Fifty Shades of Grey [Paperback]

Oh My, I mean really, Oh my, oh my, oh my......No readers, I have not just been whipped (pardon the pun) into a bosom heaving wreck by the size of my partner's "impressive length". I have in fact, just dragged myself through to the final page of this ludicrous nonsense and found myself almost speechless. Almost...

The main character, Christian Grey, is quite obviously deranged. This does not however, deter Ana, who for some inexplicable reason, has spent so long with her head in a book that she has never looked in a mirror and noticed that she is a "total babe". A "total babe" who also happens to be a 21 year old virgin. No, Ana, in the space of 3 weeks, falls so crazily in love with "Mr Grey" that she manages to bypass the whole deranged thing and instead concentrates all her efforts on a) going from virgin to porn star faster than Hussain Bolt off the blocks and b) deciding whether to let him hit her with stuff. As you do.

As for Mr Grey, obviously, readers can't be allowed to see him as simply a deranged, manipulative psycho so let's give him smouldering good looks, a few zillion quid to throw around and hey, and this is the clincher, the ability to love art and music (y'know, like Nazi's do in the war films). (Note - the bit where he plays the "haunting" piano piece, semi naked, with his eyes closed actually made me laugh so much that I almost wet myself - in a non-orgasmic way. Check it out....enjoy! ). As if that wasn't enough he also has a personal and financial interest in saving the world from famine. Just that old world peace and cancer to sort out and then hey, job's a good `un. I mean really, how did the world ever shamble along without him? So what made this beautiful, charismatic and talented man so brutal? Could it be a traumatic childhood perhaps? Why, yes I think it could...yaaaaawn....

So, the 2 beautiful people come together (Oh my, another pun) and the rest of the book is basically about Ana wondering if she should let him hit her with stuff and then letting him hit her with stuff and Mr Grey wondering if he should stop hitting her with stuff but still hitting her with stuff while she whines on about wanting "more" love and less of the hitting stuff and he whines on about how he doesn't know how to give "more" cos he has only ever hit people with stuff.

In between these nonsensical blatherings they have lots of sex, which, like piano playing, speaking foreign languages and making zillions of quid, he possesses boundless expertise. Obviously. Luckily, virginal Ana also has her "inner Goddess" to guide her on the art of sex play and soon becomes an orgasm machine, chucking them out all over the place in a rampant, fevered haze of lust. So much so that she overlooks Mr Grey's general bastardry and bends over nicely for a few beatings. She is also too enraptured to take much notice his incessant stalking, which would have got lesser men arrested. Oh, and his `feeder' tendencies that, if successful, would have surely added a good 10 stone onto Ana's lovely buttocks which in turn would have incurred the cost of a refurb' to the `red room of pain' when his ceiling shackles needed reinforcing. Luckily he can afford it.

As many other readers have noted, the writing is appallingly poor and, if you removed the sex bits, would resemble a love struck teenager's diary. It's all been said before so I won't dwell on it. I will just say, if you are looking for erotic fiction, look elsewhere, if you are looking for an unintentionally laugh out loud bit of fluff and nonsense then crack open a bottle, put your feet up and prepare to be amused. Personally I would just say that there goes a day of my life that I will never get back. Oh my!

"So" he asks, looking at me with his grey eyes "what did you think of the book?"
I bite my lower lip, looking at his beautiful face.
"well?" he asks. I roll my eyes and blush and have an earth shatttering orgasm as I see his trousers hanging in.... That way. My inner goddess faceplants.
"oh my" I say.
We bonk for a few minutes.
He points his long finger at me. "you haven't answered me yet."
Holy crap I mutter.
He spanks me, I have an orgasm which makes me shatter into a thousand pieces then burst into tears.
Him and his twitchy palms. Ooh and his white linen shirt.
He tweaks my nipple. I orgasm again. From virgin to sex kitten in less time then it takes most people to clean the fridge. Not bad!!!
We have earth shattering sex AGAIN.
And again

Repeat until authors pen runs out.
The end.

There are hundreds of reviews here and people are clearly split into two camps: the 5 stars `loved it', and the 1 star `hated it'. I'm in the latter (forced to read this for a book group). But for all the leaden, wooden, repetitive, frequently juvenile-sounding prose, and the profoundly unerotic sex scenes, this book is so awful that it's brilliant... in an unintentional kind of way.

Read aloud in the pub over a bottle or two, this provided hours of fun as our `heroine' took one look at Christian Grey's gray eyes (yes, really) and his messy hair, and the way his trousers hang "in that way" (what way?) and literally falls flat on her face in front of him. Clearly smitten by her cute innocence, Christian of the grey eyes, sculptured lips, and spicy scent is soon whipping out his little "foil packets", his riding crops and hand-cuffs, and giving our previously-virginal Ana multiple and seemingly instantaneous orgasms, all of which are "shattering".

We particularly enjoyed the way Christian manages most of his sexual exploits either fully-dressed (just a quick unzipping and a coy fiddle with a "foil packet") or with his shirt (always white linen) still on, while Ana bit her lip, and breathed `oh my!' for the umpteenth time.

So, really, this IS as bad as people say - but for barely more than two quid it managed to provide hours of derisive laughter.