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Critics' Opinion:
Readers' Opinion:
First Published:
May 2001, 288 pages
Paperback:
Feb 2008, 288 pages
A powerful, deeply personal and often lyrical memoir of a woman learning to value herself as a person rather than a sex object, after years of sexual abuse by her father. Silverman's message is relevant to anyone suffering from addictions.
A deeply personal story of a woman's addiction to and recovery from the high of dangerous encounters. In this powerful, often lyrical memoir, a woman learns to value herself---as a whole person rather than as a sexual object.
Recounting her past experiences as part of her journey toward recovery, Sue William Silverman explores her skewed belief that sex is love, a belief that began with her father's sexual abuse from early childhood into adolescence. She tells of college years in Boston, an early marriage in Galveston, and a roller-coaster life of sex and self-destructive behavior.
Finally, having become addicted to danger itself, she hits bottom emotionally and spiritually. At this point, with the help of a trusted therapist, Silverman begins to discover the difference between the high of dangerous encounters and the more reliable promise of love.
This utterly candid account may be the first book by a woman to examine sexual addiction. But the misguided search that became Silverman's life has resonance for other addictions, whether to food, drugs, alcohol, or work---anyone whose only satisfaction is now.
Last Day Out
Every Thursday at noon I have sex with Rick in room #213 of the Rainbow Motel. Today, even though I promised my therapist I wouldn't come here again, I pull into the lot and park beside Rick's black Ford Bronco. I cut the engine and air conditioner and listen to stillness, to nothing, to heat. Sunrays splinter the windshield. Heat from the pavement rises, stifling, around the car, around me. No insects flutter in the brittle grass next to the lot. Trees don't rustle with bird wings. A neon rainbow, mute and colorless by day, arcs over a sign switched to vacancy. Only the little girl from India, daughter of the motel owner, invigorates the stasis. Holding a string tied to a green balloon, she races down the diving board and leaps into the swimming pool. With the windows closed, I can't hear the splash. If she laughs, I can't hear this, either. For a moment she disappears. The balloon gaily sways above the water. The girl pops to ...
Deborah Tannen
Silverman shows how real [sexual addiction] is, how it really works, and how she was able to overcome it. Molly Peacock
Sue William Silverman shines a bold light on sexual addiction in her riveting memoir. Recoveryworld.com
An important literary accomplishment, one that will move anyone who reads it.
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