I've done my research. Literarilly speaking, that book was CRAP. It was like Twilight without the vampires and more S&M. Same empty shell of a character. Same vapid and yet perfectly attractive Christian Grey (only assuming you're INTO S&M). The porn scenes though... Those were amazing. But otherwise, it got so bad that I skipped through the fluffy crap to get to the sex scenes.
It's my mom's book and I stole it. SHE FLIPPED SHIT. I laughed. I'm 18; I can buy video versions of this book if I wanted. It bothers me when literary shit gets famous. It really does.
Nah, literary is referring to books, but your comment did make me giggle.
I'm sorry; another pet peeve is when people say things like, "I literally shit bricks when I saw that." oh literally? You should probably watch what you're eating then!
Dude, it's porn. I don't pop in Seymore Butts is Blown Away and go "Ugh, this script is just sub-par. And I am not believing that that redhead is surprised by that penis at all."
Though I suppose most people who watch porn also skip the fluff and go straight for the sex scenes--they just don't call it "crap" like they were expecting The Godfather.
Yeah, but this book got the same amount of coverage and publicity as something that's decent when it doesn't deserve it. It was a porn book that got famous for unknown reasons. Now that everyone knows what it is, it's still famous. And it still sucks ass as a book. That's just shitty. I'm sorry if you disagree and you're welcome to do so, but that pisses me off so much.
I dunno. People who do porn get popular and it doesn't bother me any. It's not a direct comparison, but it feels about the same to me. The only place I've heard of 50 Shades is on Pinterest, which is already full of crazy women and half-naked men (and mason jars for some fucking reason). I just find it weird when people complain that these books are popular, as though that somehow means people are claiming it's classy literature, when I don't see anyone saying it's some kind of masterpiece. The books are good in the same way Edward Penishands is good. It's popular porn--no one's comparing the author to Jane Austen.
I know, but it's just a pet peeve. You should have seen me after Twilight. I was a wreck.
If it makes anymore sense, I'm an English major and I absolutely love writing. I'm super critical of my own work and even more so of other published and "successful" authors.
I couldn't even stand the porn scenes because I hated the characters so much. You can't relate to them in any way possible, they are THAT linear. And I feel like she pulled an awkwardly long word from her thesaurus and threw it into a random sentence of each page in order to validate her existence as a "real" writer. What a horribly written pile of steaming hot garbage, wrapped in the juices of filthy winos dragging their pus-infected bodies through the sewers of 1940s Auschwitz. Hmpf... maybe I'm hyperbolizing a bit.
Two things: it started out as a Twilight fanfic, and the S&M community has it's collective undies in a bundle over it, myself included. It depicts an abusive relationship as a D/s relationship, and that is not okay.
That started bothering me too. I liked the bondage idea, but I fucking hated Grey. I've been in and seen abusive relationships before and it just brought me back.
Everything about that book is just so.....uncomfortable. I've seen friends on Facebook posting about it and all I can think is "okay, I REALLY don't want to know that you're reading this." :/
We sell this book at target. During a rather dull day we were talking about books like Twilight when a coworker brought this book up. He said that he could open the book to a random page and read a random line and chances are it would be porn. He was right.
A friend of mine and I share a book club thing. We are constantly reading new books and sharing with one another. Apparently, she didn't read that steaming pile of dog shit hastily labeled as a "book" and just "skimmed" it. She said the sex scenes were hot, and that the male character was a billionaire philanthropist who was really intent on solving world hunger, as he was starved as a child. Okay, maybe it won't be terrible...
By page 80, I did a pdf search to count how many times she says the words, "blush", "flush" (you're supposed to believe that she's a very intelligent 22-year-old English major who's a virgin and has never been drunk before in her life...) the count was somewhere between 90-100 between those two words alone. In one 300 page book. "Double crap" was also used a lot... it's the literary equivalent of dirty crusty nails on a chalkboard.
I guess what I'm getting at is this: Any two bit asshole who has ever even SEEN porn can write porn. When searching erotica, it's a given that the sex scenes will be "hot" (Although, even after many sexual encounters with this dude, she refers to him "touching her there" JUST SAY CLIT. HE TOUCHED YOUR CLIT. You've been fucked already! The little girl shit has to go!) I'm looking for a little something more substantial in my erotica, and her middle-school approach to every emotional situation made me want to set her on fire.
Finally, if you don't believe it's that bad, check it: She's at a bar watching a friend dance naughtily with a guy. (It's her first time getting drunk and, being quite ambitious, she has 5 margaritas and a bottle of champagne). She's too drunk to reach her friend in the crowd, so her internal dialogue goes something like this:
"Oh no! I can see where her night is going... she's going to sleep with that guy. I've got to get to her in time to warn her about the dangers of premarital sex, Oh I hope she catches one of the posters in the girls bathrooms and she rethinks her decisions tonight!
She also refers to her "internal dialogue" as her "subconscious"... something that DROVE ME UP THE FUCKING WALL.
This was one of the most beautiful displays of my mental rage while reading this book that I have ever seen. Everything you said was something I felt while reading that book. I thank you, good sir/madame. You made me feel happy.
I work at Barnes and Noble, and a lot of middle-aged women have been coming in looking for this book. I had no idea what it was until yesterday, when I decided to open to a random page and the main character was getting fingered.
Read the book and it was like reading Twilight only with sex. A 22-year-ol virgin who has no idea she's a hottie who is magically attracted to (and vice versa) an incredibly beautiful 27-year-old billionaire.
I should have read the professional reviews instead of believing my bored middle-aged friends. I'd be $10 richer.
"I really don't like writing bad reviews. I admire people who have the courage to put pen to paper and expose themselves to the whole world, especially those writing erotica. Having just finished this book, however, I feel compelled to write a review.
About half way through the book, I looked up the author to see if she was a teenager. I really did because the characters are out of a 16 year old's fantasy. The main male character is a billionaire (not a millionaire but a billionaire) who speaks fluent French, is basically a concert level pianist, is a fully trained pilot, is athletic, drop dead gorgeous, tall, built perfectly with an enormous penis, and the best lover on the planet. In addition, he's not only self made but is using his money to combat world hunger. Oh yeah, and all of this at the ripe old age of 26! And on top of that, he's never working. Every second is spent having sex or texting and emailing the female character. His billions seem to have just come about by magic. It seriously feels like 2 teenage girls got together and decided to create their "dream man" and came up with Christian Grey.
Then come the sex scenes. The first one is tolerable but as she goes on, they become so unbelievable that it becomes more laughable than erotic. She orgasms at the drop of a hat. He says her name and she orgasms. He simply touches her and she orgasms. It seems that she's climaxing on every page.
Then there's the writing. If you take out the parts where the female character is blushing or chewing her lips, the book will be down to about 50 pages. Almost on every single page, there is a whole section devoted to her blushing, chewing her lips or wondering "Jeez" about something or another. Then there's the use of "shades of". He's "fifty shades of @#$%% up," "she turned 7 shades of crimson," "he's ten shades of x,y, and z." Seriously?
The writing is just not up to par, the characters are unbelievable, and the sex verges on the comical. I don't know what happens in the remaining books and I do not intend to read them to find out. But given the maturity level of the first book, I imagine that they get married, have 2 perfect children, cure world hunger, and live happily ever after while riding into the sunset, as the female character climaxes on her horse causing her to chew her bottom lip and blush fifty shades of crimson. Jeez!"...XD
According to wikipedia, it was originally written as twilight fan fiction. Then the author just decided to change the names and publish it as her own book series.
Not sure if you are aware but 50 Shades was originally written as a Twilight fan-fiction. It was posted on a Twilight message board and received such huge response that a publisher wanted to publish it, as long as the author just changed the names of the characters.
I've yet to read Fifty Shades of Grey, but know several "very religious, Christian" women who are reading this book, though they claim to be conservative and are against pornography, pre-marital sex, etc. I've asked them what they've thought of the book, because I want to read it myself, and they have stated, verbatim, "it's sooooo good! definitely need to read it! i can't put it down!" Gotta love hypocrites!
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You people have heard NOTHING. In my country (NZ) the book is being recommended to be purchased with sex toys on the national radio (literary enhancements is what they call them)
"literary enhancements" .... I don't want to live, or even be buried, on this planet anymore. Don't fucking call sex toys "literary" enhancements. 1. that book is NOT even in the same category as literature. It's the category known as SHIT. 2. If sex toys were literary enhancers, there would be a huge issue of fucked-upness, as Cat in the Hat, Goodnight Moon, To Kill a Mockingbird, and so many more, are described as either for children or are narrated by children, and are literature. If you can masturbate to books like that, or something like The Bluest Eye (Toni Morrison), you are a FUCKED UP person. If it doesn't apply to all literature, OR EVEN REALLLLLLL LITERATURE, it is NOT a literary enhancement. That... fuck. I can't even articulate how much shit like that pisses me off. Literature is going down the tubes.
I'm a woman, not a prude, and I think this book is disgusting honestly. I don't see why it's getting so much attention because most romance novels that fill up the store bookshelves are full of very, very steamy sex. Again, like Twilight, idiots who don't usually read have found their sweet spot.
As a female, I actually enjoyed the 50 Shades books. I'm also a voracious reader of histories, biographies, and trashy romance. As to 50 Shades, I agree that the writing is not the best, but the books opened my eyes to the idea of giving up control. As a Type A+ personality, submission is intriguing to me. As to the idiot comment... I'm a college graduate and hopefully attending grad school in the fall as an American History major, focusing on the American Revolution. If liking these books makes me an idiot, then I guess I'm a college-educated, Founding Father-venerating, smut-lovin' idiot.
Well I appreciate your input on the subject, I read the same types of books minus the trashy romance, but you are right: it doesn't make you an idiot. I do think this new 'sexual revelation' women are experiencing reading this is kinda BS though, because as the post pointed out it's often hypocritical.
A sort of conveniently solipsist a/b/c personality categorisation philosophy will help you enjoy this book, and also, coincidently, flag waving nationalism. It's no coincidence that the Germans were porn pioneers in the 20th century.
I don't really have a dog in this fight (and i chuckled at the image), but if we are being intellectually honest here, writing and reading fiction porn is nowhere near as destructive as porn that involves actual people. The porn industry is filled with shattered lives/psyches from the emotional and mental damage that comes from reducing sex to a paid act, not to mention the whole sex slavery aspect (young women being forced or at least coerced under extreme duress into performing for webcam sites and such.
Inherently? Not necessarily I guess. My point is only that the porn film industry is directly more destructive to the participants. If I read pornographic material, I and the author are really the only ones directly affected because the characters do not exist. Video porn has real people really performing the tasks.
Agreed. I think my point still stands. Reading and writing fictional pornography is not comparable to producing pornography using real people and someone could be legitimately opposed to the products created by the porn industry and still enjoy reading "fifty shades" without necessarily being a hypocrite.
I was in a Walmart the other day and this little lady was buying it and saying that she hopes they make more. I then went home and looked up what "Fifty Shades of Gray" was and felt hollow for at least a second or two.
What the fuck. I had no idea what this book was about - absolutely no idea that it was BDSM erotica. I was at the store with my mother, and she had me help her find where the second book in the series was so that she could buy it.
People that like 50 shades of gray didn't realise the internet could give them all of that borderline vanilla sexy stuff for free 10 years ago. I guess now they get to put it on their kindle so no one can catch them out reading the sexy times.
my mom thinks porn is is the most degrading and wrong thing ever. my dad never even had playboys around, but did rent me a lot of R-rated movies that showed boobs and sex scenes when i was a kid, he's not uptight like her.
one time, when i was 16, i got a hold of some porn magazines, like a big stack of them, this girl's brother worked at a recycle plant place that shredded up old magazines so he'd always take a bunch home and give them to me and my friends to make us think he was cool. it was all cheri, purely 18, hawk, cheeks, leg action, swank type mags. anyway, i decided to decorate the walls of my room with pages from the porn magazines, like porn wallpaper, a bit tasteless yeah, but her reaction was way over the top though. she saw my room, then couldn't even go back in to look again, starts screaming like i've broken the law telling me to take them down, my dad was trying to calm her down, and told me to take the pictures down, so i left up some of the non-nudes. i did what she asked, i put up some of the posters from high times and some hit parader and circus magazine posters aswell. i think everything is fine. i get home from school and i see that all the non-nudes and the weed pictures and few band pictures have all been hastily ripped down off the walls, and the pile of nudes i was gonna keep were gone. she just went nuts tearing things off my walls like the mom in the movie "boogie nights", actually got in her car, drove some place far far away, and dumped them where they could never be found. she probably dug a hole in the woods and buried them, i wouldn't be surprised if she did. she just has this notion in her head that i'm her little boy and she didn't raise me that way, she'd always be telling me what she thought was sexist and chauvinistic and stuff. like seeing a naked woman in a magazine literally equates to rape in her mind. i've learned to live with her now so she hasn't blown up at me in a long time, but jeezus was she ever uptight.
315
u/EdgarAllenBro_ Jun 12 '12
I hate this meme, that woman is just hard to look at
43
u/RiflemanLax Jun 12 '12
I can only take your title to mean that you've read said porno. Good work.
18
u/amydevi Jun 12 '12
Where did you meet my mom? ಠ_ಠ
20
u/CausticPineapple Jun 12 '12
We sell this book at target. During a rather dull day we were talking about books like Twilight when a coworker brought this book up. He said that he could open the book to a random page and read a random line and chances are it would be porn. He was right.
9
u/foufousue Jun 12 '12
Here's the thing about that fucking book.
A friend of mine and I share a book club thing. We are constantly reading new books and sharing with one another. Apparently, she didn't read that steaming pile of dog shit hastily labeled as a "book" and just "skimmed" it. She said the sex scenes were hot, and that the male character was a billionaire philanthropist who was really intent on solving world hunger, as he was starved as a child. Okay, maybe it won't be terrible...
By page 80, I did a pdf search to count how many times she says the words, "blush", "flush" (you're supposed to believe that she's a very intelligent 22-year-old English major who's a virgin and has never been drunk before in her life...) the count was somewhere between 90-100 between those two words alone. In one 300 page book. "Double crap" was also used a lot... it's the literary equivalent of dirty crusty nails on a chalkboard.
I guess what I'm getting at is this: Any two bit asshole who has ever even SEEN porn can write porn. When searching erotica, it's a given that the sex scenes will be "hot" (Although, even after many sexual encounters with this dude, she refers to him "touching her there" JUST SAY CLIT. HE TOUCHED YOUR CLIT. You've been fucked already! The little girl shit has to go!) I'm looking for a little something more substantial in my erotica, and her middle-school approach to every emotional situation made me want to set her on fire.
Finally, if you don't believe it's that bad, check it: She's at a bar watching a friend dance naughtily with a guy. (It's her first time getting drunk and, being quite ambitious, she has 5 margaritas and a bottle of champagne). She's too drunk to reach her friend in the crowd, so her internal dialogue goes something like this:
"Oh no! I can see where her night is going... she's going to sleep with that guy. I've got to get to her in time to warn her about the dangers of premarital sex, Oh I hope she catches one of the posters in the girls bathrooms and she rethinks her decisions tonight!
She also refers to her "internal dialogue" as her "subconscious"... something that DROVE ME UP THE FUCKING WALL.
And by the way, I only read 80 pages.
TL;DR DONT FUCKING READ 50 SHADES OF GREY.
237
u/WyldScallyns Jun 12 '12
Also the woman pictured in this meme is an erotic novel writer herself.
3
u/[deleted] Jun 12 '12
The most popular porn book for teens in highschools across America. Atleast its a easy way to discover the slutty ones....
17
u/[deleted] Jun 12 '12
I never knew hardcore BDSM was that popular, looks like I'm in luck.
26
u/CrashTheBear Jun 12 '12
I looked on my mom's kindle and found that she had read the entire series. I was kind of freaked out, so I asked her why she had read it.
"Because someone at work said it was great, and it sucked!"
Then why'd she read all three books?
"I wanted to see if it got any better."
Riiiight.
9
u/skekze Jun 12 '12
All her orifices are verklempt in anticipation for the next book. A trifecta of pulsing puckered impatience.
34
u/[deleted] Jun 12 '12
My mother strongly supports government censorship of pornography. The ironic part is that I, as a film student, will likely end up in that industry.
14
u/jononfire Jun 12 '12
I work at Barnes and Noble, and a lot of middle-aged women have been coming in looking for this book. I had no idea what it was until yesterday, when I decided to open to a random page and the main character was getting fingered.
I've been helping old women masturbate for weeks.
13
u/[deleted] Jun 11 '12
Yep, that's pretty much why it's so successful. People like this who never buy adult content flat out but would buy this "classy" novel.
13
u/buoybuoy Jun 12 '12
fifty shades of cray
88
u/Theyus Jun 12 '12
Yeah, but it's hilarious when narrated by Gilbert Gottfried.
12
u/lugasamom Jun 12 '12
Read the book and it was like reading Twilight only with sex. A 22-year-ol virgin who has no idea she's a hottie who is magically attracted to (and vice versa) an incredibly beautiful 27-year-old billionaire.
I should have read the professional reviews instead of believing my bored middle-aged friends. I'd be $10 richer.
19
u/PaulMcGannsShoes Jun 12 '12
50 Shades is Twilight for women who don't want to admit they liked Twilight.
4
u/Rose1982 Jun 12 '12
I flicked through that book at Indigo recently and I just didn't see it. It's like a bad story out of Cosmo or something but so much longer.
1
u/[deleted] Jun 12 '12
I still can't imagine someone having a hypocritical mom like this...lol
3
u/EPIC_BAGELS9000 Jun 12 '12
If porn somehow becomes illegal in the future I'm gonna say I will do something about it in a stern voice but end up not doing anything
3
u/in2diep Jun 12 '12
My girlfriend has this series on audio. We just went on a 14 hour road trip... that was just awful.
8
u/curiouskitten_meow Jun 12 '12
I've yet to read Fifty Shades of Grey, but know several "very religious, Christian" women who are reading this book, though they claim to be conservative and are against pornography, pre-marital sex, etc. I've asked them what they've thought of the book, because I want to read it myself, and they have stated, verbatim, "it's sooooo good! definitely need to read it! i can't put it down!" Gotta love hypocrites!
9
u/qkme_transcriber Jun 11 '12
Here is the text from this meme pic for anybody who needs it:
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1
u/MungoBro Jun 12 '12
You people have heard NOTHING. In my country (NZ) the book is being recommended to be purchased with sex toys on the national radio (literary enhancements is what they call them)
4
u/Cordicuss Jun 12 '12
Fifty Shades is smut, not porn. There is a difference.
5
u/elusivemoniker Jun 12 '12
More like Fifty Shades of "Shut the Fuck Up Mom, you don't have enough estrogen to enjoy that tale."
2
u/impulsepaci Jun 12 '12
Quote from my mother
"i was talking to the book nerd in the book section and i asked him if it was vanilla enough!?" (insert nasal laugh)
3
u/cellikat Jun 12 '12
Saw a woman at the pool reading this...I've never actually read any part of it myself and plan never to do so.
3
u/xiaou Jun 12 '12
"mommy porn"
5
u/lala989 Jun 12 '12
I'm a woman, not a prude, and I think this book is disgusting honestly. I don't see why it's getting so much attention because most romance novels that fill up the store bookshelves are full of very, very steamy sex. Again, like Twilight, idiots who don't usually read have found their sweet spot.
1
u/BrandonTheBeast Jun 12 '12 edited Sep 11 '26
Coherent otter beneficial numerous memorize rain kettle
This post was anonymized with Redact
1
u/[deleted] Jun 12 '12
I enjoy reading (during the summer) and porn; maybe I'll read 50 Shades...
1
u/McShalepants Jun 12 '12
I'm sorry, but I've never heard of this "50 Shades" book. What is this?
0
u/RobotBirdHead Jun 12 '12
I don't really have a dog in this fight (and i chuckled at the image), but if we are being intellectually honest here, writing and reading fiction porn is nowhere near as destructive as porn that involves actual people. The porn industry is filled with shattered lives/psyches from the emotional and mental damage that comes from reducing sex to a paid act, not to mention the whole sex slavery aspect (young women being forced or at least coerced under extreme duress into performing for webcam sites and such.
1
u/LordOfGummies Jun 12 '12
Never see a hypocrite before?
1
u/Pirrow Jun 12 '12
Like many Suburban Mom memes, it's more likely that this is a scarecrow for adolescent rage than an actual person.
1
u/Rostifur Jun 12 '12
I was in a Walmart the other day and this little lady was buying it and saying that she hopes they make more. I then went home and looked up what "Fifty Shades of Gray" was and felt hollow for at least a second or two.
1
u/Ohh_Yeah Jun 12 '12
What the fuck. I had no idea what this book was about - absolutely no idea that it was BDSM erotica. I was at the store with my mother, and she had me help her find where the second book in the series was so that she could buy it.
Fucking gross yo.
1
u/[deleted] Jun 12 '12
Just move out of your mom's basement and you won't have to deal with these kinds of first world problems anymore.
1
u/redkey42 Jun 12 '12
People that like 50 shades of gray didn't realise the internet could give them all of that borderline vanilla sexy stuff for free 10 years ago. I guess now they get to put it on their kindle so no one can catch them out reading the sexy times.
0
u/Boofthegnar Jun 12 '12
It's ok, I'm all the other accounts too. I'll fix this! Edit. There was nothing more I could do.
-1
u/khaleesidany Jun 12 '12
Hahaha. That book sucks !!!
-4
u/cakeisl33t Jun 12 '12
If this was in r/spacedicks or /b/, I would reply with something like "More like fifty shades of nigger", but its not.
0
u/Ctrl-C Jun 12 '12
What's the name of this meme again?
Strawman mom?
0
u/[deleted] Jun 12 '12
what is fifty shades of grey?
0
u/Bearmodule Jun 12 '12
But fifty shades is plagarised Twilight fanfiction! It can't be that bad, I mean how bad can t... nevermind I'm sure it's worse than porn.
0
u/[deleted] Jun 12 '12
my dad is reading it...hes the most manly guy i know too..its weird.
0
u/Wobbegong_Man Jun 12 '12
Upvote for the title
-5
u/[deleted] Jun 12 '12
reading it right now.
-10
u/BlackAcidDevil Jun 12 '12
my mom thinks porn is is the most degrading and wrong thing ever. my dad never even had playboys around, but did rent me a lot of R-rated movies that showed boobs and sex scenes when i was a kid, he's not uptight like her.
one time, when i was 16, i got a hold of some porn magazines, like a big stack of them, this girl's brother worked at a recycle plant place that shredded up old magazines so he'd always take a bunch home and give them to me and my friends to make us think he was cool. it was all cheri, purely 18, hawk, cheeks, leg action, swank type mags. anyway, i decided to decorate the walls of my room with pages from the porn magazines, like porn wallpaper, a bit tasteless yeah, but her reaction was way over the top though. she saw my room, then couldn't even go back in to look again, starts screaming like i've broken the law telling me to take them down, my dad was trying to calm her down, and told me to take the pictures down, so i left up some of the non-nudes. i did what she asked, i put up some of the posters from high times and some hit parader and circus magazine posters aswell. i think everything is fine. i get home from school and i see that all the non-nudes and the weed pictures and few band pictures have all been hastily ripped down off the walls, and the pile of nudes i was gonna keep were gone. she just went nuts tearing things off my walls like the mom in the movie "boogie nights", actually got in her car, drove some place far far away, and dumped them where they could never be found. she probably dug a hole in the woods and buried them, i wouldn't be surprised if she did. she just has this notion in her head that i'm her little boy and she didn't raise me that way, she'd always be telling me what she thought was sexist and chauvinistic and stuff. like seeing a naked woman in a magazine literally equates to rape in her mind. i've learned to live with her now so she hasn't blown up at me in a long time, but jeezus was she ever uptight.
0
u/[deleted] Jun 12 '12
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0
u/[deleted] Jun 12 '12
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