Mating in Captivity

"Perel is the people's therapist." -The Financial Times

"Esther doesn't shy away from the hard truths about relationships, love and desire . . . and our marriage is better for it . . . Mating in Captivity is a gift to relationships everywhere . . . There was an entire 6 months where every conversation started with 'so what Esther would say is. . .'" -Glennon
Doyle and Abby Wambach, activists, New York Times bestselling authors of Untamed and Wolfpack, and hosts of the podcast We Can Do Hard Things

"Esther Perel has the number-one secret to chemistry that lasts." -Jay Shetty, #1 New York Times bestselling author and host of the On Purpose podcast

"Few works have been as impactful as Mating in Captivity in expanding the world's imagination for what is possible and desired, in navigating the delicious tumult of our erotic lives." -Dr.
Justin Garcia, PhD, executive director of the Kinsey Institute and author of The Intimate Animal

"She knows why sex falters in long-term relationships, and how to remedy it." -The Guardian

"Esther Perel's Mating in Captivity is transformative. [Perel's] work laid the foundation for the conversations I can have with guests on Call Her Daddy and the way our society talks about modern relationships, love, and intimacy. It's one of those books that I always come back to." -Alex Cooper, founder of Unwell and creator of the Call Her Daddy podcast

"The key to a sexy marriage." -Glamour

"For twenty years, Mating in Captivity has stood as one of the most honest explorations of modern love-not the love we perform for others, but the one we struggle to sustain behind closed doors. Esther's genius lies in her ability to see people fully, without judgement, holding the complexity of who we are with compassion and precision. At a time when society rushes to label and divide, she reminds us that understanding begins where judgement ends. Her work gave language to the quiet tensions that live inside intimacy: desire and duty, safety and adventure, love and autonomy. It helped us see that these contradictions are not failures, but features of the human experience. Few voices have shaped our understanding of relationships as profoundly as hers. In a world obsessed with image and performance, Esther continues to bring us back to the truth of what it means to connect, to want, and to be seen." -Trevor Noah, comedian and New York Times bestselling author of Born a Crime

"Mating in Captivity takes a hard line against one of the most time-honored institutions in human history: the sexless marriage. . . It reads like a cross between the works of Jacques Lacan and French Women Don't Get Fat. " -The New Yorker

"In her two seminal books Esther Perel illuminates liberation without license, eroticism without concupiscence, intimacy without fusion, individuality without isolation, and ethics without moralizing. She honors our healthily lustful nature but does not reduce us to our animal drives. Not conflating craving with affection, Esther empowers us to desire and to love. Her eloquent writing explores and celebrates our free humanity, a humanity all too often hobbled by the blandishments and strictures of a crudely seductive modern culture that entices and forbids at the same time." -Gabor Maté, MD, New York Times bestselling author, The Myth of Normal: Trauma, Illness, and Healing in a Toxic Culture

"As revelatory as it is straightforward . . . nicely accessible . . . Perel offers the estranged modern couple a unique richness of experience." -Publishers Weekly

"Esther Perel's Mating in Captivity is a highly original paradigm-shifting insight in how domestic security can stifle erotic vitality. Mixing deep clinical wisdom, cultural reflection, and lyrical prose she provides us with a masterful analysis of the paradox between intimacy and desire and confronts us with the notion that erotic energy depends on mystery and individuality. This means that, if we want to maintain desire with one person, we need to bring a sense of unknown into familiar spaces. By challenging partners to question their expectations and identities, this book can transform relationships by encouraging introspection rather than blame, rather than viewing sexual disconnection as a moral failure." -Bessel van der Kolk, president of the Trauma Research Foundation, and #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Body Keeps the Score

"There are a handful of people one quotes throughout a career. In twenty years, I've never stopped quoting Esther-nor referencing Mating in Captivity as a seminal text for understanding the evolution from dating to relationships to long-term partnering, and the interplay between love and desire as the dancing arrows that weave through them all. Anyone who seeks to create attraction should learn Esther's model, anyone who hopes to sustain love even more so." -Matthew Hussey, New York Times bestselling author of Love Life and host of the podcast Love Life with Matthew Hussey

"Nobody has opened up a dialogue about intimacy, passion, trust, and the infinite complexity of human relationships like Esther Perel." -Jason Isaacs

"I get letters every day from couples who are convinced their loving, long-term relationships are doomed because the spark is gone. And my advice is always this: 'Read Esther Perel's Mating in Captivity.' Perel helps couples understand what waning passion means, what it doesn't mean, and what they can do about it. Perel's book-her clear-headed, empathetic analysis-is as vital and transformative now as it was when it was first published twenty years ago. Mating in Captivity should be required reading for anyone who is in a long-term relationship or aspires to be in one. So, it's required reading for us all." -Dan Savage, advice columnist, author, and host of the Savage Lovecast

"Perel tells us why intimacy can feel imprisoning and how we can embrace the erotic-without leaving home. Her writing is fresh and provocative, in a class by itself." -Janis Abrahms Spring, Ph. D. , author of After the Affair: Healing the Pain and Rebuilding Trust When a Partner Has Been Unfaithful

"Mating in Captivity . . . articulates a poignant and unacknowledged modern crisis for the first time." -The Evening Standard

"Esther Perel is a fearless writer and thinker who will challenge your views about sex in a radical and fundamental way. She has the most original, edgy, intelligent, and high-spirited voice out there on passionless sex versus erotic vitality. She writes like a dream, making it nearly impossible to put down this book even when you want to." -Harriet Lerner, PhD, author of The Dance of Anger

"Perel has written the first really engaging and provocative "sex" book in years! With psychological sophistication and evocative prose, she reminds us what many of us would rather forget: to un-domesticate sex requires paying attention to our erotic imagination and moving beyond the security of the familiar but comfortable. An erotic sexual life is for those who want more than "workable" sex. Perel tells us how to find it." -Sandra Leiblum, PhD, director of the, Center for Sexual and Relationship Health, Robert Wood Johnson Medical School

"Perel says the kind of things that are so contrary to popular wisdom, they actually sound blasphemous - and yet, at precisely the same moment that you're being shocked by her, you're also acknowledging the validity of her ideas. Perel's ideas are. . . instantly familiar because they resonate deeply. It's all rather terrifying in its intuitiveness and its pure rightness." -Observer

"Finally! A book that truly addresses the mystery of sustaining erotic desire in long term relationships. Esther Perel's Mating in Captivity is a brilliantly written, illuminating book about the conundrum that most couples face in relationship: how to keep the romantic spark glowing over a lifetime. Perel doesn't offer yet another sex manual; rather she engages us to be open to the magic and mystery of erotic exploration that's possible for couples. She shows the rich variety of ways couples can rekindle their romance when they rediscover their separateness, differences, and vulnerable yearnings with tenderness and curiosity. This is a book I would recommend to a couple for their honeymoon and a couple celebrating their fiftieth anniversary. It's a book I've asked my wife to read. And my sons. It's by my bedside. Consider having it by yours." -David Treadway, Ph. D. , author of Intimacy, Change, and Other Therapeutic Mysteries

"An elegant sociological study, complete with erudite literary and anthropological references." -The Daily Telegraph

"Challenging the conventional wisdom, Esther Perel examines sexuality and eroticism as both independent of and yet intersecting with intimacy and commitment. Mating in Captivity is a significant contribution, as useful to clinicians as it is informative to the general public. Her clinical illustrations depict sophisticated clinical work in a manner that is lively and engaging." -Lewis Aron, Ph. D. , Director, New York University Postdoctoral Program in Psychotherapy and Psychoanalysis

"An academic perspective on the deterioration of sex in relationships. . . Perel offers insightful, progressive theories on how to put the play back into partnerships." -Daily Record & Sunday Mail

"A charming blend of wit and wisdom. . . this book will give you a fresh perspective on long-term love." -Gold Coast Bulletin

"Mating in Captivity is a provocative look into the waning of sexual desire that often plagues couples in long-term relationships. This book serves as an excellent resource for the neophyte in the field of sex and couples therapy, serving to debunk some of the stereotypes that abound around sexual desire. Just as fitting for the professional, the book is an important source of information for the lay consumer wishing to add passion to his/her relationship." -Lori Brotto, Journal of Sex and Marital Therapy

"[Mating in Captivity] makes fewer promises and raises thornier questions than any other how-to-improve-your-relationship book you've ever read, which is exactly why you should read this one. . . . [Perel] writes with worldliness and nuance and seems as comfortable drawing on Proust as from Passionate Marriage. " -Elle

"Marriage feeling a little . . . passionless? In her new book [Mating in Captivity] New York therapist Esther Perel offers couples a battle plan for fighting sexual burnout." -People