Fifty Shades of Grey by E.L James – Book Review

E.L James, author Fifty Shades Triology

Welcome to the Fifty Shades of Grey, the latest book phenomenon that has women across continents swoon in sex literature. The numbers speak volumes of its mass appeal. 4 million copies and counting in UK and another 2.5 million reprint now, making it the fastest selling book in UK, 15 million copies shipped to US and Canada and the throw in millions across the world and you know E.L James has hit a literary G-Spot bang on. Puritans might frown, the blue-blooded literature fans might cringe but millions of readers especially women are devouring the 50 shades of Grey. It is literature’s sexual liberation for whatever reasons and would make a good subject for modern-day Freud.

So what is Fifty Shades of Grey, the first of the trilogy all about? Ok, those who want to stay away from the shades of book summary can make a one para-leap here.

Anastasia Steele, a young final year collegian gets to interview the young, self-made billionaire  entrepreneur Christian Grey for the college newspaper when her best friend and roomie and newspaper editor, Katherine Kavanagh falls ill. Christian Grey is totally overwhelmed and intimidated by Grey’s greek God looks. Events follows and they meet again and by now Anna is flushed with love over Grey in spite of him warning him he is not a heart and flowers kind of guy and being a control freak. In spite of warning, the duo hooks up and Grey insists he does not make love but only fcuk hard and in a business like fashion offers her a contract that would take her into a vortex of dominant and submissive bondage, pain and lust in spite of  unspoken love simmering underneath.  She also realizes Christian is not a shining knight but a troubled man fighting his own inner demons and a troubled past that he would not share with her or anyone. So does love conquer the erotic dark cloud hanging over the couple? Where does the dark path of erotic desires lead Anna to? Did she able to unlock the troubled past of Grey makes the first book in the trilogy.

Now coming to the narrative, E.L James has no pretension of spinning a tale in a language that would be lauded by literary critics but its appeal lies her ability to make this erotic fiction appeal to men and largely women and bring them out of the closet of shame and unabashedly talk about it to others and read it in public. After all it is indeed a sex book in essence, not a romantic book laced with sex but other way around. Writing sex as I mentioned earlier is the most difficult part if you would ask any writer and to bring an erotic fiction with sex as the focal point and to explore the darkness of the erotic side of a troubled protagonist who in his own words is Fifty shades F%CKED up and gets his satisfaction in pain and pleasure of BDSM. To explore the fifty shades of darkness in a pretty ordinary and even slack language where  page after pages in detail and in-depth and managing to climax the reader’s anxiety (and imagination) is where E.L James succeeds.

My final word when I began reading Fifty Shades of Grey I had no idea what to expect but only the fact it has taken the bookshelves across the continents by storm. What I read shocked me, it was unexpected. It was over-the-top erotic sex that am not sure if I enjoyed it or not but one thing for sure E.L James did strike the imaginative g-spot somewhere that makes this book such a hit. If you like an orgasmic reading, go shamelessly indulge in it.