AAAGH -- Final Fifty Shades book to be released!

[Wifetheif]

Head for the hills! It has just been announced that "Fifty Shades Free" from Christian's perspective will be released. AAAAAAGH
https://www.eonline.com/news/124548...y-novel-as-told-by-christian-grey-coming-soon

I daresay that there is not ONE Literotica.com writer that produces worse prose and more turgid sex than E.L. James. I know the question has been asked and answered many times why her first trilogy was such a success. But I mean what a horrible, horrible writer! Only Ernest Cline is comparably bad. He writes on an eighth-grade level but is more or less comprehensible, meaning that James is not even that advanced!

All I have to say is "Head for Hills until this putrid mess is no longer in the bookstores!"

 

[galaxygoddess]

I have a friend who loves the series... and we had to come to an agreement to never mention it to me again, especially when she tried to tell me how amazingly well written it was, and how I just didn't appreciate the sex scenes.

I started laughing so hard I couldn't function for the rest of the day.

 

[yowser]

Head for the hills! It has just been announced that "Fifty Shades Free" from Christian's perspective will be released. AAAAAAGH!"

Well, at least the title suggests you don't have to pay for it.

 

[Blind_Justice]

"First trilogy?" How many books, let alone trilogies did she spin out of that Wasa-thin premise?

 

[KeithD]

No matter how bad the prose is of E. L. James (and I haven't read any of it), she opened up a whole niche for readers/buyers of a genre that many Literotica authors, riding on her back, are benefiting from. You BDSM folks should be sending her flowers.

 

[SimonDoom]

I wouldn't go so far as to say nobody at Literotic writes worse prose. That's not true. She's not a great prose stylist, but I've seen worse.

I think, whatever the literary deficiencies of her work, she deserves credit for opening up the BDSM world to the mainstream in a way that had not been done before. I was doing a fair amount of dating at the time the book came out and I was surprised how many well-heeled women had read the book and been intrigued by it. The story obviously captured the imagination of many readers, especially women. It tapped into something and it made it OK for people to talk about their interest in the subject matter in a way that was new. I read the trilogy because I was struck by how many women mentioned it in their online dating profiles.

 

[Bramblethorn]

I think, whatever the literary deficiencies of her work, she deserves credit for opening up the BDSM world to the mainstream in a way that had not been done before.

In what way? There were plenty of successful BDSM authors before her. Pauline Réage. Anne Rice (A.N. Roquelaire). Jacqueline Carey. All of them widely known and widely published before 50SoG came along.

 

[lovecraft68]

I wouldn't go so far as to say nobody at Literotic writes worse prose. That's not true. She's not a great prose stylist, but I've seen worse.

I think, whatever the literary deficiencies of her work, she deserves credit for opening up the BDSM world to the mainstream in a way that had not been done before. I was doing a fair amount of dating at the time the book came out and I was surprised how many well-heeled women had read the book and been intrigued by it. The story obviously captured the imagination of many readers, especially women. It tapped into something and it made it OK for people to talk about their interest in the subject matter in a way that was new. I read the trilogy because I was struck by how many women mentioned it in their online dating profiles.

She misrepresented the BDSM world horribly, she connected it with abuse, mental illneess and he was nothing but a stalker with money. She did nothing but open the doors for abusive men pretending to be doms and have naïve women convinced that's how it is.

Maybe if you knew something about the lifestyle you'd get that. I never saw one BDSM forum or chat group that had anything but contempt for it, but the people who know nothing about it...now they think they know...

As for erotica? She did nothing for it. The average woman who thought that book was hot would cringe at most of the stuff written here which is actual hardcore sex and not one notch above Nora Roberts. It didn't even inspire any mainstream copy cat stuff, and the billionaire prick was already a heavy trope before her.

She did well with it, her husband and her connections got it in the right hands and I don't begrudge anyone success, what I have no patience for is the uninformed spreading her misinformation like they know anything more than she does, which is squat.

The first movie killed the book. Usually a movie will create a new wave of sales, but not in her case. The reason was the director of the first one portrayed Grey for what he was, a piece of shit, he didn't romanticize him, or make him anything but the creepy no means yes fuck that he was....the movie was cringy, that director was not part of the other two. I think the third was released direct to video maybe the second too and they tried to soften up the way they represented him to fit the cheesy romance angle. The first was too accurate and that's what hurt the books reputation

The second trilogy is literally the same story told from his pov, so../.

James writes a fan fic of Twilight even using the names Edwin and Bella.
She rewrites this into her own replacing vampirism with BDSM(BTW Edwin was a piece of work as well, behind the tween book is a great message to young girls that abusive men are hot)
She gets it published after some greasing of the palm with $$$ so Meyers doesn't sue her blue
Now she is rewriting her own rewrite of a rewrite
Which takes me to the OP's post which I think is simple frustration that a plagiarist hack can break that big but there are countless people out there with real talent who will never get that break....nothing new, it happens in every category of talent.

The one thing I will never understand is why Random House didn't edit it. It is poorly written, and to have their name on it like that was strange.

The book's success was based on hype and sheeple. One of my wife's friends told me she read the first book and I asked what she thought. She said the writing was horrible(she's an english teacher) but she also hated both characters, especially the 22 year old virgin who didn't know what an e-mail was....so she then says she's starting the second book and I asked why if she didn't like te first

Answer was "well, everyone is talking about it, I want to talk about it too."

Lemmings are great for business. These are the people who eat tide pods because someone on Tik tok told them too.

One more parting shot on this. Ana who was supposed to be 22(or 23) acted, spoke and thought like a 15 year old...why? Because this was a twilight fan fic and James wanted her to be that age, but of course she couldn't get away with it, so throw some wannabe underage in there too for fun.

 

[Paul_Chance]

As an amateur erotica writer I often point to 50 Shades and tell other writers I am encouraging - read this - it tells you how bad a writer you can be and still be successful financially.

On a slightly deeper note - with fiction and the popular market it's often the character/story that catches the eye of the people who read popular fiction, not necessarily writing skill.

 

[Bramblethorn]

Jealous much? It was good enough to make a living out of it. That's even better than a red H

People make their living in all kinds of ways. Selling used cars, running lonely hearts scams, spamming Literotica forums with fake pills. Not all criticism of successful people is driven by envy of their success.

I do think a portion of the hostility to "50 Shades" was driven by misogyny - the "mommy porn" sneering, as if female authors and readers haven't always been a huge part of erotica - but there's plenty of room for legitimate criticism.

 

[litfan10]

Let's not forget that between the trilogies she released a book on how to write well.

Now if that book had been "how to write successfully" that would be one thing as she definitely knows that but writing well...nope.

I read the first book. I glanced through her writing well book. I also have read "Twilight." I was very frustrated in how poorly written Fifty Shades was - sentence structures were horrible, dialogue way too simplistic and poorly punctuated, and way too many adjectives and adverbs all over the place. Oh yeah, and constant word repetition.

My bigger problem was she clearly only has a vanilla understanding of BDSM. Anyone trying her representation of BDSM could get seriously hurt and for at least one partner the enjoyment level is very, very limited. Incredibly poor misrepresentation.

But I am sure she is crying about this all the way to the bank every day.

 

[litfan10]

In what way? There were plenty of successful BDSM authors before her. Pauline Réage. Anne Rice (A.N. Roquelaire). Jacqueline Carey. All of them widely known and widely published before 50SoG came along.

I would also like to throw in Josephine Hart's Damage and Nicholson Baker's Vox.

 

[SimonDoom]

She misrepresented the BDSM world horribly, .

I think this is true. It was one of my complaints about 50 Shades when I finished it. It's not really BDSM at all. It's a gothic romance, like Jane Eyre, where the woman saves the mysterious, powerful, but damaged man, only it's got whips and stuff. It's phony. I kind of enjoyed the first part of 50 Shades, despite the bad prose, because I thought the story had some intrigue, but I think James pulled her punches. It let me down. It would have been much more interesting if Christian's BDSM impulses hadn't derived from childhood abuse and if Anastasia had really gotten into it more than she did. But James wasn't up for that.

But still, it hit a nerve. It captured the attention of women who had never paid attention to the subject matter before. For whatever reason, women who would have been embarrassed to admit they read BDSM stuff were willing to admit they read 50 Shades. I personally encountered this and was intrigued by it. James tapped into something that hadn't been tapped into before. Most of the readers of 50 Shades had never read Story of O. It was a cultural phenomenon.

I'm not one of those who thinks a BDSM author has any particular obligation to represent the BDSM world accurately. I think an author is perfectly entitled to create his or her own BDSM world and write about it.

 

[litfan10]

I'm not one of those who thinks a BDSM author has any particular obligation to represent the BDSM world accurately. I think an author is perfectly entitled to create his or her own BDSM world and write about it.

I agree with you except about this. Yes, s/he can create own BDSM world but this is potentially dangerous stuff. Let's be safe about it.

She introduced the vanilla world of her generation to the fully equipped playroom. Then she totally left out all the safety protocols.

 

[lovecraft68]

Something positive about Shades/James is the fact that if anyone held themselves back from writing because they felt their grammar was lacking or they're just not good enough, she proved neither should hold you back.

On another topic-and on that there is an ongoing thread about as we speak-I think Shades is definitive proof the average readers gives fuck all about grammar or technical writing. If the reader likes the story, then they like the story.

I'm not advocating that you shouldn't try to do the best you can, and get editing help if you can, but it goes along way to shut up the pompous grammar nazis and "I have a degree in..." types when an author who writes at not much more than a middle school level is a best seller.

 

[litfan10]

Real captivating characters doing really interesting things can be the ultimate distraction from not only the real world but the world of punctuation, grammar, and spelling as well.

 

[KeithD]

Despite the sour grapes and the foaming at the mouth, E.L. James opened up the genre with readers and buyers for other writers if they can be clever enough and, as they claim a better writer then she is, to take advantage of the opportunity she has given them. And, gee, its just great that she couldn't write it well or correctly so that others can improve on her. Have at it. Prove you have better chops.

 

[Bramblethorn]

I may be wrong, I don't know all writers, but it's my guess that those writers were widely known as 'porn' writers and put, accordingly, into the shady corner, whereas I got the feeling that Fifty Shades was the first work that could openly be 'consumed'. People could talk about it without getting the label of being perverts.

I can't really agree with that. I think originally Rice's BDSM erotica was segregated as porn under pseudonyms, but by the mid-90s she was hugely successful as a mainstream author, with a film adaptation starring Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt. The erotica novels were reprinted as "Anne Rice writing as..." and they were pretty widely known and read - perhaps viewed as a little bit naughty, but I was introduced to them by a very respectable accountant.

(Well, not completely respectable, since she was dating me at the time, but it wasn't the sort of thing that one particularly had to hide.)

Carey's "Kushiel" series was published in a mainstream fantasy niche by a mainstream fantasy house, and it sits on the shelves alongside Tolkien/Martin/etc.

I think there has been a trend towards broader acceptance of BDSM-related fiction, but I'd have said that 50 Shades is more a beneficiary of that trend than a driver of it.

 

[lovecraft68]

I can't really agree with that. I think originally Rice's BDSM erotica was segregated as porn under pseudonyms, but by the mid-90s she was hugely successful as a mainstream author, with a film adaptation starring Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt. The erotica novels were reprinted as "Anne Rice writing as..." and they were pretty widely known and read - perhaps viewed as a little bit naughty, but I was introduced to them by a very respectable accountant.

(Well, not completely respectable, since she was dating me at the time, but it wasn't the sort of thing that one particularly had to hide.)

Carey's "Kushiel" series was published in a mainstream fantasy niche by a mainstream fantasy house, and it sits on the shelves alongside Tolkien/Martin/etc.

I think there has been a trend towards broader acceptance of BDSM-related fiction, but I'd have said that 50 Shades is more a beneficiary of that trend than a driver of it.

Shades was also published as romance and sold at Stop and Shop which is an indicator of how racy it....wasn't. It was risque to the romance crowd, but tame to people who had already been reading erotica.

Everyone here writes and reads hardcore sex so for us, Shades is vanilla, but if you're vanilla yourself? Ohhh...

But I think a lot of sales were driven by the initial hype machine and "anyone who is anyone is reading it." You were 'edgy' if you read it. Most of us were edgier in our teens so we're a bit jaded.

 

[litfan10]

Despite the sour grapes and the foaming at the mouth, E.L. James opened up the genre with readers and buyers for other writers if they can be clever enough and, as they claim a better writer then she is, to take advantage of the opportunity she has given them. And, gee, its just great that she couldn't write it well or correctly so that others can improve on her. Have at it. Prove you have better chops.

Love this!

 

[SimonDoom]

Let's be safe about it.

.

I say to hell with being safe. Art doesn't have to be safe. Art can, and sometimes should be, dangerous. And erotic art, especially -- take the foot off the brake.

 

[litfan10]

Here's where we'll agree to disagree, Simon.

I once had a sex scene with the characters doing something I just came up with off the top of my head.

I had several readers who identified themselves as doctors and nurses who informed me that action would absolutely lead to a painful trip to the hospital with potentially life altering effects.

Well I did some research and found that they were right. So I quickly rewrote the scene.

I have had lots of readers thank me as they spiced up their sex life acting out some of my scenes. I never, ever what to be told I caused somebody harmful pain.

Sure it is fiction and on them for taking it out of fictional context still, while yes, they shot themselves I still feel that I provided the gun.

 

[NotWise]

I say to hell with being safe. Art doesn't have to be safe. Art can, and sometimes should be, dangerous. And erotic art, especially -- take the foot off the brake.

I think the idea is to write what you want, but publish it someplace other than the BDSM category. It isn't the right venue.

 

[SimonDoom]

Here's where we'll agree to disagree, Simon.

I once had a sex scene with the characters doing something I just came up with off the top of my head.

I had several readers who identified themselves as doctors and nurses who informed me that action would absolutely lead to a painful trip to the hospital with potentially life altering effects.

Well I did some research and found that they were right. So I quickly rewrote the scene.

I have had lots of readers thank me as they spiced up their sex life acting out some of my scenes. I never, ever what to be told I caused somebody harmful pain.

Sure it is fiction and on them for taking it out of fictional context still, while yes, they shot themselves I still feel that I provided the gun.

I respect your viewpoint but I don't agree with it.

I don't believe that as an artist/author I am responsible for what readers do in response to my art. They're responsible for themselves. I write fiction and fantasy. I presume that the people who read my stories are adults. They have the power of choice. Some very, very small percentage of them may be so lacking in responsibility and self-control and perception of reality that they may do something foolish after reading my story. That's their problem, as I see it. It's the price you pay for living in a free world. We are much better off, in the aggregate, upholding an ethic whereby artists and authors give free rein to their imagination, even where it's twisted or "irresponsible." That's what I believe.

 

[Wifetheif]

Despite the sour grapes and the foaming at the mouth, E.L. James opened up the genre with readers and buyers for other writers if they can be clever enough and, as they claim a better writer then she is, to take advantage of the opportunity she has given them. And, gee, its just great that she couldn't write it well or correctly so that others can improve on her. Have at it. Prove you have better chops.

I KNOW I have better chops. Under my real name, I have published an award-winning, popular history, through an academic press. It was the first book on its topic written in. ninety years and the Library of Congress created a special subheading just for it! It's been quoted and cited in subsequent books by other authors. Recently, Pulitzer Prize winner Dave Maranis came to my house to peruse my research, and told me to my face that I was "a fantastic writer."

___ YOUR TURN!