Very entertaining; I laughed out loud several times. Mary Roach's personal experiences combined with her witty reporting make for an entertaining and humorous read, especially at the beach (where I read it).

Read just one of Mary Roach's book and one can tell she's happiest when she's learning something new (and twisted). Bonk is a perfect example of this.

First-hand interviews, experiences and even experiments on herself pepper this book with just enough squeamish-ness to keep the book fun as it is informative. And before I note any quibbles, please note that I thought this was a fantastic book and am eagerly waiting whatever pops into Mary's mind next.

The small cons I have to this book are these:
-Her slight discomfort with the topic off sex comes through in the text in some parts. Her humor seems a little more forced than in her previous books, so that's open to interpretation, of course. Maybe she's more comfortable with ghosts and cadavers than sex research? -Really, a negligible issue

-Mary Roach's signature of injecting herself into the story might have gone a little too far. I shudder when personal pronouns are in non-fiction, but, again, not a major problem.

All-in-all, another book that drips (ew) with Mary Roach's humor and attention to details. A great read that should sate her fans and those interested in a book on sex research that sifts through social norms in a way that equips the reader to make their own decisions.

Read it!

A good breakdown of studies of sexual issues that is bound to enlighten the creatures in their pursuits of fulfilling sexual unions.

this book had a slow start but it was a really interesting read. it had a lot of her cleverness and whit inside also. i liked her other books more, but this one gave me lots of entertainment and extra knowledge. mary roach is the queen of obscure research.

Having loved Mary Roach's earlier books, I bought three copies of this - one for me and two for gifts. I forced my way through the first half of the book before I threw in the towel and gave away my copy as well. Just the theme of Bonk promises fascinating analysis, an interesting review of the history of sexuality, and wonderful stories from differences and similiarities through the ages and around the globe. Unfortunately, you'll find none of this in this book. Instead it reads like a poorly written college term paper that focuses way too long on academia and archaic, and boring, studies. Sorry, Mary, but this book just doesn't cut it as an interesting read.

I'm afraid I might have been a bit irritating to be around while I was reading this book - there was so much I wanted to share, and this book really isn't for EVERYONE.

Some people, for example, didn't really want to see the poster from the Danish government intended to help train farmers in making sure their pigs have climaxes during artificial insemination (which improves fertility)....

I really wanted to like Bonk. Mary Roach seems joyous in her celebration of the science of sex. It's clear she's spent (and thoroughly enjoyed) her time researching the subject, unfortunately the book never really comes together. Mary Roach's 'signature wit' comes of more as juvenile as she seems lost in her perspective on her subject. Is Bonk a personal essay about her journey through the world of sex research? A portrait of the history of sex and the science surrounding it? Roach never settles in with a clear perspective on her subject and ends up getting lost in the telling.

I'm not a huge fan of footnotes, I respect when they are used well but despise when they are used as long tangents for a broken narrative. In Bonk Roach uses long footnotes on almost every other page and uses them to add 'witty commentary' to some of her points. Most of the footnotes should have been integrated into the main text as they often feel orphaned from it.

The most telling chapter of this book is when Roach goes to Cairo to get insight into sex research in Egypt. Her trip, the results and the chapter are a complete let down and yet Roach tries to salvage it at the end with a chest thumping cry of how important people dedicating their lives to sexual discourse are. It's at this point you can see that Roach is 'rounding third' in her book and realizes she doesn't have the goods to bring it all home.

It's a real shame. This book could and should have been better. Mary Roach is a fine writer, an obvious research nut and the subject is one that is anything but unengaging. Unfortunately it's yet another book where the editor let the author run free. Some real hard nosed editing, some real focus, a re-arrangement of the footnotes and a clarity of perspective and you've got a fine book. But what's in this pages isn't worth picking this book up in hardcover. It's really a casual mass-market paperback read (or even a used one at that).

Basically, if it's by Mary Roach, you should read it. Her books are at once hilarious and informative. A fan since "Stiff," I pre-ordered "Bonk" and couldn't have been more pleased. I highly recommend this book.

I have been a big fan of Mary Roach since I read Stiff...She did not disapoint in Bonk. I was laughing out loud within the first few pages and squirming the next few pages. I love how she tells you the history of things...yet keeps it intresting with little facts that would make the most open sexual person squirm. Yet you still look at her as a writer not some perv. I have already recommended this book to a bunch of people!

Quite the exciting combination of science, sex, and scintillation, Bonk is sure to please. The table of contents and footnotes alone arouse more laughs than most books do in their entirety. With skill, wit, and clarity, Mary Roach uncovers some fascinating sexual physiological research and exposes the truth about what really happens (or doesn't) between fore- and post-play. Bedtime reading at its finest!

Sexuality is a very important part of human life, that much most of us will agree with. Our history with sexuality, however, has been plagued with some of the worst behaviors the human kind can showcase: prejudice, shame and and overall desire to control it, to keep it locked.

The history of studying sexuality very much reflects the prejudice with which society has historically approached sex itself. This is something that you can get by looking at Mary Roach's Bonk. The book is funny if you like Mary's witty writing and it is filled witrh interesting facts and factoids about the men and women that have the courage to venture studying the physiological aspects of sexuality.

However, where the books falls awfully short is in making a more comprehensive job in the subjects presented. In many areas it feels like a university paper that relies too much on Google as its main source. In some others it feels like her limited sources places her in the brink of ridicule (e.g. stating that human male average time between penetration and orgasm is two minutes). Additionally in many of her examples she is not talking about actual scientific experiments, but about con artists that exploited people's desire for a better sexual life. She does not do a good job calling out the scientists from the impostors.

Mary Roach seems to have made a habit of authoring one-word titled books about science-related trivia that are intent on tickling as well as enlightening us. 2003's Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers reveals what happens to a body after death, and 2005's Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife tackles the afterlife and the existence of souls. Her latest tome provides another outlet for her witty, sometimes maddening observations, and it does have the extra titillation factor of being about sexual research with herself as the primary subject. For the most part, she ventures forward from the point of no return, The Kinsey Report, but she uses the occasional reference to the ancient Greeks to validate a point. The author's approach is intriguing as she examines less the scientific subject and instead places more emphasis on the ways scientists study their subjects. This style is surprisingly compatible with a deep-dive discussion of sex, and she has a good time using medical euphemisms and scholarly jargon like "vaginocavernosus reflex" and "nocturnal penile tumescence monitoring" to add some levity to her points.

For the most part, the 319-page book is a congenial entertainment as Roach delves into centuries of research, both scientific and otherwise, into sex among human beings and other beasts. Beginning most appropriately with a chapter called "Foreplay" (versus the typical Foreword), she guides us on a quest that takes us through the human body and the most intimate recesses of our minds. To the author, nothing is sacred. Roach goes beyond merely watching a variety of sexual acts and experiments regardless of whether they take place in the laboratory or not. She interviewed dozens of people, many renowned specialists in fields as unusual as microsurgical potency reconstruction; examined lots of heretofore confidential documents; took a tour of a Danish pig farm to explore the female orgasm's relationship to fertility; and watched sows get artificially inseminated by hand. She has no qualms about becoming an experimental subject herself and volunteered to make love with her husband while their insides were being observed by ultrasound. His inducement was an expense-paid trip to Europe where the research took place.

Sometimes, Roach's curiosity is too overwhelming, and her enthusiasm becomes less contagious and more unctuous as the later chapters attest. Her zealous tone can get alienating when she doesn't think too much about the context of her comments, for example, discussing how an erection can be compared to nasal congestion in the middle of a discourse about major penis surgery. One can only surmise that the marginalia distracts her from the more macro-level discussion this book could have addressed, such as how and when society moved from a repressive viewpoint regarding sex to one that thrives on liberation and personal pleasure. Roach is onto something here, as we tend to have a reflexive suspicion that sex researchers must be voyeurs by nature, perhaps because of our own pangs of jealousy and envy over the acts they are watching performed. Avoidance of the voyeur label is why most of them describe sex in the dullest possible way. However, Roach most definitely does not have that concern. In fact, if anything, she could calm down a bit and let the research speak for itself.

As a psychologist and sex therapist, I pounced on this book when I saw it. I should have been more excited--after all, although I was not named, the debate on testosterone that I was part of is mentioned in the book. But the book had this sort of "gee, whiz" quality that, to me, degrades the earnest study of human sexuality. No one thinks it's weird that scientists study the esophagus, the bladder, or the colon. Why is it so weird to study the organs of pleasure and reproduction? I wish the book had either been genuinely funny, or genuinely serious. Not a bad book, just an average one on a very primal, important topic.

The information, such as it is, in this book is mostly trivial and/or useless. There is also not that much of it. The actual amount of info in the book might have made a long magazine article but no more. The book is shamelessly padded on almost every page with endless jokes and cutesy side remarks, found both in the text and in anecdotes in textual footnotes (the sole purpose for which the book uses footnotes). Since they often have nothing to do either with the book's subject or the material on the page at hand, they quickly become first disruptive and then irritating. A few are funny. More would be funny on their own but fail as irrelevant asides. Some are just stupid. The footnote on page 31 ending with former President Millard Fillmore's last words is an example of both irrelevance and idiocy. So also the one on page 263 that reveals that nominations for the Nobel prize are secret for 50 years so "make the claim, and nobody can prove otherwise until after you're dead. Add one to your resume today." The cutesy remarks in the main text can be found on virtually every page. Not a very well written book, not a very informative book, not a good book.

I have enjoyed all Mary Roach's books and this is no exception. Good tongue in cheek approach to science subjects.

This is a fascinating book, full of details and information on that most intriguing of subjects, sex. I laughed while I learned.

Highly recommended.

I really don't understand why so many others gave this book a 5 star rating. Overall it was an interesting book but the extensive footnoting was a bit annoying. Funny?...not really. Not as good as I had hoped but I don't regret the purchase.

As a steady reader of Mary Roach books I was so glad for Bonk! After Spook I must say I was a little discouraged, it got too opinionated, and judging by her wonderful ability to laugh at the impersonal and not take clear sides- I was worried she would not recover... and then there was Bonk. It is funny, as typical Roach, charming, awkward and a little endearing in only the way chapters about monkey mating and condom balloon insertion can get. If you liked stiff there are even some fun cadaver facts thrown in just for you. Definitely pick this book up.

To mimic a phrase from the book itself, Bonk is a book that was "undertaken simply for the sake of understanding the world" of sex research.

In researching the history of many investigations into sex, Mary Roach looks at an intimate topic in a fun and journalistic way that removes almost all the titillation. I say almost all, because to be honest, I almost had a wet dream the night I read the chapter about the orgasmic ability of women with spinal cord injuries.

But don't let that be the reason you buy this book. Buy it because you want to be entertained, fascinated, and educated...while reading about sex. E.g., what good does it do to surgically move the clit__is to the magic distance one inch from the birth canal*? What will men do for a better erection? (Answer: just about anything, such as transplant gonads from other men and animals) Why do sex researchers use themselves as test subjects? Why did Kinsey stick toothbrushes down his urethra and film it for posterity? And why do authors writing about sex researchers fly to England to see their intertwined parts via ultrasound?

It's amazing what people will do for sex and science. But thanks to Roach's extensive research, all you have to do is read this book.

* I didn't know if Amazon precluded certain anatomical words.

I found the first third of this book hilarious; screaming out loud funny ...the rest was BORING.
Plenty of unnecessary knowledge.Couldn't even finish the last ten pages.

The book is very witty and easily captures my attention. I normally read multiple books at once, but this one commanded that I read it. Excellent, I recommend it to anyone.

If you want to learn more about arousal and fertility, you'll find some nuggets in Bonk. But information about human sexuality isn't the focus of this book which is really about the difficulties of learning about human sexuality.

The barriers to knowledge include peculiar ideas based on nothing more than speculation, lack of technology to see inside the body, and prejudice against research into sexual relationships. In fact, to find out about how some of the techniques, Ms. Roach had to become a subject (including one time when she and her husband had to become the subjects . . . having marital relations in an MRI machine).

There are places in the book where you need a strong stomach to stick with the writing. I was vaguely reminded of the books based on the Darwin Awards at time, except the humor isn't as good here.

If you find reading about sexual relations easier if there are lots of funny animal stories and humor about research, you'll probably like this book better than I did. The information content (independent of the humor) could have been contained in a book about 25 percent of the length of this one.

Watch Video Here: http://www.amazon.com/review/RO7REQ6YQX9SH We recently had Mary Roach on our radio show and she was a lot of fun. The entire interview was an hour long but there were some short hilarious conversations that I'm sharing here as they demonstrate what a wonderful and funny book this is.

And you will --- with laughter! Such a no-no subject treated by a professional with a superb sense of humor!!!!!

I love Mary Roach and I think this is her best book yet. I kept laughing uproariously while I was reading this book, unfortunately usually in public, and would have to explain what the book was all about. Then, I wasn't content with embarrassing my myself enough with that, so I had to go on and rave about Stiff, which can be seen as a bit creepy to certain kinds of people. Anyway, this book is fascinating and FUNNY. If you don't have a stick up your butt (which I guess you don't or you wouldn't be checking out this book), you gotta read it! -and I don't use exclamation points

Let me commend for your consideration Ms. Mary Roach's new book Bonk, ISBN 978-0-393-06464-3.
Ms. Roach has written a column for Reader's Digest for several years. In the most recent issue of National Geographic an article by her examines primate behavior, publishing proof of certain hunting activities by open plain chimpanzees that anthropologists have been as reluctant to recognize as the early popes were the solarcentricity of the planets. She is an attractive, intelligent and engaging author who writes with panache and the serene confidence of one who has mastered not only the skill of writing but of thinking.
This book of hers, BONK, is probably the richest concentration of crucial information on the subject of sex that has ever been produced. The Kinsey Report purported to give statistics of various behaviors of the sexes, but did not venture far beyond that topic. The works of Masters and Johnson ranged widely over the topic and brought to light many previously unknown facts, concepts and ideas, usually of a scientific nature devoid of emotion. Bonk, however, covers the totality of human sexual culture as it exists currently, and even explores various animal venues (Bear with me, please! [No pun intended]). This book gives a detailed satellite image of the entire planet of sex, including the often recondite backgrounds of topics as well-known as the breakthroughs of Van Andel, Schultz, Mooyaart, Sabelis and Jupp [LNNG], whose works earned them the Millenium Ig Nobel Prize in medicine; the previously mentioned Kinsey, Masters and Johnson; and an exhaustive list of other researchers.
Terms not familiar to the ordinary intelligent reader are carefully but succinctly explained. The tone is hilariously informal (or informally hilarious), but such a vehicle carries a cargo of the finest gold. It is the most valuable work on the subject I have ever seen.
If you have not read the book, please obtain it and read at least the first five pages. It cannot help but enhance the knowledge, insight and wisdom of any human soul who reads it, and bodes well to make the battleground between male and female a less user-hostile area.
By way of disclaimer, I am not related to Ms. Roach nor to any company with any interest of any sort in the success of this book. I have never met her, and am at most simply an admiring reader of her wide ranging interests and works. But even without this disclaimer, the book speaks for itself. Read the first five pages and then just try to put it down. I'll bet that when you're done you'll agree with me in my assessment.

Once upon a time, Dr. Isaac Asimov attempted to explain the world to everybody. When I was growing up, I devoured both his science fiction and his non-fiction, learning a lot about what had already happened in the world, what was happening at the present, and what yet might happen. I enjoyed his non-fiction books and thought he was really good at explaining science to the layman.

But these days my heart belongs to Mary Roach! I will never stray. She's only written three books, but she's already captured every inquisitive bone and impulse in my body. She's written articles for READER'S DIGEST and NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC and her curiosity and propensity for knowledge and instruction seem inexhaustible.

STIFF: THE CURIOUS LIVES OF HUMAN CADAVERS revealed what happened to a body after death. Granted, some stuff maybe I wasn't too thrilled about learning - at first - but Roach took out (most) of the gross effect and totally turned the exercise into an instructional laughfest filled with history and fantastic errata. And the fascination of the subject, as well as her own passion for it, removed the stomach-churn of the experience

In SPOOK: SCIENCE TACKLES THE AFTERLIFE, Roach brought the same kind of intelligent, informative wit to the study of the afterlife and the existence of souls. I knew people were interested in proving the existence of such one way or the other, but I'd never before known to what lengths scientists (and armchair enthusiasts) had gone.

Now Roach delivers, BONK: THE CURIOUS COUPLING OF SCIENCE AND SEX, a hardcore - sorry, couldn't resist - look at the mysteries and mismanagement of sex. When I first saw the plain white, almost virginal book cover, I was entranced. Could a book on that subject really be called by that title? I couldn't help thinking how risqué everyone involved was being.

But I couldn't expect anything less of Mary Roach. All (or at least more than I'd ever before guessed at) of the secrets of sex are revealed between the covers, so to speak. She details several of the curious minds that probed into the subject, and the test patients that laid themselves bare. (See? Even I can't approach this subject with a straight face and the occasional ill-conceived giggle and pun.)

I also love history, and Mary Roach makes the most of the study of sex within those parameters as well. She left no rock unturned in her pursuit of this forbidden knowledge that civilization had invented. I knew that the scientists covered regularly in elementary and junior high science classes dug into the field of sex, but I'd never before known exactly to what degree. Nor did I know that some of them might even have murdered patients to gain knowledge. (I mean, how likely is it that a scientist would happen upon the body of a woman who'd died in the throes of orgasm so he could examine her corpse to better understand that function?)

Another thing I love about Mary Roach is that she's apparently willing to go anywhere to seek out knowledge and report back to the armchair scientists who can't afford to go and wouldn't be caught dead asking such questions. (And that's one of the reasons I like Mike Rowe on DIRTY JOBS.)

For this book, Mary Roach interviewed dozens of people, examined dozens of secret documents, took a tour of a pig farm and watched sows get artificially inseminated, first hand (by hand!), and even enticed her own husband into having sex while being subjected to an MRI. I have to admit, that after seeing Roach in action - forgive me - I can't help but believe that has to be one of the most interesting marriages in the world. I love my wife, but I'm not crawling up onto an MRI table to be watched by scientists for anybody.

Roach goes on to explore several other reconstructive surgery avenues physicians and surgeons have pursued over the year. Just when you think she can't top the last chapter, all you have to do is turn the page.

If you haven't discovered Mary Roach, if you think reading Masters and Johnson's HUMAN SEXUAL RESPONSE has made you an expert in the field, pick up BONK and become truly educated and amazed. Her chapter on Master and Johns, and their peers, casts that research in a totally different light and I found myself alternately appalled and amused.

The science field has a new champion ready to educate and entertain the masses, and her name is Mary Roach. I can't wait to see where she's going next.

"Bonk" was supposed to be riotously funny, a real laugh-a-minute book about sexuality and sex. Well, it's not nearly as funny as I'd hoped. In fact, I only laughed once or twice. Mostly, the attempts at humor are mild and fall just a little short in timing or set-up. Roach has a decent touch for writing funny material, but not a great touch.

So, the delivery ain't great. Then there's the material. Most of this stuff is from Re-tread City. Masters & Johnson? Please. The MRI study? Old news. If Roach wanted an uproarious romp through sex research, there's a lot more funny stuff out there.

It's an OK book, but I think it's overhyped. It's pretty average.

Well, the Queen is a scientist by training and therefore a student of finer points of the exchange of genetic matter. In addition, the Queen has been studying chromosomal exchange for many, many years now and has successfully created an F1 generation of her own. In the 1970s genetic exchange was a much more casual matter and the various and sundry methods of exchange were a matter of her intense interest. However, the Queen LEARNED A LOT from Ms Roach's excellent, ribald and informative book. Pigs. Who knew? In addition to being a worthy and descriptive text, the study of the scientific endeavors of Masters and Johnson and the ilk is fascinating in and of itself. You have to admire the intense curiosity of these folks and the ingenuity of their various "methods". I also found satisfying (if you will) the final chapter where the key to transformative genetic exchange encounters was revealed. I will not spoil it for you but suffice it to say that I found it to ring true. I recommend this book with some reservations as the prurient will not find Ms Roach's sense of humor palatable.

Mary Roach, author of Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers, turns her eye and wit to the history of sex research. She examines the history, controversy, and amusing anecdotes that surround the study of sex, excitement, orgasm, and desire. Unlike studies using cadavers, studies of human sexuality have been around for less than a century (with a couple of rather amusing exceptions). Like cadaver studies, there are regulations, taboos, and difficulties connected to the field. One of the most glaring problems is finding volunteers!

Overall, this is an excellently researched book. Roach reviewed and researched studies in the field, examined current studies, and even volunteered for some studies that didn't allow visitors. Reading the works cited page is one of the funniest things I've done in a long time, and that was after reading about how she had to convince her husband to have sex with her in an MRI so she could get information about an ongoing study.

The topics include examining how arousal differs from men and women (the section considering the differences between how each views porn was fascinating), showing how the exact function and actions of all the fun parts actually work (this history of this is amazing), and describing the equipment used to figure out all this information. The book is informative and a useful read for anyone interested in the field, anyone looking to understand (scientifically) how to improve their sex lives, and anyone who is interested in the history of medical research. Her style parallels her style in Stiff. However, there she used a great deal of gallows humor. In this book, she uses a great deal of raunch humor, which gets a tad bit old after a few chapters. She also greatly overuses footnotes, which distracts from reading (and the reason this book didn't get ranked a 5 star).

If this book were not about sex, I probably would have put it down. I really enjoyed it and learned a lot and I appreciate Mary doing this research. When I read a book I like to discuss it with others who have also read it, but I can't get anyone else to read it. They get bogged down in the nonfictional aspect where she names the researcher and the school financing the research and they just don't want to read on. I, on the other hand, thought the whole project was excellent!

I thought most amazing were the involunary acts the human body undergoes in order to reproduce. Anyone trying NOT to become pregnant had BETTER be on top of their birth control, because the body itself has a different agenda. I was enlightened on the causes of ED -the veins. I thought it was mostly psychological, and would have been devastated in a few years as, my husband is not getting any younger...but there are treatments, thank goodness for the more modern ones...and the modern views. I thought the ending was a let down as I read it, but an hour or so later, her point hit me and it sort of made me sad. The whole thing about gender empathy, which makes homosexual sex presumably better than heterosexual relations was a revelation that couples do need to talk about what each partner likes. These conversations must be specific and deliberate.

Mary Roach's sense of humor comes through on every page! And her little interjections at the bottoms of the pages were almost a distraction, but knowing her humor, I read every one of them. Great book, Mary. I can't wait for your next book.

Kimberly G. Anderson
www.goodgirlonline.com

Mary Roach's first big book was a kind of multidisciplanary exploration of the history of human cadavers, and it friggin' rocked. Her latest, Bonk: the Curious Coupling of Science and Sex, follows a similar pattern: vast piles of scholarly research, some fun and disturbing field trips, and a lot of unlikely facts wrapped up in a book as clear and fun to read as a best-selling novel.

The only accusation that I could launch at Bonk with the hope of it sticking would be that its organization is loose, almost like a stream of consciousness conversation or a series of loosely realted articles. Each chapter is quite good in and of itself, and they all relate back to the main topic, but they're mostly hung together with loose segues that amount to "that made me wonder about [insert topic of next chapter here]".

That being said, Bonk is a great read: ranging from stuff you probably already know a few things about (like orgasms), to stuff you'd never have guessed (surgically adding an extra ball was very popular once). Roach, as is her great talent, manages to take a dizzying array of information and present it in a manner that's not merely accessible, but genuinely funny. When I read the footnote about Priapus - the roman god for whom four hour-plus erections are named - I laughed so hard I drooled a little.

That's about the only drooling I did when I was reading Bonk; for a book about sex, it's surprisingly unerotic. Then again, it's a book about science, and if anything could excise the eros out of sex, it's probably the rigors, repetitions, and incredibly dry language of science. Roach herself sometimes reads as frustrated by the arid descriptions and piles of lifeless data she had to sift through to find drops of interesting imagery. These she presents upon a golden platter of prose, as relieved to have found something entertaining to write about as the readers are to skip the boring research.

If you like science, and you like sex, you'll probably like this book. Or, to follow that logic to its conclusion, if you don't like this book, you're probably a moron and a liar.

As usual, Mary Roach delivers a funny and entertaining book you would be talking about during a conversation about sex. Every chapter is full of interesting anecdotes on how scientists and psychologists do sex research. If you loved "Stiff: the curious lives of human cadavers" you will like "Bonk; the curious coupling of science and sex".

Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex
I have eagerly awaited this book's release. I have Mary's other books: Stiff and Spook. She makes science fun!

When Bonk arrived and I saw that it was by the "best-selling author of STIFF", I got kind of worried. The byline "The Curious Coupling of Science of Science and Sex" had suggested that this was a treatment of, well, science and sex. But one written by the best-selling author of STIFF? I considered the implications and thought about sending back the book.

But I didn't.

As it turns out, Stiff is not about what you might think it is. In fact, it deals with "The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers". Relieved by this finding and thinking therefore that the book I had just purchased was not simply smut, I waded into Bonk.

It begins, "Albert R. Shadle was the world's foremost expert on the sexuality of small woodland creatures".

OK...

From here Roach moves deftly and with much humor through the work of well known investigators such as Kinsey and Masters and Johnson, as well as a host of less well known and prurient practitioners such as Robert Latou Dickinson, Giles Brindley, and Dorcus Butt.

Dorcus Butt??? Is it possible that there is actually a sex researcher by this name? Apparently so - a fact uncovered by the author's relentless research.

Eventually though, the book bonks (this is also a terminology to describe what happens to an endurance athlete expending too much energy and hitting the wall). Ultimately the exploration of material more and more bizarre becomes too much, and lapses into tasteless irritation.

For instance, the author travels to Taiwan to observe a penile implant operation.

When complete, and clearly in the interest of science, Roach asks Dr. Hsu (the surgeon) "May I squeeze it?" He answers, "Mary, you have traveled a long way. You can do whatever you want".

I guess this should have been expected given that it's written by the "best selling author of STIFF".

"I think by now you know how science is", says a researcher to Mary Roach. "You think you know a lot until you start to ask some really basic questions, and you realize you know nothing." That's perhaps a koan-like exaggeration, but it is certainly true that good research answers questions only to turn up more questions. This might be even more true in the arena of sexual research, the topic of Roach's enormously entertaining and informative _Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex_ (Norton). Roach has before written books about scientific evaluation of the physical and spiritual afterlife of the dead, and if she could make such macabre topics engaging and funny, you can count on a lively treatment of how science investigates sex. Part of the reason this book is so interesting is, of course, that everyone is interested in sex, and there is a great tangle of complicated hormones, engorgements, and reflexes that operate to give us sexual joy and we cannot even feel many of them operating. Another reason is that we got a late start in the scientific evaluation of the subject. Kinsey and Masters & Johnson were pioneers in a sphere where few others had gone before, because of a taint of naughtiness. Another reason the book is so interesting is that you can read all the books on chemistry, physics, or cosmology you want, and you will never find experiments as funny as those of the Egyptian researcher who monitored the coital rates of rats who wore polyester pants. And that's just one example of the experiments here.

Roach loves her subject, which she says is "as good as science gets" because it involves researchers who display "a mildly outrageous, terrifically courageous, seemingly efficacious display of creative problem-solving, fueled by a bullheaded dedication to amassing facts and dispelling myths in a long-neglected area of human physiology." She certainly gets into the spirit of the effort by recruiting her good-sport husband to be the first couple scanned in coition by 3D sonography."For the still images, we must hold still for several seconds, like Victorians posing for a tintype, only not like Victorians posing for a tintype." Roach reports on most of the other research without participating in it, like a paper from five years ago called "The Human Penis as a Semen Displacement Device". Not only did our male evolutionary forebears want to deposit their own semen into vaginas, they wanted to scoop out any semen from predecessors, and it turns out the shape of the glans at the end of the penis is just right to do this. This experiment involved no humans except for the experimenters. They used artificial semen (the recipe is given in the book), an artificial vagina from California Exotic Novelties, and three different artificial phalluses, one of them a control without a glans. The lifelike phalluses expelled 91% of the standing semen, while the cylindrical control expelled only 35%.

Roach has an appealing jocular prose, and her subjects in one chapter after another are, well, the sorts of scientists that would study such things, so they make for entertaining interviews. This does not keep her book from being packed with information, some of it at the cocktail-chatter level and some decidedly deeper. Here is the vaginal photoplethysmograph probe, and to balance that, the nocturnal penile tumescence monitor. Here is how Danish pig farmers stimulate sows so that artificial insemination has a better chance of success. Here is a report of the "inside-out" maneuver performed during surgery on the penis. Here are reflections about how doing sexual research was almost forbidden in the fifties, and then it became acceptable and fundable, but now in an era of "just say no" it has become difficult again. Here are explanations of how victims of paraplegia, who ought not to have sensation below the waist, can get orgasms. Here is evaluation of the famous upsuck theory of female orgasm, and an admission that studies comparing conception rates of women who have sex with orgasm and those who have sex without have simply not been done. Here are descriptions of sexual quackery from the past, including during the witch craze when witches were busy collecting men's penises by magic and putting them in the nests of birds who helpfully kept them alive with a diet of oats and corn. Here is the shorthand code used by the San Francisco Fire Department for sex toy emergencies. And here are some results from a forgotten study that issued from the lab of Masters & Johnson. The most fulfilling sex seems to have been that between committed gay and lesbian couples. Roach says, "Not because they were practicing special secret homosexual sex techniques, but because they `_took their time_.'" They moved slowly and lingered over each other's pleasure. They teased. They talked. Well, perhaps Roach examined research with more revolutionary lessons, but nonetheless, it might be practical to put this one into action.

ARE YOU IN THE MOOD FOR IT?

In her new book, Bonk: The Curious Couple of Science and Sex, Mary Roach approaches the subject of sex research with the same wit and curiosity present in her previous books- Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers, on the science of death, and Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife, a look at what happens after we die.

In Bonk, Roach describes the evolution of sex research: from studies by Alfred Kinsey and the lesser-known Robert Latou Dickenson, to the Egyptian doctor Ahmed Shafik, who dressed rats in polyester pants.

The 1920s were a curious decade for sex research. During that era, Dickenson, a Brooklyn-based gynecologist, became the first to take a laboratory-based approach to examining what happens physiologically when people have sex. Dickenson used test tubes to see what happened inside a woman during sexual intercourse and debunked theories that the penis locked on to the cervix during intercourse.
Dickenson later inspired Kinsey to conduct his famous experiments.

A history of scientific research is not that interesting, even if it involves the racy subject of sex. In Bonk, Roach has tried to infuse a dull subject with wit and humor. I agree with the reviewers that have commented Roach's banality gets old quick, but I don't know what other intriguing approach Roach could have taken to this topic. I concluded that as bored as I was with the post-modernist, sarcastic writing, it's probably the only approach Roach could have employed to write a book on sex research that you- presumably not a scientist and not a Cosmo or Playboy devotee-would have read.

Part of the problem is that this genre may be getting old. In the last decade I've read books that have dug up the quirky history of everything imaginable-the writing of the Oxford-English dictionary, orchid growing, bibliophilia, and china (as in china vases, not the country). It's clever, and at the time, I was happy to learn something about such idiosyncratic subjects, but this type of reading doesn't really satiate innate curiosity. You probably haven't read about sex research, because, well, let's face it, you probably don't care. I read history to learn about the present-the "Those who don't know history are bound to repeat it"-type of approach. Knowing that someone stuck polyester pants on a rat back in the day doesn't really tell me anything about my life now. It's interesting in a navel-gazing sort of a way, but not that fulfilling.

If you are in the mood for history, I think a People's History of the United States by Howard Zinn is probably the most interesting history book I've read. But it's serious. When I was a kid I read the Guiness Book of World Records and learned that Napoleon's small sex organs were kept in a glass jar after his death. They are now "in the hands of" a private collector who paid around $10,000 dollars for them. That's interesting right? You'll get the same sort of information from Bonk. Decide for yourself whether or not you're "in the mood" for it.

I enjoyed reading Mary Roach's earlier book, "Stiff", which was an entertaining and informative romp through the history of scientists' uses of cadavers. Granted, it was informative in the way that trivia questions are - fun to discuss over cocktails, but not really helpful to know. Still, it is interesting to pause and think about aspects of life - or death - that usually are beyond our concern. So, I was intrigued by "Bonk"; I expected Mary Roach would easily rise to the challenge.

She never quite got it up. Sure, it was informative. But after reading about one too many sex experiments involving primates, the thrill was gone. Since the subject became dull rather quickly, Roach filled the text with too many jokes - and some of them fell flat. (Some of them were downright nasty, such as the footnote in chapter 9 about a young boy being killed in an MRI machine. What could possibly be funny about that?) After a while, the forced humor and repetition of sex talk reminded me of 5th grade locker room conversation.

She also tried to make the story interesting by giving the reader portraits of the scientists involved in the research. The caricatures were either too silly or too scary; for the latter, she had to repeatedly make an effort to defend them as real scientists, not voyeurs. Adding these characters to the locker room talk and lame humor hardly made for an entertaining read.

You can only try to be funny about body parts for so long, before the reader just starts wishing Roach would hurry up and finish. The stories that could have been interesting, such as when she relates her own involvement in some of the more tame experiments, are about as titillating as a cold shower. Worse than that, the book doesn't seem to go anywhere. The reader is up to the eyeballs in scientists and genitals, but there seems to be no point to the story, except to say that there have been some scientists that have been interested in genitals. Well, isn't that a thrilling thesis?

In the end, I was reminded of something that Raymond Chandler wrote, comparing alcohol to love: "The first kiss is magic, the second is intimate, the third is routine. After that you take the girl's clothes off." In "Bonk", the preface - entitled 'foreplay', of course - draws you in. You'll read a chapter or two, but then you'll wish you'd said, "Not tonight, dear; I have a headache." It's just routine - and if the author isn't going to try to make it interesting and new, then the reader might as well just roll over and get some sleep. At least you'll still respect yourself in the morning.

About: A rundown of the scientific study of sex.

Pros: Funny and well written, Roach has a knack for putting scientific jargon and concepts into very understandable terms. Interesting and you're guaranteed to learn something. Also includes recipe for simulated human semen (Mix 7 ml room-temperature water and 7.26 g cornstarch, stir for 5 minutes and you'll get one fake ejaculate). Bonus fact: One study found 351 slang terms for penis but only 3 for clitoris.

Cons: I was surprised that John Wayne Bobbit was not mentioned when the concept of cutting off penises was brought up. I also expected Dr Kellogg, the inventor of Corn Flakes who was very against masturbation to get at least a nod. One nitpicky thing: In the chapter on boar sex, boar 433 gets referred to once as boar 443 (pg. 89).

Grade: B+

Here's to Ed! Author Mary Roach's husband Ed must be the world's most agreeable husband, seeing as he agreed to have sex with his wife in a 20-inch-diameter MRI tube. While she takes notes. And an observing doctor makes chit-chat.

I actually laughed out loud while reading this book. Often. At the rec center where I work out, I kept getting the giggles while pedaling on the stationary bike. I took off the book jacket with the giant word "Bonk" on the cover (and the tiny, um, "bonking" ladybugs) so it wouldn't be obvious what I was reading.

I learned a great deal. For example, did you know that Victorian gynecologists treated women without looking at them? Or that using most homemade sex machines of that era was "like dating a corn dog"? Or some people thought that witches collected penises and put them in boxes, where they moved around on their own and ate oats and corn?

Mostly I learned that I need to get Mary Roach's other books. She's a gem.

Here's the chapter list:

1. The Sausage, the Porcupine, and the Agreeable Mrs. G: Highlights from the pioneers of human sexual response
2. Dating the Penis-Camera: Can a woman find happiness with a machine?
3. The Princess and Her Pea: The woman who moved her clitoris, and other ruminations on intercourse orgasms
4. The Upsuck Chronicles: Does orgasm boost fertility, and what do pigs know about it?
5. What's Going On in There?: The diverting world of coital imaging
6. The Taiwanese Fix and the Penile Pricking Ring: Creative approaches to impotence
7. The Testicle Pushers: If two are good, would three be better?
8. Re-Member Me: Transplants, implants and other penises of last resort
9. The Lady's Boner: Is the clitoris a tiny penis?
10. The Prescription-Strength Vibrator: Masturbating for health
11. The Immaculate Orgasm: Who needs genitals?
12. Mind Over Vagina: Women are complicated
13. What Would Allah Say?: The strange, brave career of Ahmed Shafik
14. Monkey Do: The secret sway of hormones
15. "Persons Studied in Pairs:" The lab that uncovered great sex

Here's to Ed! Author Mary Roach's husband Ed must be the world's most agreeable husband, seeing as he agreed to have sex with his wife in a 20-inch-diameter MRI tube. While she takes notes. And an observing doctor makes chit-chat.

I actually laughed out loud while reading this book. Often. At the rec center where I work out, I kept getting the giggles while pedaling on the stationary bike. I took off the book jacket with the giant word "Bonk" on the cover (and the tiny, um, "bonking" ladybugs) so it wouldn't be obvious what I was reading.

I learned a great deal. For example, did you know that Victorian gynecologists treated women without looking at them? Or that using most homemade sex machines of that era was "like dating a corn dog"? Or some people thought that witches collected penises and put them in boxes, where they moved around on their own and ate oats and corn?

Mostly I learned that I need to get Mary Roach's other books. She's a gem.

Kegels and paraclitoridiennes and Thrillhammers, oh my!

Popular science writer Mary Roach is no stranger to the business of taboo-busting; her previous works, STIFF: THE CURIOUS LIVES OF HUMAN CADAVERS and SPOOK: SCIENCE TACKLES THE AFTERLIFE are books one might hesitate to discuss in polite company. (The biology of "human soup" isn't exactly acceptable dinner conversation, now, is it?) Lucky for us, Mary Roach* is a curious and intrepid soul who's more than willing tread where many of us would rather not - and then pen a witty, sarcastically humorous account of her journey.

BONK: THE CURIOUS COUPLING OF SCIENCE AND SEX is Ms. Roach's latest foray into the dark nooks and crannies of the scientific community's attic. Starting with the 1800s, the author details the history of scientific inquiries into human and animal sexuality. In its infancy, sexual research was awkward and, at times, nonsensical; as understanding of human biology increased, the field of sexual science evolved. Nowhere is this more evident than in science's treatment of women and gender; whereas scientists once argued whether women could even have orgasms, they now quibble over the most efficient means of getting the ladyfolk there. Just as the development of sexual knowledge reflects the progression of science and the embrace of the scientific method, so too does it correspond to women's liberation and gender equality. Thus, a history of sex studies is a history of science and social movements.

All is not meta with Ms. Roach, however. In fact, her delight seems to be in the details. While her discussion does focus on some overarching topics and themes - including the history of research into and knowledge of sexuality; female and male anatomy and psychology, including the similarities and differences between the genders; the physiology of sex, and how one goes about documenting it; and technology's impact on sexuality - BONK is full of meandering tangents and interesting side notes. Though the asterisks are many, don't skip a one. While a few are a bit extraneous even for me, some of the juiciest tidbits are in the side notes.**

BONK is a popular science book that's suitable for both lay people and professionals alike. The science in BONK is presented in such a way that it's accessible and engaging, yet it isn't watered down, either. Ms. Roach has an engaging writing style and a biting sense of humor, making this a "science of sex" book quite unlike any other. At times sardonic, macabre and morbid, she just has a way of skewering sacred cows - she'll show you precisely how the hot dog is made before cajoling you into taking a bite.**** Like many gourmet dishes, Ms. Roach's brand of humor may not please every palate - but this doesn't make it any less of a delicacy.

While I enjoyed the book immensely, I do have to offer a caveat. If you're sensitive to images of animal suffering (more specifically, vivisection and factory farming), read BONK with caution. As with any "history of science" book, BONK contains scenes of gratuitous violence against animals. For example, one early study the author describes involved the decapitation of a female dog - while mating (!) - in order to study the mobility of the male's semen. It's pretty gruesome stuff, and while Ms. Roach is for the most part appropriately horrified, some of the more modern abuses are left unquestioned.

* Even the woman's name tickles my fancy. "Mary Roach." Roach clip, anyone?

** For example, I bet you didn't know that perforated postal stamps are a low-tech way to determine whether a man is medically (as opposed to psychologically) impotent. Just wrap a roll around the package in question, and ship it off for overnight delivery. If the stamps are torn upon morning pickup, said package is in working (physical) order.***

*** The USPS both knows of and endorses the practice, FYI.

**** Much in the same manner she cajoled her husband into bonking in an MRI machine in the name of science. Or so one might assume.*****

***** Pants off to you, Ed!

Author Mary Roach set out to find and write about sex research around the world (and about the yeilds of that research) and wound up following a lot of very strange paths. From a urologists office in Taipei to a sow furrowing operation in Denmark to a "toy" manufacturer in Chatsworth California, the author tracked down all leads that were presented to her and followed up to learn all there was about how the human anatomy works and why research on this subject is usually cloaked in euphemisms. At times she delves back into the 1800s to explain how we are where we are today and why.

To say the book is funny is an understatement. The author has a gift for puns and uses it to maximum potential, taking material that could be somewhat dry and turning it into page turning reading. If you are interested in the science of sex and love to laugh, this is a wonderful book that will not fail to deliver.

Ms Roach has written a hiliarious account of science in search of better sex. A lot of her discoveries fall into the category of "It seemed like a good idea at the time." The author of previous off the wall subjects like "Spook" (post-death exploration) and "Stiff" (dead bodies), she has the knack of finding obscure information that no one has ever heard of. While the book is verbally graphic, it is not porn. She injects herself into her story and her humor resembles the writer, P.J. O'Rourke.

This a truly great tale of a first-hand look at science and sex from both the inside and the outside! Mary Roach provides a humorous and often very personal view--both as a participant and observer--of humans, animals, and mechanical devices: there is much that you would never have imagined, and perhaps would rather never of heard of at all. She and her husband Ed have sex in a 20-inch diameter MRI tube in the interests of science. The doctor looks on, makes suggestions, and finally tells Ed "You may ejaculate now". The author also recounts the experiments by Kinsey is his attic many years ago and tries to track down the film footage.

The author's great sense of humor needs to be read to be believed. She spares no one, and particularly not herself or her husband. She travels to Taiwan to watch an implant operation. In one of the funniest parts[and this says a lot, since the book will have you howling a lot] she goes to Denmark to watch artificial insemination of sows. We know this happens with cows, and you might suppose that there's not much difference with pigs, but you'd be wrong, very wrong indeed. Suffice it to say that the best results occur, when, among other things best not mentioned here, the AI person lies down on the sow's back and fondles her teats during the process. You may never regard your morning sausage quite the same way again.

The author has a lot of asides that are a delight to read. If you usually skip the footnotes in a book, you'll miss a lot here. You'll learn a lot--for all the things that might seem frivolous, but which are not, the book is a scientific one. Roach has a curiosity, an appetite for knowledge, and has the capability that perhaps most scientists do not have, which is to mix science and humor. Stephen Gould was able to do this, but his humor was not as pervasive--his writing is, at a guess, 95% science at 5% humor, whereas with Roach it's more like 50-50. Martin Gardner's great Fads and Fallacies in the Name of Science may be the closest similar work to Roach's book. This book is certainly not for everyone, and there are those who will be deeply offended, but for most it should be a real treat to read!