I decided to check out the “50 Shades of Grey” trilogy after hearing through the grapevine that it was a good read. Needless to say, as with many other trendy books that people rave about, it was utterly horrific.
Be prepared for spoilers after this point. And profanity.
The series starts and it is relatively interesting. Our main character, innocent and demure, meets Mr. Grey, who is infinitely rich, infinitely good looking, and arrogant. He turns her on. Shocker! They meet again “by coincidence” later on and a few times after that, and she soon finds out that he is a Dominant and wishes her to be his Submissive. Ooh, a different concept for popular fiction. Cool! The sex scenes to follow are vivid and entertaining. Good porn value. So where does it go wrong?
As you get to know the main character, she becomes increasingly more irritating. The book begins to fill with interjections from her “inner goddess” telling her to be a slut or to not let him be in control of her. I’m pretty confident she says or thinks “Oh my” a minimum of 256 times in the entire series. George Takei would be proud.
Things take another turn. She decides that she wants to help him. Fix him. She can’t be his Sub, but she can try to turn his life around! Next time, on Dr. Phil…
The entire second book is spent whining about whether or not she really wants to be with him and deciding whether or not he’s actually a violent dude. But – lo and behold – she slowly begins to change him. Mr. Grey, in the span of…maybe a year total throughout the three books…goes from a cold, calculating, arrogant, sexy in a somewhat scary way – prick – to a slobbery, crying, emotional pile of goo who freaks out whenever the female lead does anything. He sheds 20-30 years of emotional baggage INSTANTLY because of her. Because of love.
Totally realistic.
By the end of the third book, they are married, have a child, and are on their way to the second child. Happily Ever After.
WHAT THE FUCK? Wait a second. 1000 pages ago, he was nailing her from behind, spanking her and…
Here is where I get angry. Obviously, E.L. James is a genius. She knew exactly what to write to make millions of naive and stupid women fall ass-over-face for her books. It is the same concept that Twilight took advantage of. I really need to come up with a term for it….
Naive Romantasy. Let’s call it that for now.
The concept of Naive Romantasy is a simple one. Women who don’t know better, especially ones who have been brought up with junk like the Twilight series as primary reading in their teens, are raised with the preconceived notion that every man can be a perfect specimen of fairy tale princery with just a little bit of work on her part. Every man can be molded into exactly what you want and need with love.
And I’ve KNOWN PEOPLE like this. Women my age (mid-twenties) who keep meeting men and becoming sorely disappointed because they don’t sweep them off their feet and instantly fulfill their every fantasy. Women who expect men to read their minds, cry when they’re emotional, and be vulnerable when they feel they should be. Men who let them control what they do and when because they’re just so in love. Seriously? Really?
It’s junk romantic fiction like Twilight and 50 Shades of Grey that give teens and women this impression. They sell because these women want to believe that it could happen to them. They could meet the real Prince Charming and he could carry them back to his mansion on a giant white unicorn, then make sweet love to them and tell them they’ll do the dishes and that they love them more than anything in the universe. That they’ll never look at another woman again because their eyes are just overtaken with love.
It’s depressing. I’ve read accounts on other blogs of teenagers that have broken up with their boyfriends because they’re, and I quote, “Not like Edward”. They compare real-life men to the men in these Hyper-Romantasy novels. So real-life men are getting turned down, ditched, and are going into relationships with such incredibly overly unrealistic expectations that no ACTUAL HUMAN MALE has a chance in Hell.
I say stop producing this shit and actually write a romantic novel that’s real. Sure, keep the juicy sex and spanking; who doesn’t love that? But please, stop pretending that men can be origami cranes folded to perfection and placed on display for everyone to be jealous about. They can’t be. Stop twisting the fresh minds of adolescent girls with your torrid trash. Learn to write better, and write something awesome.
Ladies, please. Realize that your man is human. Realize that you’ll never be an angel and neither will he. Maybe have a “Romantasy” day with your man where you guys pretend that you live in that type of world. But please accept that men like Edward and Grey don’t exist.
Come to terms with that.