Book cover of Testo Junkie: Sex, Drugs and Biopolitics in the Pharmacopornographic Era

Book description

This visionary book on gender and sexuality weaves together high theory and intimate memoir, with "spectacular" results—"and the gendered body will never be the same again" (Jack Halberstam). 

What constitutes a "real" man or woman in the twenty-first century? Since birth control pills, erectile dysfunction remedies, and factory-made testosterone and…

When you buy books, we may earn a commission that helps keep our lights on (or join the rebellion as a member).

Why read it?

1 author picked Testo Junkie as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

Paul B. Preciado’s Testo Junkie, originally published in Spanish in 2008 and republished in English translation in 2013, is lusty, hyperbolic, and explosive.

It’s part postqueer, trans-feminist manifesto, part record of a cis-female’s illicit experimentation with testosterone, and part explicit fucking. A much more enjoyable book than Judith Butler’s groundbreaking Gender Trouble and Bodies that Matter, and it has the advantage of updating Butler’s Foucault-based theory with the twenty-first-century concerns.

Preciado argues that today’s “pharmacopornographic” regime utilizes drugs and erotic imagery—hormone shots and money shots—to control our subjectivity and gender, instating a system of knowledge and power in which…

If you love Testo Junkie...

Ad

Book cover of The High House

The High House by James Stoddard,

The Victorian mansion, Evenmere, is the mechanism that runs the universe.

The lamps must be lit, or the stars die. The clocks must be wound, or Time ceases. The Balance between Order and Chaos must be preserved, or Existence crumbles.

Appointed the Steward of Evenmere, Carter Anderson must learn the…

Want books like Testo Junkie?

Our community of 12,000+ authors has personally recommended 100 books like Testo Junkie.

Browse books like Testo Junkie

Book cover of Epistemology of the Closet
Book cover of Beyond Sexuality
Book cover of Profit and Pleasure: Sexual Identities in Late Capitalism

Share your top 3 reads of 2025!

And get a beautiful page showing off your 3 favorite reads.

1,210

readers submitted
so far, will you?

Ad

📚 If you like Testo Junkie, you might also like...

Book cover of Aggressor

Aggressor by FX Holden,

It is April 1st, 2038. Day 60 of China's blockade of the rebel island of Taiwan.

The US government has agreed to provide Taiwan with a weapons system so advanced that it can disrupt the balance of power in the region. But what pilot would be crazy enough to run…

Book cover of The Duke's Christmas Redemption

The Duke's Christmas Redemption by Arietta Richmond,

A Duke who has rejected love, a Lady who dreams of a love match, an arranged marriage, a house full of secrets, a most unneighborly neighbor, a plot to destroy reputations, an unexpected love that redeems it all.

Lady Charlotte Wyndham, given in an arranged marriage to a man she…

5 book lists we think you will like!