The Fan Club is the fifth of six Wallace novels with sexual behavior as its explicit subject matter. It presents a grimmer picture of the state of American sexual union than do its four predecessors, but at the same time it is their logical culmination.

The Sins of Philip Fleming (1959) describes the protagonist's impotency with a woman he desires to make his mistress. The Chapman Report (1960) observes the impact of a sex research team upon the lives of several suburbanites whom they interview. The Three Sirens (1963) contrasts the natural promiscuity of South Sea Islanders with the unhealthy puritanism of American anthropologists who study the tribe.

The Seven Minutes (1969) depicts the obscenity trial of a writer whose erotic novel allegedly caused a rape. The Celestial Bed (1989) recounts a controversy over sexual surrogates in a small California town. These novels depict modern Americans, male and female alike, caught...