I’m a happily married guy who started reading it but gave up after the first book. Before reading it I thought it appealed to both women and men, and maybe the polls show that. But after book 1 it didn’t appeal to me and I thought maybe it appeals more to women.
Maybe this is why. Maybe not.
A woman in my on-line book group said “It’s gross and badly written and trashy but I just can’t stop reading!”
I felt that way about the Black Jewels trilogy by Anne Bishop. I could recognize that there wasn’t much literary value, but I felt some kind of emotional connection. It’s hard to explain.
True, but the traditional way to introduce the possibly of a new -ah- recreational activity to a partner, while giving yourself plausible deniability, is to arrange for you and them to watch a movie containing examples of the activity of interest. Then you can casually ask about it as the credits roll. And then she can demand to know if you had her watch that whole movie just to ask that question, and you can wuss out and deny it, and she can get mad, but look very slightly disappointed, and even after your inevitable divorce you can wonder if that look was ‘disappointed in you for bringing it up’, or ‘disappointed in you for being too spineless to actually go through with it.’
–
And unlike real life war and real life murder, spanking is actually pretty fun in real life. So are rope harnesses.
Women discover porn.
In other news, I was reading steamier stuff in Penthouse Forum when I was 14.
Didn’t want to start a new thread, but I just finished the third book and wanted to share an observation. There are loads of faults with the books, but I noticed something I found odd about half way through book two.
She never mentions his balls.
His “erection” gets pretty good coverage, as does his “happy trail”, and she’s more than keen to talk about her new found BJ skills. But the poor bloke gets zero fondling, nuzzling, tongue action or anything in the nut department. It’s as if he doesn’t have any.
I’m a woman who enjoys a good bit of erotica, and part of the enjoyment is the “ooh, that sounds like fun”, or even getting a few tips (if you’ll pardon the pun). But for an allegedly very steamy book, this falls far short by neglecting part of every man’s favourite playthings.
Did anyone else notice this? Any other observations?
I have a Nook, and it offered a 66 page sample of this book. If the first 66 pages of dreck are any indication of the quality of the entire series, I’m noting every poster that managed to plow through this. Y’know, for “the record”…
I heard about this book from my mother. I have no idea why she brought it up; I certainly don’t discuss my porn with her. :dubious:
I’m just ticked off that I didn’t get off my butt and finish a novel-length piece of erotica. It’s a flavour I used to really enjoy writing: older man/younger woman, dominance, and lots and lots of sex. I even had steamy emails in my stuff. If I weren’t so lazy, I could have been that author. Maybe.
I’ve read bits of it, and it didn’t really grab me. Perhaps it’s those sour grapes I was nibbling at the time. 
But I’ve read better erotica, and I think I’ve written better. But I didn’t work hard enough to finish something longer and try and get it out there.
Read it, went through all the books because it was like watching a train wreck. The smut is horrible and I just started skipping the sex scenes, but I was interested in christian’s past.
Spoiler for all 3 books:
I really wanted Elena to just be a confident domme who was just friends now with Christian, instead of a villain. Just so the heroine wasn’t perfect and her total jealousy unfounded.
Kushiel, I agree with you 100%. Especially the plot point you’ve spoilered.
This post contains open spoilers because I don’t think these plot points are important enough to spoiler box, but just in case, here’s a warning.
I read the first book and kind of enjoyed it, despite it having bad grammar/punctuation and being an obvious, thinly veiled Twilight knock-off.
I read the second book but skipped large chunks of it, as there were a lot of things that pissed me off. Ana’s baseless jealousy of Leila and Elena (always calling her a pedophile, while she was technically an ephebophile (and while under the law, it’s still statutory rape, I have a feeling Christian was more than capable of telling her off if he so chose)). Christian’s ridiculous possessiveness and controlling nature were huge red flags. He bought the company she works for, and changed policy just so she can’t go on a business trip with her sleazy boss. And, of course, Christian was right about the boss pretty much being a rapist. Another issue I have is this: why is a billionaire instantly obsessed/in love with this plain, ordinary girl? What makes her so special that she “cures” his various issues within about a month? Ana is a massive mary sue, and it shows.
The third book I skimmed very quickly, and from what I could see, it was more of the same. Sex in elevators, being pissed at each other, make-up sex, imminent danger just to pad out the plot, yadda yadda blah. And if I have to read about her inner goddess or her subconscious glaring at her disapprovingly or dancing the macarena or some other stupid shit one more time, I will…do something violent.
I guess I get the appeal of the first book, sort of. I did start to like the characters, or at least Christian, as time went on. There’s no need to read the last two in the series, though, as it only gets worse. Here’s a very funny dramatic reading of one of the sex scenes from the first book.
I’ve heard much the same about Twilight.
Thank you for the link! I regret never knowing this was a thing we could do, back when I was drinking. The world is probably a better place because I never thought of it, though.
I came across another fun one too.
My 60-year-old hairdresser literally became a reader and bought a Kindle because of this series! Once I learned it was Twilight fanfic I never bothered to check it out, but with Evil Captor’s endorsement, I may just have to download a sample.
This, from the Daily Beast article linked above:
Do people not know that there is better erotica/porn out there? When your prose is more painful than your S&M, I’m just not going to bother.
(My daughter says, “This just shows that Twilight fans are now old enough to read porn!”)
I know it lacks literary value, but goddamn, does Anne Bishop know how to manipulate readers into caring about the characters. For 50 Shades, I kept reading to find out Christian’s big trauma. But for the BJT I kept on reading because I genuinely cared. I dunno, I feel like comparing the two does a disservice to Bishop. She understands certain points of writing the 50 Shades author doesn’t.
I remember after finishing the second book of the BJT, being destroyed by how it ended, and absolutely dying to know how it turned out. I have to say I’ve never been so strongly affected by a cliffhanger since. But for some reason I never read the third book. It’s been a few years, but I may need to start from the first book again to get up the necessary anguish to enjoy the finale and the subsequent books. Thanks for reminding me. 
So Bret Easton Ellis, who * * wants to write the screenplay for 50 Shades but hasn’t actually landed the gig yet, has tweeted that Matt Bomer is all wrong for Christian. Why? He’s openly gay, of course. Ellis claims not to be homophobic, he just believes the actor who plays Christian should be “an intensely straight actor” who is “genuinely into women”. Because, obviously, gay people can’t play straight. :dubious:
I find his claims of not being homophobic a little dubious, since I doubt he would say the same about a straight actor playing a gay person.
My inner goddess laughed at the horrible writing.
It did lead to that Gilbert Gottfried reading, which makes it all worthwhile though.
I’ve been following the general weirdness inspired by 50 Shades of Gray on my blog. It’s been FASCINATING. It’s been claimed that the novel has sparked a baby boom. It’s been claimed that the novel’s sales, and the sales of sex toys inspired it, will save the economy. A British power company has launched an energy conservation campaign called 50 Shades of Green. Penguin books, whose profits are down by 50 percent this year, claims that 50 Shades of Grays’ sales has distorted the adult book market. A TV station in Ohio promoted a communal book burning ceremony for 50 Shades of Gray by husbands, in what can only be called a communal celebration of dicklessness.
It’s a weird world out there, and 50 Shades of Gray is making it weirder every day.
For all of you who say that there is so much better erotica out there, mind sharing? I have found one other similar series but it’s so much worse it makes 50 shades look like classic literature.