A review by readingisforhotgirls
Fifty Shades of Grey by E.L. James

dark tense slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

i have a love/hate relationship with the movies (love, mainly because of dakota johnson) so i decided to read the books as well… the writing style is pretty low quality and the story was quite lacking. for an as-advertised erotica novel, the sex scenes were honestly quite dull and i don’t think this was a fully accurate nor realistic depiction of the bdsm lifestyle. it also shouldn’t be considered the “bdsm staple”. characters are weak, poorly written, abusive, and not very lovable. james’ writing is often very embellished and not in an enjoyable way. i found myself skimming a lot of the chapters yet still processing the information fully, which typically is not a good sign. and so everything about this story is telling me to hate it, but with dakota johnson my beloved as ana in the film adaptations, i physically cannot!!! christian grey sure is fifty shades of fucked up, but i’m still probably going to continue reading the rest of the trilogy because i know the plotlines develop further on a bit later. hopefully it gets better rather than worse? despite all this, i didn’t completely despise reading it. it was fine despite it not being necessarily “good literature”.
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