Sex Gets Real 144: The cult of virginity & first time sex with Amber Keyser

As you know, January's theme this year for confessions is FIRSTS. It felt wonderful to be able to have Amber Keyser, author of The V-Word, join in the fun this week as her book is an anthology of 17 stories all about first time sexual experiences.

But what does first time sex mean? The V-Word explores that with beautiful depth and diversity, including trans voices and queer voices among the many stories.

We dive into virginity and what a dated, patriarchal concept it is. Amber even has a phrase I've become obsessed with: the cult of virginity. We talk about teenagers and sex, resources for young people that offer possibilities rather than prescriptions about what sex should be, and dive into her new novel.

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Resources discussed in this episode

"Beast" by Brie Spangler, which is a YA novel centering a trans character

About Amber Keyser

Amber J. Keyser is an evolutionary biologist-turned-author, who writes both fiction and nonfiction for tweens and teens. In addition to The V-Word (Beyond Words/Simon Pulse, 2016), she is the author of The Way Back from Broken, a heart-wrenching novel of loss and survival (Carolrhoda Lab, 2015), Sneaker Century: A History of Athletic Shoes (Twenty-First Century Books, 2015), and the forthcoming Pointe, Claw, a novel about claiming the territory of the body (Carolrhoda Lab, 2017). She is the co-author with Kiersi Burkhart of the middle grade series Quartz Creek Ranch (Darby Creek, 2017).

 

You can learn all about Amber at www.amberjkeyser.com. You can also follow her on Twitter @amberjkeyser.

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