Happy Valentine’s Day everyone! I’m not a big Valentine’s Day celebrator, but I know many of you love the day of Love, so I hope you have a wonderful one.
In honor of Valentine’s Day, I wanted to write a little bit about a very famous book series that is finally playing its final film in theaters right now. I’m talking about 50 Shades of Grey.
I know the title of this post will give me away, but I have to be honest with you and tell you that I have read the entire 50 Shades of Grey series twice. Sigh. Please don’t hate me.
I first read the series a few years back as a treat for my birthday. I wanted to have a guilty pleasure read and I hadn’t read the series before, so I decided I would give it a go and see if it was as good (or as bad) as the hype was saying. Turns out, it was both.
I loved that it was terrible. I honestly think that this is the reason why I continued to read it at first. I thought that it was crap and that the sex was not believable and the relationship between Ana and Christian was this super toxic one.
However, the biggest driver of my love of this series was the fact that I wanted to learn more about Christian Grey. If you weren’t aware, Christian Grey is a person who was abandoned by his mother at a very young age. He was abused by his mother’s pimp and his mother was also a drug addict. He lived in a crack house and after his mother died, the doctor treating his mother decided to take him in. He was extremely lucky as an abandoned child to meet his forever mother in a hospital waiting room.
When I read a story like that, I get curious. I want to know more about Christian and how he went from being a poor orphan to a super rich deviant (“I make $100,000 an hour,” is a line from the book on his salary). Why is he the way he is? Will they go more into this as the story unfolds? What kind of growth do I expect to see from someone as terrible as Christian Grey?
These were some questions floating around in my head after I finished the first one. Also, the first one leaves you on this massive cliffhanger and I needed to see what happened in the second one to ease my curious mind.
Sadly, you don’t really learn more about Christian Grey, but you do see him grow. From being the man who can barely stand a woman’s touch, he falls in love with Ana and ends up marrying her. It’s such a beautiful story, but when the writing and the writer aren’t the strongest, it becomes a story much more difficult to appreciate because of those glaring flaws.
However, that’s not the reason why I read it the second time. The second time I read it was when I went to go see the movies for the first time. I had seen both in the theaters and after watching both, I felt this compulsion to read the books again. I honestly don’t know really why I wanted to read it again other than the fact that it was such a guilty pleasure.
And I know that many of you will still be weirded out by the fact that I watched the movies more than once and read the books twice, but I really loved how brainless these books were. When you read a lot of serious novels about serious subjects, you want to escape that for a while. For me, I tend to read trashy romance novels with poorly depicted images of a very misunderstood subculture. Do I feel shame in this? Not really. Because I like what I like and it made me happy to read about Christian and Ana and eventually what happens to them.
And my inner goddess agrees.
Simone and Her Books 
Good to know you support blatant domestic violence and abusive relationships
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Thanks so much for commenting. I wish you asked this rather than assumed, but I don’t support either of these and I mention in my blog post that I know this is a trash couple and that their relationship is super toxic. These aren’t the reasons why I liked this book. I liked how trashy it is and how unbelievable it is. I don’t support this lifestyle and feel terrible the author got the bdsm lifestyle so terribly wrong, but it took me away from my life and my troubles and made me laugh every once in a while. Also the books become more of a thriller the further you go along. I appreciate you commenting your thoughts, but I urge you to please speak more forwardly with others especially when you’re assuming the worst about their character.
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Your comment that it was as good and as bad as people were saying is right on! I felt the same way. As I was reading, I could tell the writing was terrible and the story was far-fetched, etc. But, I can’t deny I was interested. It presents an interesting dilemma…what do you do if a man you’re in love with has this weird thing about him that you’re not on board with? Do you get on board or run for the hills?
And that’s so true about not learning much about how Grey got to be the way he is. It almost needed a prequel. Maybe that was covered in Grey, the follow-up from his perspective? Was over it by the time that came out.
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That is such a good question! What happens if you love someone, but their flaws are something you just can’t overlook? I don’t even know how to approach that question let alone be stuck in a scenario like that!
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Simone, I read 50 Shades (and the second novel) for the same reason; I was faced with some really difficult circumstances in my personal life at the time and it was a fabulous escape. I didn’t want to read anything “serious,” I didn’t want to think about my own problems or be reminded of how tough life can be and this was perfect. Of course, like you, I recognized the flaws and, when I’m reading “trashy” fiction, I ignore the logical and stick to the fantasy that’s being presented by the author. I’m so glad you shared this!
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