Fifty Shades of Enlightenment

Perhaps you've heard of a little series of books called the Fifty Shades Trilogy? Several weeks ago, I started noticing many of my friends posting about Fifty Shades of Grey, the first book in the series by E.L. James, on Facebook. They were all raving about it. People were saying they were waiting to read it and couldn't find copies (Amazon is your friend, people!). I was intrigued. I like to jump on reading bandwagons. Since I don't watch much television, I need something to keep me in the loop of pop culture. So I was intrigued. I had to read this book!


I got Fifty Shades of Grey for my Kindle and devoured it quickly. Fifty Shades Darker and Fifty Shades Freed followed onto my Kindle in quick succession. Because I don't want you to be alarmed if you don't know anything about these books and innocently decide to give them a try, let me share that I've heard them described as Mom Porn, and that is a pretty apt description. Yes, there is a lot of sex. But there is a pretty good story buried in there between the explicit sex scenes. This is not great literature, but it is entertaining. If you're used to reading books of a higher literary caliber, you might find yourself annoyed by the repetitiveness. Holy fill in the blank (cow, crap, sh*t, f**k) is used so often, it started to get a little aggravating. Certain adjectives (mercurial, for one) are also over used, I guess to get a point across. Christian Grey is mercurial, I got it. (From dictionary.com - Mercurial: changeable; volatile; fickle; flighty; erratic.)

I've heard that the series originated as Twilight fan fiction. I read all the Twilight books (see above comment about jumping on reading bandwagons) and loved them. But if you're interested in the Fifty Shades books because you've heard the same thing, don't expect sparkly vampires, or anything else remotely supernatural. The similarity, as I see it, is in the intense love story. One really messed up dude (Christian Grey/Edward) meets one innocently sweet girl (Anastasia Steele/Bella), and the two develop an unlikely relationship. Also don't expect anything PG or PG-13. Fifty Shades is more NC-17. Twilight never gets explicit. By comparison, the Fifty Shades books will make you blush often (a la Anastasia Steele).

I've also heard there is movie talk. I mean Hollywood just can't look away anytime there is a massively popular book circulating the masses, right? This may be Mom Porn, but I'm pretty sure it would win over the male audience on the big screen. Millions of men around the world will pretend they are doing their wives and girlfriends a big favor by agreeing to see a "chick flick" on date night. Now if they manage to get the casting right, it'll be positively golden. Although, will anyone outside of the porn industry consider these roles? If you've read the books, who do you think should be considered to play Christian Grey and Anastasia Steele, the two main characters?