Fifty Shades of Repetition

I broke down and did it. I read Fifty Shades of Grey by E.L. James. I almost wish I hadn't. With few exceptions, it really is a very badly written book. The characters are stereotypical, over exaggerated and annoying. The writing is repetitive. Actually, the whole book could be described as repetitive. I'm getting ahead of myself though.

I mentioned on Facebook that Fifty Shades of Grey read like bad Twilight fan fiction. It turns out that Fifty Shades started off as Twilight  fan fiction, until the fan fiction sites got testy about the BDSM subject matter in the stories. Unfortunately for James, this puts her at an immediate disadvantage. I think that Stephanie Meyer writes some of the most nauseatingly bad tales ever set to print. Any Twilight fan fiction has a lot to overcome. After getting the boot from the Twilight community, James adapted her stories out of the sparkly vampire realm. She just didn't do a very good job of it. It is painfully obvious from the characterizations, setting and tone that this is a kinky Edward and Bella rehash.

Before I go too much further, I do want to say that despite the criticism to come, James obviously has a sense of humor and some of the quips in Fifty Shades made me snicker out loud. I am fond of smart, quick humor and the heroine, Anastasia Steele, does have a sharp wit on occasion.

Sadly, that is about all I can really speak positively about.

Christian Grey is the dark, angst-ridden, damaged prince who really does mean well. He was abused as a child by his crack whore mother. He's a control freak. He's into bondage and sado-masochism. He has issues by the truckload. He's arrogant. To counterbalance all these things, James makes Grey a 27-year-old, drop-dead good looking billionaire (not millionaire--that's not good enough) who was rescued as a child by a wealthy couple and adopted, funds agricultural research to help feed all the starving children in Africa, lavishes gifts upon the object of his desire, and is so anti-drug that he enforces drug screenings for his employees every six months.

I don't know if James dreamed up a teen-aged girl's perfect man and then did her best to sully him or if she dreamed up a stereotypical screwed-up control freak and tried to redeem him. Either way, it borders on the absurd. It also touches on the offensive. The notion that only abused, messed up individuals can be into BDSM is a pretty broad assumption and not at all flattering.

Anastasia Steele is the innocent young woman ensnared in the glow of the incredibly hot Grey who is probably not a good guy for her. We know he is hot because James tells us so twice on almost every single page of Fifty Shades. She is intoxicated by the reclusive billionaire she only gets to meet because her roommate got the flu. She is principled and stubborn, but not so much so that she'll stand firm rather than have sex. She's very smart. James tells us her GPA is so high it opens a lot of doors several times throughout the book. Apparently James doesn't think her readers are smart enough to remember details such as that unless she repeats them ad naseum.

Mostly, Steele is the beautiful girl who thinks she is ugly, can't style her own hair, is a bit geeky, full of self-doubt, and can't walk a straight line without falling over. If this all sounds familiar, it is. It reeks of Princess Diaries. The physical description so matches Mia Thermopolis, that I actually picture Anne Hathaway from that movie when I imagine Anastasia Steele.

There's also a Pretty Woman element going on, with the obscenely wealthy man riding to the rescue of the poor girl. Grey lavishes expensive gifts on the financially struggling Steele, which her subconscious insists makes her seem like a "ho."

The annoying, running dialog Steele has with her inner goddess makes her seem like she is having a schizophrenic conversation with a demon, rather than she is a woman dealing with new, unusual desires. After the third argument with herself, I wanted to slap both Steele and her inner goddess.

For as much "amazing sex" as Steele has and as many screaming orgasms she has in the book, she frowns more than anyone I've encountered. She also cries more than she should considering that on every other page she's moaning in ecstasy.

Unfortunately, the wrong things stick in your mind after reading the book because the writing is so repetitive. James uses "jeez" 69 times, "oh" 424 times. We are told Grey has long fingers 24 times. Steele cries 38 times. Steele and Grey never just say anything. They whisper mostly, 197 times in total. They also frown 123 times. The reader is reminded 20 times that Grey is rich.

The whole story is a series of repeats. Grey is an Twilight Edward/Pretty Woman Edward clone. Steele is a Bella/Mia clone. The setting is stolen right out of Twilight. Even the BDSM themes are repeats, and not very good ones at that. (For excellent fantasy novels that also incorporate BDSM elements, I highly recommend Jacqueline Carey's Kushiel series.) The exclamations repeat, the expressions repeat, the emotions repeat. It's Fifty Shades of Repetition.