The Surrender: An Erotic Memoir

A New York Times €œNotable Book of the Year€ and Winner of the Charity Erotic Awards Writer of the Year

Witty, intelligent, and eloquent, The Surrender is an erotic memoir and story of a woman€s unusual path to sexual and spiritual discovery inspired by a powerful exploration of what is perhaps the last remaining sexual taboo, one for which she becomes a compelling advocate. Toni Bentley is the author of five previous books€"all of them New York Times €œNotable Books€.

€œBentley is writing of her rhapsodic experience with sodomy. So some will call this memoir blasphemous, others spiritual; some pornographic, others erotic. What it is, is wonderfully smart and sexy and witty and moving, a tale of unbounded passion that leads to transcendence€¦. While deeply serious, Bentley is also hilarious.... Bentley€s honesty about the most intimate of subjects is daring and delightful for those willing to follow her to, so to speak, the end.€€"Publishers Weekly (starred review)

€œToni Bentley...has taken the radical decision to compose a manifesto for anal sex.... No woman before Bentley has felt quite zealous enough about what she calls €˜emancipation through the back door€ to write an entire book in its praise.... The Surrender is a brave book€"although not because it tackles a €˜taboo€ or because it is frank. Its bravery lies rather in its earnest attempt to do justice to the transcendent dimension of a profane act.€€"Zoe Heller, The New York Times Book Review

€œHot.€€"Newsweek

€œMs. Bentley€s new sex confessional is extraordinary.€€"Alexandra Jacobs, New York Observer

€œStylish and amusing...The Surrender celebrates €˜the joy that lies on the other side of convention.€... Enjoyable.... Oddly charming.€€"Entertainment Weekly

€œI think it might be a small masterpiece of erotic writing. I admired its lucidity, the tone is true and unsentimental, and it€s so natural€"the explicitness is so completely unaffected.€€"Leon Weiseltier, New York Observer

Toni Bentley danced with George Balanchine€s New York City Ballet for ten years. She is the author of five books€"all named New York Times €œNotable Books€€"which include Winter Season: A Dancer€s Journal, Holding on to the Air (the autobiography of Suzanne Farrell written with Toni Bentley), Costumes by Karinska, Sisters of Salome, and The Surrender: An Erotic Memoir. She was the recipient of a 2008 Guggenheim Fellowship and her essay, €œThe Bad Lion,€ (originally published in the New York Review of Books) was selected by Christopher Hitchens for Best American Essays 2010.