Mating in Captivity examines the tension between emotional security, domestic life, and erotic desire in long-term relationships. Drawing on Esther Perel's clinical experience as a psychotherapist, the book explores why sexual desire may diminish even in loving relationships and discusses ways couples can maintain intimacy, passion, curiosity, and erotic connection. The twentieth-anniversary edition includes a new preface in which Perel reflects on the origins of the book and cultural changes since its original publication.

Human sexuality seems normal to us, but it is bizarre by the standards of other animals. Diamond arues that our strange sex lives were as crucial to our rise to human status as our large brains. Among the aspects of human sexuality discussed are female menopause, our having sex in private, our often having sex for fum rather than procreation and the expansion of women's breasts even before use in lactation, and the battle of the sexes over parental care. These features might seem too natural to require explaination, but on reflection they prove surprisingly difficult to account for.

In this book, Barney explores her family tree, chronicles her friendships and associations through reprinted correspondence and recreated conversations, and evokes the golden age of her salon in gallery of literary portraits.