I was barely five years old in 1973 when author Nancy Friday’s cult classic My Secret Garden: Women’s Sexual Fantasies found its way onto the bookshelves and handbags of millions of women. Friday’s book revealed that, unfettered by assumed social conventions, self-consciousness, or perhaps fear of embarrassing our partners, we can indulge our deepest, most transgressive desires in our imagination. At first it was provocative, even revolutionary, and then it became required reading and a worldwide bestseller.

I first read My Secret Garden when I was preparing for my role as sex therapist Dr. Jean Milburn in the television series Sex Education. I am a woman with my own sex life and fantasies, and I was curious to see how women’s deepest desires have changed in the 50 years since the book was published. How might the fantasies of a diverse group of other women be similar to or different from mine? I invited women around the world to share their sexual fantasies, thoughts and feelings that so many of us have in our heads but so rarely say out loud. A chance to put together a new book of fantasies for a new generation.

For me, sex has never felt like a static entity, but rather something that adapts and changes as I grow and change, with each new phase and stage of my life. A big part of it has always been in the thinking and feeling, not just the doing. As an actress, my job has an inherent permission to indulge in an alternate reality, which is the very definition of fantasy. The women I embody, whose worlds I enter, also have inner lives, desires and fantasies that are crucial to understanding what drives them. And quite a few of them have taught me something about sex and sexuality.

If I’m honest, I think I have two sides, as perhaps many women do: the side that’s good at asking for what I want, and the side that’s accommodating to my partner’s wishes, that’s happy to share my innermost desires with me, but only if my partner initiates the conversation (and then not all of them). Is this out of shame? Or an indication that I wouldn’t trust anyone with such a level of intimacy? Or is it because I think it’s somehow better to be partially unknowable? Do we all struggle with being fully unknowable in some way?

If there’s one thing I hope for from the book, it’s that it sparks a new conversation about sexual power, especially for women. Sexual liberation must mean that we can enjoy sex on our terms and say what we want, not what we’re pressured to say or what we think we want. One thing is for sure: sexual fantasy continues to play an important and healthy role in our lives as women and genderqueer people. And we all have the power to say – and get – what we really, really WANT.

Romanian/in a relationship/bisexual

One of my most significant sexual fantasies arose from a frustration caused by a religious dogma: in the Orthodox religion, women are not allowed on the altar. My departure from religion happened around the same time that this fantasy was born. Before I die, I must find an empty church – abandoned or not – and I want a man to perform oral sex on me while I lie on the altar, my moans of pleasure filling the echoing room. I even imagine finding a young priest who is willing to do this and is not afraid that his God might punish him, because I believe that sex can be one of the most religious experiences of our lives.

Scottish/married/pansexual

I have been with my husband for 13 years, 12 of which we have been married. After we got married, our sex life was virtually nonexistent – not because of a lack of attraction, but because of his severe depression, self-loathing, and the influence of an overprotective mother. I felt empty and lonely. To cope with this and to feel a sense of affection and love and to orgasm myself, I began to build a fantasy world. Sometimes I am a survivor of a zombie apocalypse or a witch in a wizarding world. I can live out these fantasies for months and then start a whole new one. In reality, my husband and I now have sex maybe once a month. We have a respectful, friendly, and fun relationship. Part of me wants to retreat into my fantasy world, but for him, I try to stay present in our lovemaking. Still, the level of rejection I felt for many years was incredibly destructive, and I know without my fantasies and flexibility in building imaginary worlds, I probably would have ended my life.

Unknown location/single/ heterosexual

My fantasy has long revolved around a dominant man. A wealthy man with a great job who is really, really good in bed. The “Christian Grey” fantasy. Every single boyfriend I’ve had since I was 17 was shit at sex and had to be catered to somehow. They were usually broke and had no real sexual experience. In my fantasy, I’m with a man who surprises me with restaurant reservations without asking me first. He buys me a new dress and leaves it on the bed with a note saying, “Wear this.” I get picked up in an expensive car, he pays for the meal of course, and then in the bedroom I don’t have to do anything. I’m completely submissive and get incredibly satisfied.

New Zealanders/married/pansexual

I have two main fantasies. In the first one, I’m not myself, I’m younger, thinner and I’ve met Harry Styles and he really likes me and wants to spend time with me. Usually I’m a writer or lawyer and very successful in my own right and after a few dates and time spent together, he starts telling me how much he likes me and wants to be with me and only me. Then very hot, sensual, passionate sex develops. The second fantasy is always about my partner and another woman wanting to have sex with him. When I think about it outside the context of this fantasy, I find it a bit perverse and uncomfortable with how desperate she is to be fucked by him. I cry quite often when I have this kind of fantasy. Until recently, I didn’t fantasize during sex with my partner. He had an emotional affair with a woman and when we had a lot of desperate sex, I imagined him fucking her a few times. I cried afterward too.

Australian/in a relationship/bisexual

I am a machine. I move rhythmically to the beat, pumping. But I am also a machine that pumps out nutrients. I am being consumed. My lover sucks my teat. Another sucks between my legs, drinking the juice. Feeding. My eyes are rolled back in our heads, we are all mindless. I am being devoured. I am meat. I am milk. I am fruit. I keep them alive. I am nothing but this purpose. Like a sow with 20 piglets hanging from her teats. Their hunger has become their lust. They are strong now. I am pumped up again after I release my fluids. Then our juices overflow. We are full. We stop pumping. We are oiled. We slide apart. My lover and the others get up and move on. The next lover comes. They suck my teat and start sucking. They start eating. I start feeding them. I keep them alive. I am devoured. I am a machine.

Chinese/single/heterosexual

My deep-seated fantasy is that a man will be indelibly – and naturally – nice to me. I don’t crave flowers and speeches and thoughtful gifts or an expensive vacation. In my fantasy, I’m not pampered. The thought that makes me wet the most is that of a partner who will take care of me in bed, who will try to match our bodies and their pleasures to each other, who will do all these niceties in the most general sense of the word.

Mestizo Ecuadorian/single/bisexual

I would like to have a penis. That’s my fantasy. I love my breasts and my femininity. But I would like to have a penis so I can fuck a woman or many women with care and protection, but also with fiery desire and feel the pleasure that men feel when they have sex with a woman. Isn’t that funny?

British/married/bisexual

My absolute favorite fantasy will unfortunately never come true, as it involves a room that I enter through my full-length mirror and wait for myself in. No, I’m not a narcissist (although a narcissist might say that) – I just love the idea of ​​being completely free, experimenting with someone who knows me as well as I know myself, not needing mood-disrupting guidance, and feeling that complete uninhibitedness.