Fifty Shades of Grey, by E. L. James

When I caught the SNL bit on this popular erotic read this past spring, I had to turn to the internet to figure out what it even was.  Yah, I'm aware that I take "living under a rock" to a whole new level.  I skimmed an article or two and promptly decided that I was not in the least bit interested in reading porn.  In true Julia style, I was feeling mighty meh about hopping onto this bandwagon.

On Monday night, a copy of the nefarious Fifty Shades of Grey materialized from Soeur's bag.  I smirked, mildly amused that a copy of this wanton book had somehow landed in my home.  Of course she'd have a copy.  You should read it.  Not great, but keeps you turning enough pages to keep you awake on the red-eye was the gist of her feedback.

I had heard that Fifty had outsold the final Harry Potter book.  Let's face it: that's impressive.  Outstanding, even.  So that very night, I opened my mind and had a go.  I whipped through the first two hundred pages.  Not much happened, but it held my interest enough that I picked it up again last night.  A few pages in, I got stuck.  I could not, for the life of me, move past page 231.  That page starts a chapter with a disturbing description of the protagonist naked and shackled to a bed.  Spread eagle.  There was also some mention of leather in there.  Maybe a whip?  Or a belt?  I don't remember.  All I know is that the visual images forming in my head were gravely stressing me out.  I could not get my eyes to read through the sentences, no less finish the paragraph.  I closed the book and removed it from my bedstand to the living area.  I could not have it near me.

Utterly baffled doesn't even begin to cover it.  Why do people want to read about a woman tied down to a bed and whipped?  Isn't that the least arousing and most frightening thing imaginable?  How did this outsell the last Harry Potter book?  The world of sadomasochism eludes me.  Psychologically, it seems seriously unhealthy.  Damaging.  Not good for the soul, mind, or body.  Surely, I must be missing something here.  Why do I find this so vile and disturbing while millions of readers are making this book a bestseller?  And now there are plans for a blockbuster film.  Wha?

Stranger things have happened than a ridiculously successful erotic book trilogy about two beautiful people like Christian Grey and Anastasia Steele.  That's not new.  But it is extremely unsettling to know that this book has been so well-received globally - as in, translated-into-several-dozen-languages globally.  Human beings are strange creatures.  I guess as hard as I may try to understand and accept, mass behaviors will never cease to surprise me.  What I do know is that halfway through page 231 of book one of three is probably as far as I'll make it on this bandwagon.