My Secret Life Book

Popsugar challenge 2020 - A banned book

This isn't just a book, it's a project, and at 1,969 pages probably the biggest book project I'll ever take on. I started this back in January and therefore its taken me 6 months to get through so it's really hard to review as there's a lot that hasn't stuck in my mind.

There was no middle ground for me with this book, either I was loving it or absolutely hating on it.

This is the secret life of Walter, his memoir which he left with a friend to be released after his death. Walter is a sex addict and this is his diary of his sexual experiences from an early age, through his teens and into much later life during the Victorian era.

If you are thinking of taking this book on just beware, this focuses purely on Walter's sex life, he doesn't write about popping to the shops etc etc, each chapter is his memory of a particular sexual experience. I love a book like this, but almost 2,000 pages on sex felt like wading through treacle at times.

This book is problematic in today's society, not being around in the Victorian era myself I've no idea how his adventures would have been perceived then but certainly now he would have been locked up for some of his experiences.

My favourite part of this book were the volumes featuring Sarah, a prostitute who was with Walter for many years and I just adored their relationship. The sexual journey they encouraged in each other, the mental hurdles they overcome. I felt this was the period of time when Walter really stepped outside his comfort zone and grew as a sexual being. After Sarah I felt he really leap from that platform and threw caution to the wind.

Walter for me is going to be extremely memorable, his adoration of vaginas is incredible, there are whole chapters dedicated to the finest details of the vaginas he had seen and his love of them. His frankness of STI's was really interesting to read about, in many ways I feel society has gone backwards in the topics we tiptoe around and the shame we carry if we have experienced them. Walter had his fair share of STI's and no shame or bravado radiated from him, he was very grounded and factual in his handling of them.

There's so many things to talk about with regards to this book but as a side note I am currently listening to The Happy Vagina podcasts on Spotify which centres around women's sexuality, their body's, orgasms and I really feel that this is something Walter would have championed. I don't think there's a man who walked the planet that worshipped the vagina the way he did and all these centuries on we are still not talking to females about masturbation or encouraging self exploration. In many ways the world needs more Walter's (not in all ways!) as he encouraged everyone he encountered in his secret life to explore their limits.

I found a lot of humour in his expressions, revving his engine, his love pole, the love trap, uncunting (in these 2000 pages the C word is probably used around 4,000 times however it is used in the way it was originally intended) to name a few. The experimentations with feet, shillings and peas will always make me laugh along with some of the women he met along his journey, Mollie, Amelia, Sarah, Helen and the Great Eastern.

To sum up, if you enjoy Marques De Sade but feel it's a shame that people generally die after their orgasm, then Walter is your man.

Three stars.