emmadotnott

I’m not generally a bandwagon jumper-onner; I always come late to the zeitgeist party whether it’s Breaking Bad, Mad Men, Anchorman – I eventually find them, realise they’re great and enjoy them in my own time. This is partly true for the 50 Shades trilogy by E. L. James. When the mania first hit I was working full time, childless and probably far too busy to be arsed to read anything. I was also pretty put off by being constantly told by friends and colleagues how ‘great’ it was, so ‘sexy’ and ‘naughty’. Now, I’ve read some of the Black Lace series books and can report that there are ‘great’ and ‘sexy’ and was fairly sure that 50 Shades being mainstream, they wouldn’t be as ‘naughty’ as the BL books; it also didn’t help that I’d been reliably told by my Mum that they were horrifically written (she hadn’t read them either but had read a number of scathing broadsheet and feminist website reviews). This was the biggest turn-off; not the thought of paddles, ball-gags, spanking or fisting, but the appalling writing – just, not, sexy.

So I managed to avoid them, politely turned down numerous offers to borrow the books from friends, replying with disgust at people’s suggestions my soon-after pregnancy was fallout from the ’50 Shades Effect’ and genuinely having a little sick in my mouth at the sight of baby changing mats being sold on Doncaster market with ‘9 Months Ago Mummy Read 50 Shades’ emblazoned on them. However – to be fair, I spent most of my pregnancy with varying amounts of sick in my mouth, not always related to crass changing mats. So much was my developing loathing of this fad that I remember posting this on twitter:

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Then it fizzled out. Everybody who wanted to read them had the trilogy by now, people stopped hiding their Kindles on public transport as they went back to reading less ‘naughty’ and ‘sexy’ books and that was that. Cue Hollywood stage left. Of course they would make this drivel into a film, of course it would become current again, of course everyone would start speculating the perfect actor for ‘Grey’ or the perfect ‘Whatever-her-name-is’ and I went back to cynically rolling my eyes and zoning out of conversations in the office.

Fast forward to July 2014, I’m no longer working and now have a beautiful 16 month old daughter. I have lots of time, especially when my husband is working nights and therefore have lots of hours to fill with carnal pursuits such as reading terrible books. This week the 50 Shades film preview was presented to the salivating masses. Somebody I probably ought not to follow on Instagram posted a link and out of curiosity I watched it. While I have no point of reference to compare it with – having still successfully not read it, it left me thinking ‘So what?’ I have no invested relationship with these fictional beings, I have never created a picture in my mind of Christian Grey or Whatever-her-name-is and thus it moved me in no way whatsoever. However as the day went on the realisation dawned on me that at some point I’m likely to watch the sodding film; years in the future on Channel 4 one evening, or a night in with the girls or god forbid by husband wants to see what all the fuss is about (any excuse to watch a bit of shagging on telly, Spartacus, GoT etc. etc.) Given that I’d conceded I was probably going to see the film at some point, I reasoned with myself that I probably ought to read the book. I’d now realised I was desperately looking for rationale to explain away reading it and thought ‘Sod it, just download them. Find some free ePub files online and read them on the tablet’. This way I didn’t have to spend money on them, nobody could tell what I was reading and I’d not lost out if I couldn’t bare to get further than a few chapters. So I did.

I was first struck by the confirmation that it is indeed terribly written. It feels so amateurish and reminiscent of a primary school children’s ‘What I did at the Weekend’ story – obviously without the mild bondage and BDSM (but this is Doncaster, so who knows?) E. L. James should invest in a thesaurus and quickly before she writes anything else; ‘mutters’ is horrifically over-used and if it’s intentional and Grey really does mutter, maybe a heartwarming tale of his blossoming love with an elocution professional may be more appropriate. The clichés come thick and fast too; the first one causing me to screw up my face in disappointment involves ‘Anastasia’ (no longer Whatever-her-name-is) scrutinizing herself in the mirror and remarking on her ‘too-big-for-her-face blue eyes’. This said however, I managed to plough through the first third of the book before calling it a night. For those who’ve read it, I left it where ‘Ana’ is weighing up whether or not to sign the contract after reading it for the first time’. By this point I had read through a number of the ‘sexy’ and ‘naughty’ parts and had decided that I’d give the story development the benefit of the doubt and that they were so tame and mild as ‘Ana’ is a virgin they’re working up to the good stuff. I’m now half way through the second instalment: ’50 Shades Darker’ and can report that the sex is still mild, tame and boring. And that reminds me – the word ‘sex’ is the only reference made to our heroine’s vagina. See, you can use the word; that’s what it’s called, a vagina. At no point, up to now at least, does our lusty, filthy, quote unquote ’50 Shades of fucked up’ anti-hero Christian Grey even refer (by any name) to his Plaything’s plaything… that’s just odd. The entire way through thus far ‘Ana’s’ internal monologue and musings on the sex acts only every refer to feelings, sensations and cravings ‘down there’. Down where? The Southern Hemisphere? Devon?  Perhaps not, given that our tale is set in Seattle and James insists on constantly reminding you of this with unnecessary details of the Interstates taken in various car journeys and postcard references such as the Space Needle. Guess what E. L. James? I have no point of reference to roads in Seattle and I don’t need to know, I suspect that people from Seattle don’t need to be told this repeatedly either. Speaking of unnecessary details, the books are littered with them. Completely pointless descriptions of items and details that feel more like an attempt at reaching a word quota than offering an insight into the storytelling. Equally irritating is James’ insistence on showing some basic knowledge of wine with every encounter between our shag-happy couple. What difference does it make that it’s Chablis or Frascati? We only every read that it’s ‘crisp, light and delicious’ whatever the vintage we’re to believe they’re quaffing pre, post or mid coitus.

The most irritating and distracting point for me however is our leading lady herself. It was my belief that this series of books was meant to empower women; unleashing their sexual desires while offering reassurance that it’s OK to want to do something a little more outside of the box, without being a ‘slut’ or a ‘slag’. In my opinion, ‘Ana’ misses the mark of achieving this by as many miles as the I-5 we’ve heard so much about. Her constant need for reassurance that she’s ‘enough’ for Grey and habitual whining and overall dissatisfaction at everything, really pisses me off. She is without doubt the most unlikeable leading woman in a book I’ve ever read and I’ve now got to the point where I hope Grey drops her like a sticky butt plug and never sees her again. Of course, I realise there’s time for this yet, being only half way through the trilogy, but I’m fairly sure by now I’m meant to have developed some empathy with ‘Ana’ and be rooting for them, but I’m not.

To conclude, if you haven’t read these yet, don’t. Defy James’ message to give in to your desires and curiosities and supress them, deep, deeper and then even deeper than that. Tie a knot in them, a BDSM ligature knot if you must, either way, don’t read them. Not if you have a vagina, a penis, a sex, or you mutter, if you live in Seattle or drink wine.