I recently hate-read Fifty Shade Darker and Fifty Shades Freed for all of you. I realized, about a month ago, that the sequel films were definitely going to be made and that I should know what the hell I was talking about when I bashed the stories. You know what? It was WORSE than I was expecting. I’ll give FSD a little bit of credit – E.L. James put in a “mystery” that kept some of the story afloat, although FSD also messed up the timeline in a major way – by my estimation, Ana and Christian got engaged after knowing each other for less than a month. Seriously. FSF was the worst though – what could have been a half-way not-terrible plot was ruined by E.L. James habit of making Ana selectively stupid and disengaged at just the right moment.
Anyway, E.L. James has a new book out right now. It’s called Grey, and it’s the same story (the seduction of Anastasia Steele) told through Christian’s perspective. As soon as it was released, it was widely mocked – go here to see Gawker’s hilarious and NSFW coverage of Christian’s many emotions as told through his penis. To promote the newly released book, E.L. James did a Twitter Q&A yesterday and it went off the rails almost immediately. Here’s a sample of some of the hilarious tweets E.L. got (I’m not embedding the tweets because that would take all day):
#AskELJames after the success of “Grey,” have you considered re-telling the story from the perspective of someone who can write
#AskELJames I need advice on making a BIG romantic gesture. Should I put a GPS tracker in her phone and make threats if she tries to leave?
#AskELJames a guy stalked me and put a GPS tracker in my phone, I think he rly likes me should I ask him out for a date or wait for him to??
#AskELJames Is it only ok for Christian to stalk, coerce, threaten & manipulate Ana because he’s hot, or is it also ok because he’s rich?
#AskELJames Are you aware that using alcohol and manipulation to gain consent is incredibly abusive and negates any consent given?
#AskELJames Is there a safe word which will stop you from writing anymore of this bollocks?
#AskELJames How many times a day do you think Charlie Hunnam just laughs with sheer relief?
Are you as homophobic in real life as your books are? Asking for a friend. #AskELJames
My boss said no when I asked if I could kiss him and then I did anyway because no means yes right? Things at work are awkward. #AskELJames
i like this girl but she doesn’t seem all that into me, is it cool if i beat her into liking me like christian grey #AskELJames
Did you see the abusive relationship of Bella and Edward and think “hmm needs more abuse” #AskELJames
Will there be a delay to our answers while you wait for Stephanie Meyer to answer them first, so you know what to write? #AskELJames
What do you dislike more, Independent strong woman or the English language? #AskELJames
Will you be rewriting the book from Stephenie Meyer’s point of view next time? #AskELJames
[From the #AskELJames Twitter]
Bless them. Bless them all. After reading the original trilogy, all I can say is BRAVO and BRAVA! While I do think Christian and Ana’s relationship is abusive, I came out of the trilogy angry at the simply sh-tty storytelling. At some point, it wasn’t even a joyful hate-read of “Hahaha, this is so stupid, you’ve got to laugh.” It was so stupid, I got really depressed.
Photos courtesy of WENN.
And she is $30M richer because some media twisting during the release of the original book turned this drivel into some sort of female empowerment clap trap.
I started to read it but had to stop; it seemed to be written by a 4th grader.
And don’t even get me started on how far off of a healthy, consenting, adult relationship should be. People into S&M are appalled.
I, for the life of me, can not understand why these books became a hit. They were written terribly! I felt second hand embarrassment for the author while reading it (only read a few chapters and then stopped for the sake of my sanity) And I know this isn’t good but I instantly dislike people who say they enjoyed Fifty Shades, either the book or the movie.
I didn’t menage to continue after page 1. It was just TOO bad.
I can’t believe this woman made millions out of that mess.
I got about 10 pages in and couldn’t make it any further. It was pure shite, and let me tell you, I read a lot of garbage books to rest my brain (paranormal and regency romances, don’t sue me) and this was worse than any of those. Way worse. Offensively bad.
I couldn’t even read the excerpts without itching to bust out a red pen and correct the terrible writing.
I read an excerpt and had to stop. I was embarassed for her, especially because she’s not embarassed by how horrible a writer she is and how pathetic the women that made this book series into such a huge success. I’m ashamed for all of you! It’s horrible drivel and there is no good messages in it at all for young women who jump on the bandwagon because they think it’s cool or a thing! It’s just embarassing! Even the BDSM community hates it! But I guess she’s laughing all the way to the bank. I really hope the next movies flop in a big way and she crawls back into her mansion and doesn’t try to write anything ever again.
You know, if I had the choice to make all the money she made but it was because of writing stuff like this, I’m not sure I’d want to be rich that badly.
I was curious about the horrible reviews and told myself a book can’t be all that bad, so I started browsing through the first book in the bookstore. I should have known better. By page 10 I literally threw it back on the shelf like it was something toxic. I never read such abominably written tripe in all my life.
I made it to Chapter 4 of the first book, gave up and threw it in the trash. I cannot believe people actually read and enjoyed those books. Reading her writing was so painful I just could not go on!
I couldn’t get through it – at all! I was laughing at the bad writing. Read excerpts on line. That was enough. If you want to try well written erotica, Anne Rice wrote some books under a pseudonym. They would have to be better than 50 shades.
Well if you remember during the initial hey day for the books, everyone was reading them. All these older married woman were reading them. Everyone was talking about how sexually permissive they were. It was cool, you had to be WITH it or you were just way behind the times. I actually know someone who got a DIVORCE because of what this book did to their marriage and sex life. It was all the rage……… It AMAZES me the power of the media and how everyone just cow tows to the “official” storyline until all of a sudden reality sets in and someone brave enough to wave their hand and say, hmmm, no, this isn’t cool, finally is listened to. It happens with all the “politically correct” topics. We should have better shaped opinions based on our own BELIEFS and MORALS and not be so unsure of our selves that political winds blow us around. Everyone gets all giddy with liberal hail fellow well met and then suddenly the bottom drops out and there is a realization, no, that wasn’t good. But hey, EJ will make another $30M while all the selfie blowing aren’t I sexyyy types buy into some weird version of Do What Thy Wilt…….
Wait, you know people that got divorced because of that crap?? OMG that is just madness. I cannot even begin to understand …
ETA: I’m with Anon33 on the political rant at the end.
I was with you until you somehow turned this political. In my experience, liberals wanted nothing to do with this crap.
Sorry, wasn’t going for a political statement at all. I wan’t using “liberals” as a political term, bad choice of words. I just mean that the media puffs stuff all up and then everyone jumps on the media bandwagon and the whole thing goes over the cliff because people have just taken some generalized view and not thought through whether it is in line with their own views, beliefs, morals, sense of goodness, what they like, what they care about.
And yes, they got all permissive sexually after she read the book and it went askew from there…………
I think there are so many people who read these books because they indeed wanted to be cool and “with-it”. I have an educated friend who won’t stop talking about these books. She always finds a way to bring them up with total strangers and works in how she wasn’t shocked by all the sex. I wasn’t either but I was shocked by the horrible writing and laughable dialog. I think my friend is just trying too hard to show the world she’s totally cool and a hot ticket. I don’t think this is a political issue, but there is a certain amount of media manipulation in selling this tripe as this years “big thing” (no pun intended).
Perhaps they would have gotten divorced anyway……… but I have a feeling that there really are people that stupid out there that a terrible book would cause that bad of a rift.
The only good thing that came from this was a general recognition of “yes, women enjoy erotica too”. Porn isn’t just for dudes, and women tend to prefer written porn and there’s nothing wrong with that. There is, however, EVERYTHING wrong with how terribly these books are written.
“…and how everyone just cow tows…”
Unless everyone was hauling cattle, I think the word you want is kowtows.
And if you didn’t mean to say ‘liberal,’ then perhaps you shouldn’t have. If you wish to support your statements & arguments with words that matter, then words must matter.
@belle de jour REALLY? Lol! You are very funny.
Feminists hate these books. They were slammed by prety much everyone as far as feminist websites go… the S&M community hates them as well. Don;t know where you got this idea, it’s mostly housewives who buys this crap and made it a bestseller.
I watched the movie, at home, because I wanted to see what the deal was about. There’s a scene where she pisses him off because she’s standing up for herself. He grabs her and puts her over his knee and spanks her. I’m still pissed off about that!! They spun it around to make it seem sexy. I guess we’re all supposed to shut off our brains and be cool with being treated as property. This book series and movie is utter BS!
Hey now, let’s not insult the housewives! I was one for a few years, and I can tell you I didn’t suddenly drop 20 IQ points just because I decided to stay home with my kid for awhile.
I don’t blame housewives… I blame people who don’t actually read books who made this a phenomenon. Women (and men) who read fairly often would have already read better erotic romance and have a higher standard for the quality of writing out there. It doesn’t need to be Shakespeare, but basic grammar should be required.
It was a dumb smutty book that got non readers curious.
*doffs hat to English language loving Twitter users*
+1
These tweets are giving me LIFE! I can’t stop with the laughing.
Delicious: more wit in a single tweet than in entire volumes.
^This^. I loved :#AskELJames after the success of “Grey,” have you considered re-telling the story from the perspective of someone who can write?
Me too lmao
They gave me a much needed laugh! I couldn’t even pick a favorite! So many are awesome.
+ 1
Kiddo, that was my favorite tweet too.
A friend and I read two randomly chosen pages of the first one in a bookstore when it came out, and were strangling trying not to laugh too loudly. Then two other women came up, perfect solid suburban soccer mom types, and snatched their copies from the table and gave us the absolute filthiest looks, like we were deriding fine literature. My friend hissed, “The demographic lives!” Needless to say, we began work immediately on our own super hot super sexy book, Shag Shag Shag.
Oh Liberty, I can’t wait to read it!
Some more great ones:
Tim @Playing_Dad 20h20 hours ago
#AskELJames What is your favorite thing to do with eggs? (My money is on beat them)
ewenmacintosh @ewenmacintosh 20h20 hours ago
#AskELJames In Spain are you known as ‘The James’?
Belial Bell @AlwaysAnimated 17h17 hours ago
#AskELJames you do realize that if Grey wasn’t a billionaire, the 50 Shades trilogy would be one hell of a Law & Order episode?
Jessica Ward @Starbuggy2290 24h24 hours ago
Do you intend to mold your body with Stephanie Meyer? Or just make a suit out of her skin? #AskELJames
Hehehehehehe. Thank you for sharing those– they’re as good as the ones Kaiser posted. “Are you going to make a suit out of her skin” has to be my favorite. So glad the general public is calling her out on her obvious bull. Bless the twitterverse. Bless.
“Jessica Ward @Starbuggy2290 24h24 hours ago
Do you intend to mold your body with Stephanie Meyer? Or just make a suit out of her skin? #AskELJames”
Omg, just perfect! Also I really should stop reading Celebitchy at the office, just made the most akward noise when trying to contain my laugh…
+ Infinity. I outright guffawed at all of the delicious snark they lobbed at her.
@Kiddo. That was my favourite too.
My second fave: Will there be a delay to our answers while you wait for Stephanie Meyer to answer them first, so you know what to write? #AskELJames
lol
THIS is why Twitter was made. THIS. Praise whatever, THIS.
yes!
My favorite tweet was “Can you confirm that you will be writing the story of Ramsay Bolton from his perspective, showing he is just misunderstood?”
Aren’t they great? I’m loving this.
I know. I love that people are calling her out for trying to romanticize an abusive relationship. And for acknowledging the she can’t even write well. P.S. Having GNAT acknowledge my comment is the celebitchy equivalent of having a celebrity give me a shout out.
I agree and I loved that some of them were men!
Lol, GreenBunny, your comments are great!
Swoon!
I have never read her books, so please don’t handcuff and beat me for saying this, but are they really so reprehensible that they can’t fall into the category of fictionalized sex fantasy sadomasochism/BDSM/little-princess-who-wants-to-be-dominated-by-an-aggressive-handsome-outrageously-attractive-big-scary-man? People shouldn’t be made to feel that their fantasies are wrong or indicative of a real life desire to have something similar happen to them. They’re just stories after all.
WALMOS
I get your point.
The thing is the writing was awful. The grammar was awful. The overal story was terrible. What there was in the book regarding fetishes was unfortunately glorified abuse and not what you’d think. Not fantasy as much as aggressive manipulation. In those fantasies people have they still hold some control. Some consent. Not the way ELJ wrote it.
That’s where things split and that is why this woman gets mocked like this in the QandA
EDIT
Didn’t see others answered below. What they said!
HA HA HA That one is amazing
We Are All Made of Stars, I haven’t read the books myself. As a lover of books, I absolutely refuse. But after reading a lot of commentary, I got the idea that FSOG goes way beyond a healthy dominant/submissive relationship. There are certain key aspects that are crucial to healthy BDSM– Consent, mutual respect, safe words, etc. I don’t believe any of that was present in FSOG. No one is saying there’s anything wrong with having some kinky fantasies (and I’m all for it, personally), but there’s a clear line between healthy kink and abuse. The people who have read the books have said it’s pretty clear that they cross that line multiple times.
Yep. Book Ana is written as someone who is never an equal participant in it, he manipulates and harasses her and coerces her into doing what he wants even when it’s made clear many times she is not comfortable with it. In a good S&M relationship, even though there is a sub/dom they are equal and there is a respect there. He follows her even after she tells him not to, he stalks her, gets angry with her about stuff she has no control over (other people’s actions), gets annoyed when she uses the safe word (a big no no in the S&M world) and EL basically paints anyone into S&M as damaged and someone needing to be fixed. It carries on into the second and third books. A shining example in book 3 is when she sunbathes topless on a beach in France along with hundreds of other people, he gets angry and during sex he marks her body without her consent and knowledge at the time so she has to cover up for the rest of the trip. Honestly, it’s appalling and he’d have been removing his own detached penis from his bumhole if a man did that to me.
Oh and he fakes his death to freak her out and get her to agree to marry him.
He’s a peach.
+1
Hoo-kay, well that does sound pretty extreme and ridiculous. Although again I would have to point out that many fantasties “cross the line” for real life, e.g., rape fantasies, and that’s totally okay so long as you’re just enjoying the fantasy. These books were written for adults, and hey, if that’s the level of nuttery and melodrama that you’re into, good for you!
@We Are Made of Stars: a very large part of the mockery & disgust is based upon the fact that the writing itself is so egregious… no matter the subject.
When coupled with the way in which El Jameso handled the fantasies or predilections in question, I think she had people from all sorts of disparate camps lined up to take a swing at her piñata.
I personally don’t mock the fantasies themselves to which you refer. But I feel free mock her as an ‘author,’ as well as her portrayal of ‘fantasy’ done in such a cheesy and irresponsibly unaware pile of borrowed purple prose.
Im not mocking the fantasies in the book or what you mention by any means. Each to their own so long as youre doing what makes you happy and its because both parties want to. What sat off with me about it is that he manipulates her into what he wants. Id have seen past the bad writing if they EL had bothered to do her research into sub/dom relationships and it would have been better if they went on to stay together and continued to explore their fantasies together. Instead you get something in him is broken and she wants to fix it by doing stuff shes not entirely ok with. Its then validated by her “curing him” with love.
@lindy79 I think the argument of We Are All Made of Stars and belle de jour means that the manipulation is part of the fantasy. So for some people out there it might be a great to not read about a healthy s/m relationship, but to read exactly how he dominates her and takes away her choices except to submit to his sexual hunger. Rape fantasies have been mentioned and if these get fictionalised, I guess they aren’t written as roleplay in a healthy s/m relationship but as the real deal? I don’t know for sure because I’m not into that and therefore have never read rape fantasy stories, but I want to say: in fetish fiction some things are considered hot that the readers wouldn’t want to happen like that in reality. In regard to 50 Shades this would mean that the readers find Christian hot and his total dominance of Ana hot, but would still run as fast as they could if they ever met someone like this in real life.
I guess the real problem with the book is that a) some readers don’t/can’t/won’t see the difference between fetish fiction and reality and b) EL James herself probably never thought about that stuff very much.
Ramsay Bolton was the result of child neglect and poor toilet training, dontcha know?
Dear kindly Sergeant Krupke, You gotta understand, It’s just our bringin’ up-ke That gets us out of hand.
I was genuinely howling with laughter at these tweets yesterday.
Twitter can be awful but at times like these it’s truly amazing.
Someone sent her this and I couldn’t breathe.
http://50shadesofflashheart.tumblr.com/
Are those actual lines from the book? How bad is that?!
Apparently so.
It has made me wish that Rik Mayall was still alive and could record an audio book of it.
YES YES YES! That would be the best thing ever.
You can totally hear his voice doing it can’t you Sixer? It would be amazing!
Thanks for that Lindy now I will get nothing done today because I can’t stop cackling!
Hodor!
HODOR!!!
OMG that is insane. I love it.
The quotes on that page are so hilarious but combined with Mayall’s facial expressions I have tears running down my face.
WTF is arousing about a woman smelling like your grandad’s apple orchard…or your grandads anything for that matter?? and “Wholesale” the cheeky bastard!
Personal fav: “Her words travel directly to my dick…… passing GO along the way”
Well, who doesn’t love a good Monopoly pun when talking about an erect penis? Did the words travel with a top hat at a jaunty angle or the little dog, or possibly the iron. The SEXY iron.
“She has a fresh, wholesale fragrance that reminds me of my grandfather ‘s apple orchard.”
I am crying from laughing.
1. It’s wholesome in the book. She’s not THAT bad lol
2. Translation from twitter: “She smells of horse manure and rotting apples.”
I feel like having is say wholesale just makes it better, the said part is how many of us would not be surprised if it said wholesale, the mistakes in the book were that bad.
“Wholesale”? Most apt word ever used by E.ver L.ame James – Anastasia Steel truly is a budget character.
I like to think she so obviously meant wholesome and nobody picked up on it because everyone involved has the mental capacity of a squashed satsuma..
It’s wholesome in the book. Someone made a mistake while quoting it.
The mental capacity of a squashed satsuma! XD
LOL
Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
*dying*
How Perfect! I’m in tears laughing!
That made my day. I’ll accept that she made a boatload of money off of this drek, and that’s a bitter pill, but I’m glad that no one will go along with her posing as a serious author. Sit down.
Blame the publisher who sought her out to make money off the fan fiction that millions of women had already read and “loved.” Hey: It’s okay to encourage poor writers when the content is free and you’re in a community of other poor writers who wish one day to get a book deal. But once a major publisher steps in there, there needed to be a boatload of clean up, editing, revision, research, character and plot work, and a reevaluation of our culture and society if they are heading into the abyss to capitalize on that dreck. The publisher and her “editor” (who did no such thing) are evil geniuses. E.L. James was just a pawn in their moneymaking “Con”-zi scheme.
Never underestimate the public’s love of stories about abusive sex.
How people can still defend this mess is beyond me…
Problem is, you have a ton of bored housewives who are over Harlequin and want something spicier. And the publicist for this crap totally capitalized.
Honestly it’s difficult to find Romance on theme out there. I.e. the themes are pretty broad, so if you are not familiar with something it can be pretty intimidating.
If I had time, I’d totally start my own blog on this, recommending alternatives to this sort of crap.
A lot of the women who loved this were young educated career women though. I think it plays into a fantasy a lot of younger women have that they’ll be the one to fix a bad boy.
Yes, seriously people? Can we all stop with the housewife putdowns? People liked the books, and no, all of those people were not named June Cleaver and Donna Reed, get real. No matter how many times you want to tell yourselves that, it simply isn’t true.
@LaraK, a few weeks ago NPR’s Pop Culture Happy Hour podcast did an entire episode on romance novels and one of the guests has a blog “smart bitches, trashy novels” that sounds like something that might interest you. They discussed a lot of niche types of story lines (fantasy AU, can’t remember any other examples) as well as recommendations of works featuring POC characters.
And yes to the #AskELJames TL being a constant source of entertainment.
Women who read romance regularly would have been exposed to far better and spicier stuff years before. BDSM in novels is not actually new. Starting from Anne Rice on, it has been available for decades.
Smart Bitches Trashy Books is a great site to both discuss and often mock some of the silliness. It’s not all bored housewives.
Not a single person I know who read/enjoyed this garbage is either married or a housewife.
LOL! She really had it coming, didn’t she? Maybe now she’ll snap out of her delusions that she can write.
Not a chance. Maybe she and Iggy Azalea can team up and do something together. It would be a disaster and we could sit back with popcorn and margaritas and watch them blame each other.
Money feeds a lot of delusions, unfortunately. Stephenie Meyer thinks she can write.
“Is there a safe word to make you stop writing this bollocks?” Omfg, I’m crying, these are so funny. God love ya Kaiser, I have so much admiration for your ability to focus and get thru those books!
Yes, that was my favorite, too. I love that she’s being called out for this. I need to let my local librarians know so they can feel vindicated. 🙂
This is awesome. I wish this would never end!
“Is there a safe word…” was my fave, too!! I read this last night from another site while I was at work, and I was almost crying from laughing so hard! Every single person was a better writer then EL James. Which isn’t hard, but oh I laughed like a hyena! I know everyone has different tastes/opinions but really her books suck gag balls. Awful, awful awful.
The best tweet I saw was someone asking how many feet EL James has to legally stay away from Stephanie Meyer, LMAO.
No pity for this woman.
It’s like the Kardashians, when you make your millions by cheating and manipulating people tend to drag you through the coals. Add to it the whole bored housewife hoghwash that is 50 shades and you get a PR nightmare everytime.
It is so strange that of all people to copy she chose Stephanie Meyer. I mean Meyer was planning to write Twilight from Edward’s perspective at one point. E.L James kind of makes Meyer look better she at least had some interesting ideas even if the execution was bad.
James makes Stephenie Meyer look like Margaret Atwood.
Nice @insomniac!
It wasn’t so much to copy Meyer but the characters of Edward and Bella that she latched onto. Several of my coworkers talked about being TwiHards and then started reading Twilight fanfic. Just like “youtube” is making, for the lack of a better word, celebs. Some of the fanfic sites are making “Authors”. I think that’s where she got plucked from. Made some publicist/publisher a load of money.
Insomniac, skooled!!!! 🙂
I’ve never read the first book once I kept hearing about how poorly written it was. I had no idea she had two follow-ups to Fifty Shades of Grey.
Do NOT read it. Those are three hours of my life I will never get back.
Exactly. I chose not to read the book after hearing just how horribly it was written. I just can’t be bothered with wasting my time.
My fave tweet: What do you dislike more, Independent strong woman or the English language?
Same here, much to my husband’s chagrin! He’s sure I’ll be titllated, but I have remained strong. I even read him the snarky posts here, just to rub it in a little. Harrumph!
I read exactly 47 pages and developed a twitch in my eye that took hours to go away.
I made it through the first chapter only. My right eye still twitches occasionally.
The safe word one is my favourite! Very clever.
i always wonder if she thinks she is a great author or just laughs on the way to the bank.
Going by the shenanigans she pulled during the film production and the reasons she’s given for doing so, I think she genuinely believes she’s a gifted auteur and curator of this ‘fantastic’ universe she created.
To quote a truly great song writer (the Boss himself): “Poor men want to be rich, rich men want to be kings”.
I believe the lack of respect does bother her…a lot…and that is a very wonderful thing.
Except for the whole part where she knocked off someone else’s work. She is delusional.
Yes, and that’s what bothers me about her. If she’d just stumbled into this success, taken the heaps of cash, and said see ya!, I wouldn’t blame her for it. But she let it all go to her ego, is churning out more (I’m assuming terrible) work, and now acting like she knows how to do everything for the films too? Nope.
@Fallon, even her being delusional was a knock off: I remember vividly a Stephenie Meyer interview where she compared Twilight to Shakespeare!
“I think she genuinely believes she’s a gifted auteur and curator of this ‘fantastic’ universe she created.”
Agree 100%. And though I hate that I know the following, she’d already burned a lot of bridges before she even got a publishing deal: she depended upon a pretty tight-knit community of fanfic writers & readers for free feedback, editorial help, reviews, etc. as she was crafting this masterpiece – then, almost as soon as she posted her last chapter of MOTU for them to read, she yanked the whole thing off the free fanfic site and ran off. So many of them still feel betrayed by her that they won’t even speak her name anymore – Hudson/Hawn style.
The other sin for them: Stephanie Meyer – unlike Anne Rice or Dianna Outlander Whatshername – has always been extremely gracious about enthusiastic amateur fanfic authors using her characters and original books for inspiration.
@belle de jour – I’m ashamed to say I read MOTU on fan fiction, and James most certainly did incorporate reader suggestions into “her” story. In my book, she’s a total fraud as well as a plagiarist.
I saw someone on ohnotheydidnt call James the NC-17 version of Cassandra Clare/Claire (well known in fandom circles for switching out the names in her Harry Potter fanfiction to publish it as The Mortal Instruments). She was well known as a bullying Big Name Fan within that fandom, and distanced herself/pulled her fanfic like James did, as soon as she got a book deal. James has pretty much just followed this same template.
And as a nice little bonus, Claire’s fanfiction – the one that became her bad YA book – turned out to have lines and paragraphs that were directly lifted without credit from various other books and tv shows, including Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
LAK – this, exactly.
Yeah, she’s known to be a total cow on twitter so I’m sure she’s not a great person.
Can’t believe anyone thought a Twitter feed Q&A was a good idea in the first place! just hope the comments didn’t criticize her looks, or use the “fat lady/sex starved” trope to criticize other posters.
“Can’t believe anyone thought a Twitter feed Q&A was a good idea in the first place!”
Perhaps someone can start a GoFundMe for the deserving evil genius & ex-publicist responsible.
This! I mean, open house on twitter, what could possibly go wrong?? Epic fail for the publicity department. :))
I didn’t see any tweets like that, Tig, and I read the entire feed. Maybe some tweets were deleted, IDK, but all the ones I saw went after the writer for her awful writing and plagiarism.
Good to hear, bec last night saw one comment that said something like “not nice to trash on other commenters” and of course the pile on began on that observation. I bailed on the article at that point.
Did she even A any Q’s?
From what it looks like on her TL, she only answered questions that had nothing to do with the books. Probably because she couldn’t find legit questions about the books to answer! Also read on another site that she was blocking pretty much every single person that sent tweets like the above.
LOL – maybe she should ask some of the poster to ghost write for her next novel. They were hilarious. As mean as it was her ego needs to be brought down a peg or 10 – Twitter was calling a spade a spade, can’t shade that.
The woman will milk this for all she can – they only way to get her to stop is to stop reading her drivel and going to see the movies.
I feel for Stephanie Myer – she keeps getting dragged into this pile of poo. As much as I didn’t really like Twilight – her writing isn’t that bad (I know she got shaded by Stephen King) and it got better with later books. James got worse.
At least Stephenie Meyer didn’t blatantly steal someone else’s story.
Oh…but she did! Do NOT give that hack credit either!
I did read the first book and all I could think was that some publisher actually paid her and published it. Then she gets a movie deal?
Would love to see Lifetime do Shades of Grey trilogy with Lindsay Lohan and Tom Sizemore
Lohan FTW. I feel like her interpretation of the Inner Goddess would be… divine.
Stephanie Meyers is x10 times the writer EL James is. At least Stephanie had an original idea that really struck a chord with a LOT of people, EL just jumped on her story, changed the character names and threw in creepy sex stuff. I wouldn’t even care if EL gave due credit to her but she really distanced herself from Twilight and Meyers the second she smelled a book deal.
As much as people like to say Edward and Bella was an abusive relationship , Bella never did anything she didn’t want to do. She kind of did the opposite of what Edward ‘told’ her to do most of the time. If anything Edward was under her thumb! Ultimately she became the most powerful of them all and saved them against the volturi. Are parts of the books dumb? Of course, the whole Renesme thing is just daft but i think Twilight gets a very bad rap and didn’t deserve the backlash it got. It just became ‘cool’ to hate on it and pretend you were above it.
Stephanie deserves her millions, EL is just a fraud who hit the jackpot embellishing an original idea.
Meyer’s ideas weren’t that original. Have you ever heard of Vampire Diaries?
I don’t think Twilight was at all like Vampire Diaries. I read TVD back in high school when they first came out. They weren’t the greatest (the show was 100x better lol).
I still think it’s just beyond shitty that EL copied Stephenie’s idea of writing the books from Edward’s point of view. It was bad enough that she based her books off of Twilight fanfic but that was taking it too far, for me. And now I’m afraid Stephenie will never release Midnight Sun. Although I hope she will and it blows “Grey” out of the water in sales…
Meh, Twilight was also terribly written and the characters did not exhibit healthy relationships for teens to emulate. And if you read any other vampire novels preceding hers, you can see many things borrowed from the genre.
But… at least it’s more original than 50 shades.
I’m with FingerBinger and Abby in that I’m not convinced Meyers is the most original author ever. I will give her points for being 10X more classy than EL, though, in the way she has handled the media, kept her ego from exploding, cooperated with film directors, etc.
G – I tend to agree with you. Although Bella displayed a lot of really un-healthy behavior in book 2 that was probably not great for teen girls to read, she is the one who pushes for everything and Edward is the reluctant one to take their relationship (or her desire to be a vampire) further.
That said – I will defend those blank pages from book 2 until my dying breath. The emptiness those blank pages represented – I vividly remember needing to put the book down and have a good cry before going on.
Bella gets v depressed when Edward leaves but who doesn’t when somebody you are madly in love with dumps you? It’s not behaviour you want teenage girls to copy – the daredevil pursuits in order to ‘see’ Edward, but Meyers was also telling a story. She had to have Bella hit rock bottom to explain why she would actually WANT to transform into a vampire. She couldn’t live without him. It’s not real life we are dealing with, it’s fantasy. I’m kind of sick of everything having to be so PC. How dare a girl dare to wallow in self-pity about a break up. That’s SO weak…
Bella fell in love with a vampire and also had feelings for a werwolf. This is fantasy fiction, her personality traits really shouldn’t be seen in any reality at all. Seriously, do you know how you would behave and act if you fell for a vampire? I probably would act like a stupid adolescent or a mental patient who knows.
Now Fifty shades of Grey has more of a reality base, and I could see why people would be more upset by the books and the images portrayed. Originally when I saw E.L. James she was funny and said she wrote the book with a case of wine, and it seriously made me laugh, because it was just taking Twilight and making it happen in another crazy but almost possible setting. It was so bad it was humorous, but then she took herself too seriously. She went too far and now it is just stupid. Someone send her a case of tequila, maybe the humor will come back.
I have seen the books in the discount bin at Tesco yesterday and what shocked me is how thick the books are. It’s longer then Lord of the Rings with almost no plot line. Wtf.
Finally a good use for twitter
“Will there be a delay to our answers while you wait for Stephanie Meyer to answer them first, so you know what to write? #AskELJames”
I can’t! lmao
Genius question.
HA! I want to be friends with that person.
That was funny but I kinda wonder who then bought these books? Countless people did and nobody admits it or least doesn’t admit they liked them. We can sh*t on her all we want (and I do because she is a TERRIBLE writer) but people made her a success.
Really? I have a lot of friends (some of them I’m close to IRL and others are more like “Facebook friends”) who openly admit they love the books. And what i hate the most is that of course, all of them have pretty awful ideas about what a women’s sexuality is suppose to be (you’re supposed to be in love or at least in a relationship to have sex with someone, not sleep with more than a certain number of men, and so on). When I see how the media painted 50 shades as sexually liberating it makes me want to barf.
I’m the only one in my circle of friends who’s read it (tried to, threw it out after 100 pages). Or maybe they just won’t admit it.
Littlemiss…you are right. Alot of people bought her books or should I say downloaded her books. There was a frenzy for it. Even if she got just a quarter of the TwiHards she sold a good number. Reading apps offer anonymity to read her books. So why not a little guilty pleasure. Did I remember hearing on the Today Show that even Adult only hotels/resorts had this book in the bedside drawer? At the Amazon discussion boards, whenever some asked for a recommendation of a any romance….Her book would ALWAYS be mentioned. It got so bad that the ladies would put a disclaimer in their posts that they didn’t want “Grey” as a recommendation.
Interesting that she is getting the backlash now.
@ Dappadaph: Oh God, the bedside table??? Why? I’m not even going to pretend I don’t like my ridiculous romance/erotica because I do. But there are better books out there! If you like garbage, admit it. It’s the motto I apply to my movie watching. Sometimes I like trashy stuff.
People will twist anything to use for PR. Some trashy newspaper once tried to claim she’d outsold JK Rowling…..but it turned out they were referring only to ebook sales made via Amazon UK in 2012.
Keep in mind, Harry Potter wasn’t even available to buy in ebook form till 2011. Four years after the series ended.
Is it weird that I really like EL James’ red carpet looks? She’s a surprisingly good dresser!
Which do you hate more, women or the English language?
I legit cackled at this.
Honestly, how did ANYONE think this would end well?
“how did ANYONE think this would end well?”
I’d bet money it was the same person who told Robin Thicke to do it.
I remember an early-on interview she did with GMA and she said that she didn’t think her writing was all that great, but it caught some media attention and she was “going to ride it while it’s popular” kind of an attitude….
Dear Celebitches,
I am reading all of your comments to this amazing gift of a story and laughing aloud at my desk
My colleagues think I am nuts, and I don’t even care.
Thank you!
Can we track down some of these Twitter users and give THEM book deals? They certainly seem like better writers than the author herself.
I have a few questions myself:
How rich does one have to be before abusive relationships are ok? #AskELJames
Have you ever had a menstrual cycle or do you not understand ripping out a tampon day 2 of a period with teeth will have sheet ruining consequences? #AskELJames
When you were writing this on adultfanfiction.com, did you ever stop to think about your place in the universe? #AskELJames
When you decided to put in the “Jacob” character, did you just say, “Ah, f*ck it, no one cares”? #AskELJames
Would you re-enact “Misery” with Stephanie Meyer or have you already done that in your mind? #AskELJames
Is your experience with BDSM limited to the very frightening Avengers fanfiction or the equally frightening Home Improvement fanfiction? #AskELJames
Have you actually touched your inner goddess or is she busy bemoaning the fact you ended about 7 million sentences with prepositions? #AskELJames
OMG HOME IMPROVEMENT FAN FICTION.
I am dying
“Would you re-enact Misery with Stephanie Meyer……………HAHAHAHAHA! DYING DYING I love you MONICA Q!!!!!!!!!!
Why am I not surprised that there is Home Improvement Fan Fiction? I have been to the dark side of Internet Fan Fiction and it is a scary, creepy, (sometimes hilarious) place.
hahahhahahhahha omg this is amazing
This is the story of the year!
Whoever suggested this Q&A is either a subversive evil genius master of shade, or an extreme fool with their head lodged so far up ELJ’s rectum that they actually had no clue just how this was going to go (see: Robin Thicke)
I bow before those who had the wit and command over the English language (unlike her) to take this twit to task. She may have millions, but she will never have the public’s respect, which actually seems to bother her. And that delights me in ways I can’t even name.
It would make my year if Cassandra Claire ever got a similar public roasting for her own shady conduct in Harry Potter fandom/fanfiction circles (she essentially did the PG version of what James did, only I don’t know if it’s actually PG since her fanfiction involved suggestions of incest).
AHAHAHHAAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAAHAHHAHAAHHAAHHAAHAHAA
Thank you, this made my day!!!
This is my favorite:
Did you see the abusive relationship of Bella and Edward and think “hmm needs more abuse” #AskELJames
Will there be a delay to our answers while you wait for Stephanie Meyer to answer them first, so you know what to write? #AskELJames
this is fantastic. i could not have asked for a better snack to go with my tea.
Seriously, though. It is some of the worst writing I have ever seen. My cat could walk across my keyboard right now and the plot and dialogue would be better than anything James wrote.
How hungry this woman is for money, she’s probably happy her name is a hot topic on Twitter. The tweets bring more attention to her terrible books, which gives her publicity. I read that she has made $58 million from this crap, not even counting the film or the other book.
not even counting all the products she is licensing.
As a friend said it so simply and perfectly, “Why are women buying books about “sex” that sound like the author heard about sex from someone else?”
I know, right. It reads like a fantasy written by a teenager who thought she just discovered what BDSM was…
Can someone please explain the Stephanie Meyer thing to me? What does Twilight have to do with 50 Shades?
James wrote (and I use the word loosely) FSOG as Twilight fan fiction. It was her take on a sexier (even more abusive) Bella and Edward.
This debacle is everything that’s right in the universe at this brief moment in time. Today’s moment in pop culture, brought to us by the Twitterverse Trolls. Bless them all. This story made my week.
Well I haven’t read any of her books nor seen the film; but she is where she is because women bought her book in MASS.. went to see that movie in MASS.. So no matter what anyone says or thinks she is laughing all the way to the bank. She has an audience and fanbase that is eating up what she is producing. People here may not be her audience.. but facts show that millions out there are.
I think the mistake is thinking that what people on twitter or even a gossip site are saying is a clear indication of what the majority of the world is thinking. It is not.
I read this as in mass and thought “bloody hell thats an open minded church!”
HAHAHAHA… shame they picked that book, though, right?
Thankyou Celebitchy/Kaiser for posting this, and for all the celebitchies’ witty comments. I am just sitting here laughing out loud at each post. THIS is why this site is my favourite. Awesome.
Búho Cafeinado @Ink_Bleeder
#AskELJames Is your PR team going to get spanked against their will for how epically this backfired?
The utter SHAAAAAADE!
LMAO! “What do you dislike more, Independent strong woman or the English language? #AskELJames”
Mmm…One night I was a little down so I decided to read the reviews of Fifty Shades on amazon.com and I laughed my blues (or grays) away. Besides, the comments are like reading pulitzer prize literature compared to this idiotic book.I did not want to pay for it but heard the hype so I got it from the library. Even though I didn’t purchase it I figured I spent $1.50 on gas and would like to get it back.
That first tweet has destroyed my soul! Lmao!
I realize I’m totally alone here, but even though I agree the books were bad, I feel sorry for her. It can’t be fun to get made fun of constantly and told you aren’t a real writer when that is what you really want to be.
I know, I know, she cries into her piles of money. I guess I’m just too empathetic or something. :S
I think I’;d feel sorry for her if she showed even an ounce of humility or self awareness but given her carry on about the movie, nope she has no sympathy from me. The woman is delusional and genuinely thinks she is a literary genius. She’s also gone out of her way to ignore the genuine abuse concerns about the book, when she could have used it to start a really interesting dialogue.
High sales just means there are a lot of silly people out there, and a fool and their money are easily parted, not that it’s good work. Same with anything really.
I keep meaning to hate read the books because I do want to have an informed opinion before I bash, but I just can’t bring myself to do it. I’d rather just watch videos like this and giggle! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M-ilQtsazZU
I did think the Twitter q. and a. was a tiny bit mean spirited, but then I read about how she just blocks abuse survivors and has totally blanked them in the past, even when they’re just trying to ask her a calm, measured type question. So she’s kind of an a**hole, for a woman her age to not even be smart enough and respectful enough to acknowledge the nerve this book touches with abuse survivors is pretty sh*t. I do hate book snobbery though, I enjoy really lowbrow chick lit like it’s going out of style.
And for whatever reason, her books have drawn a whole passionate group, many of them (I know from personal experience) former non-readers. I don’t believe she is unique in glorifying or romanticizing abuse, it’s been happening in film and literature forever before she came along. But for her to act like it’s all a Disney Princess love story and not acknowledge the psychotic manipulation (from what I gather) of the Christian -Ana dynamic is understandably infuriating,
Re: ur 2nd paragraph. I didn’t know that and it makes me dislike her even more. She’s promoting abusive relationships pure and simple – she clearly has no idea about BDSM and erotic fiction.
To read real erotic fiction in this vein may i suggest The Story of O by Anne Desclos – was written in the 50s by a French woman.
The reason why it was so popular was that it hit a nerve with frustrated married women (who lapped it up) and the Twilight age group. It was aimed at a younger (late teens/early 20s) woman in the way it was written – even though it was atrocious. It’s throw away fiction and am not sure a 2nd movie will be made as people will lose interest in it -esp if she keeps telling the same story over again.
Nah, George Takei does it Better: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7WahBH9sANg
Oh My!