The sexual life of Catherine M.

Written in spare, matter of fact prose, The Sexual Life of Catherine M. is the diary of a well-known Parisian intellectual who likes to spend nights in the singles clubs of Paris and the Bois de Boulogne, where she has sex with a succession of anonymous men. Unlike many contemporary women writers, there is no guilt in Millet's narrative, no feeling of use or abuse: on the contrary, she has no regrets about a life of energetic sexual activity. Catherine Millet's writing is a subtle reflection on the boundaries of art and life and how an individual's sex life is also a work of art. Without remorse or guilt, Catherine M. enjoys her sexual encounters and the respectful attention of her male partners. Though located in a pre-aids decade, The Sexual Life of Catherine M. is very much a sexual manifesto of our times: times in which the sexual equality of women is a reality.