Tucson, struggles with open marriage in San Diego, and explores forbidden intimacy in the arms of a Chilean graduate student in Boston. These experiences, men, places, and friendships transform her. Both a coming-of-age story and a depiction of an era, The Practical Seductress exposes the gender double standard and the dangers and joys of sexual freedom that defined the 1970s and '80s. Filled with humor and learned wisdom, this is a story of desire and survival, navigating treacherous and unpredictable paths, defying social norms, and finding redemption.