Tamsin Wilton interviewed close to a hundred women in order to understand how we go about constructing a sexual identity as 'lesbian' or 'heterosexual'. How do women experience desire? What are the differences between men and women as sexual partners? How do desire, pleasure, intimacy, gender and morality become part of women's sense of self? Asking these, and other questions, this study breaks through the stand-off between essentialists and constructionists to propose a fresh re-thinking of the desiring self.

TAMSIN WILTON is Professor of Human Sexuality at the University of the West of England, Bristol, UK. She has been active in the field of sexuality studies and queer studies since 1987 and has published many books, including Lesbian Studies: Setting an Agenda, Sexualities in Health and Social Care and EnGendering AIDS.