Most Popular Books by Nancy Friday

The #1 New York Times–bestselling author’s “groundbreaking” work on women’s sexual fantasies (Publishers Weekly). First published in 1973, My Secret Garden ignited a firestorm of reactions across the nation—from outrage to enthusiastic support. Collected from detailed personal interviews with hundreds of women from diverse backgrounds, this book presents a bracingly honest account of women’s inner sexual fantasy lives. In its time, this book shattered taboos and opened up a conversation about the landscape of feminine desire in a way that was unprecedented. Today, My Secret Garden remains one of the most iconic works of feminist literature of our time—and is still relevant to millions of women throughout the world. “The author whose books about gender politics helped redefine American women’s sexuality.” —The New York Times

A classic work on how women think about sex, from the New York Times–bestselling author of My Secret Garden and My Mother/Myself. Nancy Friday’s groundbreaking books such as Forbidden Flowers offered an unprecedented honest look at the inner fantasy lives of ordinary women. In Women on Top, Friday returns to this topic, collecting detailed sexual fantasies from over 150 contemporary women from diverse backgrounds. Based on intimate personal interviews and letters, this book updates the conversation started in her earlier works on women’s sexual fantasies, detailing how women’s erotic lives have changed—and remained the same. “This absorbing, titillating and empowering feminist book is also a ribald bedside companion.” —Publishers Weekly

When Nancy Friday began her research for My Mother/My Self in the early 1970’s no work existed that explored the unique interaction between mother and daughter. Today psychotherapists throughout the world acknowledge that if women are to be able to love without possessing, to find work that fulfills them, and to discover their full sexuality, they must first acknowledge their identity as separate from their mother’s. Nancy Friday’s book played a major role in that acceptance. The greatest gift a good mother can give remains unquestioning love planted deep in the first year of life, so deep and anassailable that the tiny child grown to womanhood is never held back by the fear of losing that love, no matter what her own choice in love, sexuality, or work may be. Through candid self-disclosure and hundreds of interviews, Friday investigates a generational legacy and reveals the conflicting feelings of anger, hate, and love the daughter’s hold for their mothers–and why they so often “become” that mother themselves.

Reflections on how physical appearance, and beliefs about it, affect women’s lives from a #1 bestselling author who’s “enormously fun to read” (The New York Times). Beauty and appearance play a pervasive role in our culture. Here, the #1 New York Times-bestselling author of the groundbreaking, controversial bestseller My Secret Garden delves into beauty''s influence on popular media and the psyche of modern women. Combining in-depth cultural analysis with personal anecdotes, sexology, and individual case studies, Nancy Friday explores the dissatisfaction women feel about their bodies—and how it affects their sexual freedom. Her analysis is broad-reaching, examining how popular culture, advertising, stereotypes of women in the workplace, the sexual liberation of the 1960s, and the dynamics of family relationships put pressure on women to live up to an impossible feminine ideal. Also published under the title Our Looks, Our Lives

A "fascinating [and] evocative" analysis of these powerful emotions by the #1 New York Times–bestselling author of My Mother/My Self ( Kirkus Reviews, starred review). What is jealousy, and how does it undermine our closest relationships? Renowned journalist and author Nancy Friday tackles this difficult topic with compelling honesty and depth of insight. Here, Friday explores the feeling of fear and its connection to jealousy—specifically the fear of losing love and power. Informed by close readings of psychological treatises on jealousy as well as anecdotal interviews, she offers new insights into jealousy at every stage of life--from childhood to old age. The author of the iconic bestseller My Secret Garden, Nancy Friday is known for her courage in tackling incredibly intimate, personal topics head-on and with astonishing honesty. Here, she turns her focus toward an emotional issue that often cripples loving relationships—and shows new pathways toward healing.

The bestselling author of My Secret Garden exposes the wild and sexy fantasies that many of us have but are afraid to share. For over thirty years, Nancy Friday has written about eros, love, beauty, and seduction. Now she returns to the territory she pioneered during the sexual revolution—exploring our most taboo sexual desires. Fans of Fifty Shades of Grey will love this provocative collection of real fantasies from dozens of women—and for the first time, men. Friday knows that forbidden sex "gets us higher faster" and explores love, lust and power through erotic tales of domination, masturbation, S&M, threesomes, and more. Beyond My Control: Forbidden Fantasies in an Uncensored Age shows that our forbidden fantasies are not compensation for a lackluster sex life, but are a critical component of our fullest selves—and how our secret desires can lead to exhilarating and satisfying sexual freedom. Praise for Nancy Friday "YOU''LL BLUSH, YOUR PULSE WILL RACE."—The New York Times "Delicious... women can share in their sisters'' secrets and not feel that they are alone."—Los Angeles Times "Nancy Friday''s work... demonstrate[s] beyond doubt that the emancipation of women''s bodies begins with the emancipation of our minds." —Faye Wattleton, former president, Planned Parenthood Federation of America

The internationally bestselling author of "My Mother, My Self" and "My Secret Garden" and renowned champion of women returns with an illuminating and empowering examination of how looks shape our lives. Friday probes the power, allure, and mystique of beauty, including fashion, fear of competition, shoes and sex, adolescent pain, envy, the double standard of aging, fairy tales, feminism, love, and more. Part memoir, part history, this book changes the way we all look in the mirror.

Gennem samtaler med psykologer, sociologer samt over 200 kvinder fortæller Nancy Friday, hvordan forholdet mellem en kvinde og hendes mor kan påvirke og forme kvindens liv på godt og ondt. Hun beskriver, hvordan hæmninger og holdninger kan gå i arv fra generation til generation, og hvordan det er muligt at gøre op med de regler om skyld og skam, som kvinder ofte bliver påduttet ikke bare af samfundet, men af deres egne mødre. Bogen er ikke en løftet pegefinger til hverken mødre eller døtre, men derimod et forsøg på at frigøre kvinder fra de hæmninger, der kan forkrøble deres liv og seksualitet. "Bogen anbefales varmt som hjælp til selvtænkning." - Kristeligt Dagblad

LULU is a fascinating heroine based on the equally fascinating life of her creator. Come take the journey with LULU as she grows from a precocious child in Charleston, S.C. into a co-ed at a college in the North. A journey that comes with all of the heartbreak of first love, motherly rivalry , brotherly caring and parental betrayal. With a literary voice in the grand tradition of the great southern writers, one of America’s best-selling non-fiction authors Nancy Friday, has in LULU, created a fascinating first work of fiction. "A short novel of a young girl growing into adulthood, trying to understand her Charleston home and world, jealous of her mother’s greater caring for her older brother, puzzling over her missing father, realizing her early peer leadership is fading with her friends dating and her own seeming rejection by boys, then seeing her heroes collapse, and in the end understanding that one can only rely on oneself to find friendship, love and closeness, a life in the world. LULU is funny and sad, intriguing and ultimately insightful, a book for each of us, a helpful and even important read." - NetGalley "Loved this book! ...A great read about a young girl coming of age. - Steve French, NetGalley Praise for Nancy Friday''s Previous Works- “I closed the book and wept for half an hour“ - Christina Robb, The Boston Globe ”Illuminating and Moving… she writes with deep insight about the central mystery of mothers and daughters…”. - Michael Korda ”Brilliant, courageous, moving!” - The Washington Post

”Jeg er en kvinde, som har brug for at blive set. Det er et lige så basalt behov som at trække vejret eller at spise." Med udgangspunkt i kulturhistorien og egne og andres erfaringer forsøger forfatteren Nancy Friday at udforske den magt, udseendet og skønheden har over både mænd og kvinder, lige fra de bliver født. Udseendets rolle ændrer sig i løbet af ens liv, men ikke desto mindre er den en ufravigelig del af vores tilværelse lige fra barndommen, over ungdommen og voksenlivet og helt frem til alderdommen. Den amerikanske forfatter Nancy Friday (1933-2017) begyndte sin karriere som journalist, men kastede sig snart ud i arbejdet med at skrive og udgive bøger på fuld tid. Hun var en af de første, der skrev om kvinders seksuelle fantasier og frigørelse, og de fleste af hendes bøger er bygget op omkring interviews med en lang række forskellige kvinder.

L''auteur de Ma mère, mon miroir choisit une fois de plus un sujet universel, la jalousie, et l''analyse dans ses aspects les plus inconscients. L''auteur a fait un considérable travail de recherche, puisant essentiellement dans l''oeuvre de Mélanie Klein, célèbre psychanalyste de l''enfance, pour mettre en évidence ses théories les plus audacieuses sur l''envie et la rage qui seraient à la source de cette émotion violente que nous nommons jalousie. Nancy Friday a cherché à la comprendre à l''aide des travaux les plus récents en matière de psychiatrie infantile; elle a discuté avec les plus grands spécialistes, ethnologues, anthropologues, psychanalystes, tels que Lionel Tiger ou Bruno Bettelheim. Elle a exploré la rivalité œdipienne et la trahison sexuelle, du Nouveau Testament à Shakespeare, de Médée à Jean Harris, célèbre criminelle américaine, coupable de crime passionnel. Nancy Friday nous entraîne, de façon très stimulante, comme à son habitude, avec ses habituels compagnons de route, dans un voyage intérieur à travers leur propre conscience, traquant sans merci les racines cachées de leurs anxiétés. Tandis que Nancy Friday met peu à peu en évidence les sources d''une envie méconnue, nourrissant sa quête - et le lecteur - de sa recherche méticuleuse, le livre gagne en suspense et en force psychologique. Ce qui est ici révélé, c''est un aspect, le plus souvent méconnu de nous tous, de notre humaine nature. Le message de Friday est libérateur. Si nous comprenons mieux le rôle que la jalousie joue dans notre vie, nous pourrons prendre avec elle assez de distance pour expérimenter enfin l''amour et la gratitude vraies. Ouvrage riche, fécond qui, à chaque page, donne à réfléchir et à réagir.