Housewife Hype

Alright, as a review blog I really have to do it. I don't want to (and I am ashamed to say that I've read this novel, meaning I succumbed to all the hype) but I'm going to be honest in this review.

This review of "Fifty Shades of Grey" by E.L James.

Labelled as being of the "erotic romance" genre, the novel follows the not-overly surprising college senior "innocent" (which is a fancy way of saying virgin) that is 22 year old Anastasia Steele, as she embarks on a "relationship" of sorts with successful and ridiculously handsome, 27-year-old businessman Christian Grey. There are a bunch of other characters thrown into the mix (a best friend, a couple of close male friends who could never ever possibly like 'Ana' because she's so unattractive(!), and of course the respective family members for each party) and the story basically starts from there.

Following the ups and downs, the highs and lows associated with Ana coming to terms with this very attractive man that has enveloped her life, we're given a taste of the "dark side" of sex and several doors are opened to show us the "naughty" world of BDSM (bondage/discipline, dominance/submission, sadism/masochism). Throughout the novel we see Ana and Christian (but mostly Ana) faced with decisions about their relationship, things like whether or not there is a relationship between them at all.

Before reading this book I had of course heard all the hype related to it. Supposedly, this was one of those books that would thrill me and re-inspire my love of literature. That this was a novel that would convince a world of people to once again develop a love of reading, to see the benefit of reading as it truly is: something that enhances our know-how of the world around us.

No. There was nothing in this book that hadn't been written by other authors before. "But what about all the sex scenes? It says erotic novel doesn't it?" Yes, the labelling is correct. And the sex scenes were written well and did indeed work well in breaking up the monotony that was the rest of the book. But still, it wasn't like I hadn't seen any of that kind of stuff before in shows like True Blood and The Tudors. What I found most disappointing about this book was that it didn't live up to the hype.

A lot of the writing was predictable. In instances were Ana was faced with a tough decision, I found myself guessing (correctly) the outcome and the choice that she was going to make. It was quite obvious what she was going to do and how she was going to go about doing it. And indeed, maybe the biggest dissatisfaction that I had with Ana was basically just her character as whole. She lacked self-esteem. That was her big thing. And I'm sorry if we haven't seen enough self-esteem lacking girls who end up getting the hottest guy on the planet! Oh wait a moment! We have. Enough already! We've been down that road and heard that story before.

And I'm not even going to talk about the Christian Grey image that was created. Nor the fact that a move is going to be made. I can't really get my mind around all this quite just yet.

Whilst I didn't like it, several of my friends found it to be quite a good read. So, my recommendation for this book is to seriously think about why you want to read it. Don't just read it, like I did, because everybody else says that it's good. Borrow it from the library and read it before buying it. I give this book a 2.5/5 and if you do like it, some other authors that you might consider reading are Syliva Day and Shayla Black. Check out Popular Erotic Romance Books for more suggestions.

Happy reviewing everyone!


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