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50 SHADES OF BREAKING NEWS

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Friends.

Friends.

Friends.

E.L. James’s lawyers warned someone off for copyright infringement of 50 Shades.

From the article:

EL James’ agent Valerie Hoskins said the legal letter was not personal, adding: “You can’t just hijack something someone else owns.”

“You can’t just hijack something someone else owns.”
You can’t just hijack something someone else owns.”
“You can’t just hijack something someone else owns.” 

Look at this cover!

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Today, I got my cover for my first ever release from Ellora’s Cave. And it is epic:

Silent Surrender is a historical romance set in Plymouth, England, 1849. The heroine is a Deaf woman, and her love interests are a dock worker and her childhood tutor. I’m not explaining this as masterfully as the back cover copy will, I’m sure, and release date is TBD, but look at that cover. Is it not stunning? I’ve always wanted a cover with a corset on it, and now I can cross that off my writing bucket list.
More information to come, but I’m super excited and had to share!

My #newtoWHO Story

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If you follow me on twitter, you know that my twitter stream looks something like this:

So, you’d think that the establishment of a Whovian hashtag, one that encourages, nay, begs, Whovians to share their first experience with The Doctor, you’d think I would be all over that.


Sidetrack: How the fuck is Chris Hardwick getting all these jobs talking about my favorite shows? More importantly, why aren’t they hiring me? I have two things going for me that he does not: I do not make every sentence drip with false urgency, and I never hosted a really sleazy dating show. That any copies still exist of.

Back on topic, the hashtag #newtoWHO. How can one ask a true, dyed-in-the-horizontal-striped-wool Who fan to share their memories of their first Doctor in 144 characters? It’s criminal. So, I’m sharing my #newtoWHO story right here. Lucky you.

My first Doctor, MY Doctor, is the Eighth Doctor, Paul McGann.

Eight has the dubious distinction of being the Doctor with the shortest television run, but his epic adventures span a number of novels and Big Finish audio plays. It is truly criminal that we didn’t get more time with Eight, because he was the perfect bridge between the classic series and the new series, in which The Doctor became more “human” and showed self-doubt in a way the previous Doctors didn’t.
In 1996, after being off the air for seven years, Doctor Who made an attempt to resurface in the United States. If you watch the television movie, you get a glimpse of what the American reboot would have been like, and it’s not entirely removed from the Russel T. Davies series. A quick summary: The Doctor is transporting the mortal remains of The Master, who has been executed by The Daleks, from Skaro to the Time Lord home planet, Gallifrey, in accordance with The Master’s final wishes. As the TARDIS travels through space, the Seventh Doctor kicks back and relaxes in his bad ass, totally Steampunk TARDIS, reading H.G. Wells’s The Time Machine and eating jelly babies. But The Master’s plan all along was to funnel his essence into The Doctor to secure more regenerations. This goes awry when The Doctor makes an emergency landing in San Francisco, 1999, and gets shot in the crossfire of a gang turf war (no, really). He ends up in the hospital, where a brilliant, sexy cardiologist, Dr. Grace Holloway, assumes he’s human, performs a heart procedure, and kills him. Because he was anesthetized at the time of his death, his regeneration is delayed, and when he regenerates, he has no memory of being a Time Lord. He has to recover his memories in time to stop The Master, and to stop the universe from being destroyed at 12AM on January 1st, 2000.
Definitely helped that he was a hot ginger. No wonder Ten was so disappointed to turn out as David Tennant.
At the time the tv movie aired, I was fifteen or sixteen, and possibly the biggest nerd on the planet. I was still deeply grieving the cancellation of Covington Cross, a very short-lived 1992 dramedy that ABC pulled because they hate me and everything good. Since I had been so terribly burned by that cancellation, I had taken to videotaping literally everything I watched on television, in case it got cancelled. I had an entire closet full of VHS (this strategy also paid off for My So-Called Life). When I heard there was going to be “some time travel show thing” on Fox (my mother continued to refer to Doctor Who as “some time travel show thing” for the rest of my years at home), I thought it might be kind of cool to check out.
My reaction was somewhere between “holy shit” and “where has this been all my life?” Keep in mind, I had no idea that the show existed before 1996. I thought it was the most amazing thing I’d ever seen, and whoever had come up with this startlingly brilliant new idea should be immediately handed heaps of money and the keys to the Vatican. I was in L-O-V-E. 

It should have come as no surprise to me that since I loved the show, it never got picked up for an American series. But I didn’t realize it was supposed to be a series, so I was perfectly happy to watch the story of The Doctor and Grace over and over again. I learned about amnesia as an exposition device. I learned about atomic clocks. And I was torn between pride that Grace was an independent enough woman that she wouldn’t forsake her own life to ride off into the time sunset with The Doctor, and furious that he didn’t pick me instead, because I would totally have gone with him. Also, jealous because she got to kiss him.
A few months after the movie aired, I was flipping through the pathetic five channels that I could get at my grandparents’ house, and I landed on PBS. Immediately, I was struck at how bizarrely similar to my Doctor Who this weird show with a funny looking, curly haired guy and his assistant, Sarah Jane, was. And she called him The Doctor… and they were in… the… TARDIS… and they…
I swear to you, I get teary-eyed remembering the feeling I had upon learning that The Doctor had other adventures. I didn’t know about regeneration yet. I just figured that in Great Britain, people were very high-brow and could overlook the fact that The Doctor’s appearance changed wildly. But as time marched on, and my love of The Doctor grew, I learned more about the show. I wrote fanfic. I tried to knit the scarf. I failed, but damnit, I tried. I routinely drew question marks all over my body in sharpie in loving homage to Seven.
But then it became time to put away childish things. I went out into the real world. I got a job, and a guy to live with, and a kid. So, when I learned The Doctor was returning, I didn’t pay much attention. I wasn’t that nerdy little girl anymore, I had very important things to do. Plus, The Doctor was wearing a leather jacket. I was so terrified that they were trying to “update” my beloved Doctor, to make him into something sleek and polished for a jaded modern audience, the way they’d tried and failed to do in 1996. I didn’t want Doctor Who without cardboard walls and papier mache monsters. So I put off watching the new series… until 2008.
When I started watching it again, friends, it was all over. I had regaled my husband with stories of my childhood nerdiness, and he watched with amusement as I geeked out all over again. And he started watching it, too. And my son made a Doctor Who puppet show, with Daleks he drew and taped to popsicle sticks. And so, here we are again. I guess it must be fate. And other Peter Cetera lyrics.
A few days ago, I watched the tv movie again. I do, every once in a while. It feels dated, of course, but dated like the sofa you grew up with. I feel echoes of Dr. Grace Holloway in Dr. Martha Jones, because they were both the girls who didn’t wait. I watch that first episode of Christopher Eccleston’s run and imagine the regeneration we never saw, from Eight to Nine. When Ten speaks so passionately about the Time War, I want to cry, because I know it was Eight, it was my Doctor who fought those legendary battles we’ll never see.
I hold out hope for a lot of things to happen during the 50th Anniversary celebration. Donna’s memories to return. The Doctor going back and picking up Lethbridge-Stewart for a fantastic voyage. Susan. Romana. The end of the Time Lock that imprisons Gallifrey. Triumph over the Daleks, for once and for all. But most of all, I wish for my Doctor to return. Because we’ve got a lot of running we still need to do.

50 Shades Darker Chapter 9 recap, or “Isn’t that how Natalie Wood died?”

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Hey there, friends, Romans, countrymen. Lend me your eyeballs a second.

I’ve had several people send me this link, and someone posted in the comments of the last recap. When I first read it, I could see a couple points I agreed with. Then I started thinking more about it, and I was like, “Well…” because on reread, I started to not agree with it. But I was still going to post it, because I thought, “Maybe it’s just me.” Then, after MomE posted the link on the last recap (and thank you, everyone who sent me the link or posted it here, because it’s created a discussion!), I saw some people kind of agreed with me about it, as well. So, here is what I’m going to do. I’m going to post the link, so if you missed it in the comments section, you can go read it and form your own opinion of it for yourself: http://theulstermanreport.com/2012/08/16/50-shades-of-grey-pedophilia-hiding-in-plain-sight-letter-from-a-reader/
Here is my take on this piece: I think she was reaching way, way too hard to connect 50 Shades to Jerry Sandusky, and it leaves me with bad feelings. First of all, the stuff that happened at Penn State was horrible. Incredibly, life-destroyingly horrible. But there is a mountain of difference between the rape of children and a consensual sexual relationship between adults, no matter how naive or childlike Ana acts in the book. While I believe Ana suffers domestic violence in these books, and I’ve shared my doubts as to whether Ana could give informed consent about entering into a 24/7 D/s relationship due to her sexual naivety, I firmly and fully believe that Ana can consent to a sexual relationship. This is the primary condition on which the author of that piece (more to the point, her social worker friend) and I disagree. Ana might be childish, but she is not a child, and I feel the author of the piece is intentionally misleading in her cataloging of Ana’s allegedly childlike traits. Does Ana wear pigtails? Yes, twice, but more often she wears a simple, non-age-implicating pony tail. Does she say “Jeez!” and “crap,” absolutely, but she also uses words like “avuncular” and “precis” and opens the first book by graduating from college as an English major. I can’t believe I’m actually defending this fucking book, but while I may use Chris Hansen occasionally as a gag, I do not for a moment believe this book encourages pedophilia, or that it was E.L. James’s hidden agenda to mainstream pedophilia. I don’t think E.L. James is a good enough writer to subtly sneak pedophilia in under our noses on purpose. But your mileage may vary, and that’s okay, too, because it’s not like it really hurts us as a culture to examine these things.
With that in mind, here is another link, this one to some 50 Shades fanfic that retells the story from Chedward’s perspective. So, I guess this is a 50 Shades/Twilight/Midnight Sun fanfic? I don’t know, but Anonymous brought this to you, so unto Anonymous go the spoils of your adulation: The strange thing is, the writing is almost better. Unfortunately, she loses me when she casts Drew Fuller as Jose, because Drew Fuller is, you know, not Mexican. Or maybe that was the point.

  Heads up, I find hidden racism like whoa in this chapter, so I don’t know what that says about me.
So, in the interest of public service announcing at you, if you’ve sent me a link or posted it in the comments and I haven’t posted it here and you’re particularly sore about it, hit me up again. Sometimes, I don’t post links because they’re total bummers, and sometimes I don’t post links because I just forget.
All right, on to the recap:
When we last left Ana and Christian, he had just told her that he loves her. Well, no, actually. She said, “You love me,” and he said, “Yes, I do.” Which means he never said he loves her. He just agreed with her. And let me point out that he agreed with her after she stopped trying to have sex with him in order to talk about his feelings. Does anyone else see some motivation here for him to move this scene along? Does anyone else feel like this is a conversation Charlotte had with the rest of the girls on Sex and The City?
“I’m an Ana!” said no woman. Ever.

Since being owned by a man is the highest bar that Anastasia Rose “Courageous” Steele has set for herself, the next chapter starts like this:

I cannot contain my jubilation. My subconscious gapes at me in stunned silence, and I wear a face-splitting grin as I gaze longingly up into Christian’s tortured eyes.

Why is she smiling if he’s looking tortured? It’s like that old “I always cry at weddings,”/”What the fuck do you do at funerals?” chestnut from days of Rocky Horror yore. Also, way to show that bitch, your subconscious. It’s not like she’s given you any good advice that you’re routinely ignoring in favor of your loins. Your stupid, stupid loins.

Ana gushes over his “three small words,” even though they’re not “I love you,” and might as well be, “Sure, fuck now?” because confessions garnered in pursuit of nookie are inadmissible in the court of this blog. Then she again thinks about him being a “beautiful, fucked-up man,” which an astute commenter pointed out is directly from the lyrics of Sarah McLachlan’s “Building a Mystery.” I should have caught that, too, because I passionately sang that album from start to finish during my hormonal teenaged years, even though my boyfriends in high school were all pretty normal teenaged boys. I desperately wanted a beautiful, fucked up man to angst over. I guess some writers grow out of it.

Oh yes, I did.

My heart swells with joy but also pain for his suffering. And I know in this moment that my heart is big enough for both of us. I hope it’s big enough for both of us.

Oh, so you mean, you’re pretty sure you can love him so much that he doesn’t have to really participate in the relationship and all and you can still trick yourself into feeling that your emotional needs are fulfilled? Because that’s what you’re saying, Ana.

They decide to continue the fucking, albeit in another location, probably because talking about his feelings in the shower has deflated Christian’s erection considerably. Ana dries Christian’s hair with a towel, and he comments that no one has ever done that for him before. Ana insists that Grace must have done that for him as a child, and he answers:

“No. She respected my boundaries from day one, even though it was painful for her. I was very self-sufficient as a child,” he says quietly.

I feel a swift kick in the ribs as I think of a small copper-haired child looking after himself because no one else cares.

You mean like the adoptive parents who took him into their very wealthy family and gave him opportunities to achieve things he could never have dreamed of in his past situation, while respecting the fact he came from a hideously abusive and traumatic childhood and treating him with that in mind? Yeah, those fucking monsters. Only you can love him the right way.

So, Ana gets this idea that if she can dry his hair with the towel, she can touch him through the towel, too:

Carefully, I wipe his back beneath the faint lipstick line, which is still visible.

Please, someone tell me what this brand of never-wears-off lipstick is, so I don’t accidentally buy it and tattoo myself into permanent Joker cosplay with it.

Ana wipes his back with the towel, even in the no-go zones, while he makes audibly tense breathing noises and grimaces, and it’s a lot like the scene in Diana Gabaldon’s Dragonfly In Amber where Claire rapes Jamie into not being messed up by rape. Or something. I was kind of confused by a lot of stuff in those books.

Gazing at us both in the mirror – his beauty, his nakedness, and me with my covered hair – we look almost biblical, as if from an Old Testament Baroque painting.

Okay, first, how self-involved do you have to be to compare drying your boyfriend off after a shower to the fucking Bible, which is, btw, probably the only book that could outsell this behemoth? Second, what strange phrasing. “Old Testament Baroque painting” makes it sound like the Baroque period was actually in the time of the Old Testament, and that it was referenced in the Bible. Also, I’m pretty sure Satan didn’t take your soul in exchange for advertising his primary competition, E.L.

Oh, yes I did.
She’s still wiping him off with the towel, and he’s still reacting like a war veteran during an air show, and she thinks:

My subconscious looks on with approval, her normally pursed mouth smiling, and I’m the supreme puppet master.

Whoa, that got 50 Shades Darker. Really, Ana? Your boyfriend has severe PTSD and you’re proud of how well you can make him suffer from it? Don’t get me wrong, Christian Grey is a dickhole, but I don’t really think it’s fair to manipulate him through his childhood memories of molestation and physical torture.

Ana and Christian have off-camera sex, but it isn’t shown because it’s apparently not uber-kink, the way all these other, very, very shocking and titillating glimpses into the life of hardcore BDSM have been.

Apparently, this time it wasn’t fucking, hard, but making love. Awww. Ana mentions that Christian was surprisingly gentle, then tells him:

I grin. “You weren’t particularly the first time we… um, did this.”

She still cannot speak about sex with the man, even after they have just had sex. She literally can not say the word. The instant I read that line, it took me directly back to this novel I wrote in seventh grade. You see, I wanted to write a blisteringly good romance. It was about actors in a Broadway company of Joseph and The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat (no, I didn’t have many friends, thanks for asking) who fell in love while working on the show. It was the worst novel anyone has ever written, and that’s including the book we’re talking about right now and the historical romance novel I wrote in sixth grade (which is actually pretty good, probably only because it was partially lifted from Far and Away). There was no conflict in the romance, there was no external conflict on the characters, it was just a story about two people who dated, fell in love, had sex, and got to be on Broadway. But what I felt was very grown up and important to the story were lots of conversations between the main characters about the sex they were having, because that’s what I thought a grown up relationship was. Only, they said stuff very similar to “the first time we… um, did this,” because while I was horribly fascinated by the concept of sex and adult relationships and thought night and day about how those concepts worked together and separately, I was also very embarrassed and giggly about those subjects, as well.

“No?” He smirks. “When I robbed you of your virtue.”

Hey, when I lost my virginity to you, you weren’t gentle enough. Wait, are you smirking? Why would you be proud about that? That’s horrible.

“I don’t think you robbed me,” I mutter haughtily – I am not a helpless maiden. “I think my virtue was offered up pretty freely and willingly. I wanted you too, and if I remember correctly, I rather enjoyed myself.” I smile shyly at him, biting my lip.

No, you’re not a helpless maiden. Just a stupid one who won’t bother to call the police – or assert your right to call the police – when your life is in danger, because you can wait for big, strong Christian to protect you from the problem he created.

 “So did I if I recall, Miss Steele. We aim to please,” he drawls and his face softens, serious. “And it means you’re mine, completely.” All trace of humor has vanished as he gazes at me.

That’s right. If a man gives you an orgasm, he owns you now. It’s in the Magna Carta, look that shit up.

Ana asks Christian if he knows who his biological father was:

His brow creases and then he shakes his head. “I have no idea. Wasn’t the savage who was her pimp, which is good.”

Maybe it’s just my white guilt, but something happens in this section that gives me pause. First of all, he says that pimp was a “savage.” I hate that word, because it makes me think of all those 80’s rapemances where the women were kidnapped to nights of endless, sometimes non-con rapture by sweet, savage savages (aka Native Americans). The word savage would be used liberally, either in the title or the back cover copy, to warn the reader that non-white loving would be happening in the pages. So when Christian says, a few paragraphs later:

“Police interviewed him later. He denied flat out I had anything to do with him, and Carrick said he looked nothing like me.”

I can’t help but wonder if this is a clumsy, roundabout way of implying that the “crack whore’s” “pimp” was not white.

Ana figures she has to change the subject “before he goes all Fifty on me,” which, you know, that doesn’t sound like an abusive relationship at all, trying to constantly monitor the situations you’re in so the abuser doesn’t react negatively or anything, but I guess I digress.

“Can you face going out for some fresh air? I want to show you something.”

No, she can’t. She’ll wilt, because she’s a porcelain Victorian lass whose vagina will fall out at the mere mention of physical exertion.

 He grins at me with his boyish, carefree, I’m-only-twenty-seven smile, and my heart lurches into my mouth.

Because she realized that in three years he’ll be the dreaded thirty and impossibly old. I love that Ana, who is younger than Christian, is thinking of his age in terms of “I’m only,” as if she’s much, much older than he is. Look, I’m not calling Ana a Mary Sue, but I’m calling Ana a wishful projection of E.L. James.

As we dress, I notice that we move with the synchronization of two people who know each other well, each watchful and acutely aware of each other, exchanging the occasional shy smile and sweet touch.

The synchronization of two people who have known each other for, what, is it three whole weeks now? I’ve lost count, because it seems like time moves in slow motion in this book and days are like, thirty-seven hours long so that there is plenty of time for hours of love making and daring escapes and charity balls. For example, in this day already they’ve had breakfast, Ana’s gotten forced birth control, they shared their feelings in the shower, made slow and tender off-screen love, now they’re going to go buy Ana a new car and then take Christian’s yacht out for a day of sailing. Then they’re going to go out to dinner, drive to Christian’s apartment, have a mini-fight, have a bigger fight, play pool, fuck on the pool table, take a bath together and then they’re in bed by TEN-THIRTY. And this apparently super long day? It takes place over three or four chapters.

Christian drags a large, cream, cable-knit sweater out of his bag and drapes it artfully around over his shoulders. With his white T-shirt and jeans, his artfully rumpled hair, and now this, he looks as if he’s stepped out of the pages of a high-end glossy magazine.

New drinking game rule: take a shot every time E.L. uses the word “artfully.”

As they got dressed, Christian and Ana traded quips about how his palms still twitch, and he could prove it, or whatever, so after the artful sweater draping paragraph, Ana thinks:

And I don’t know if it’s the momentary distraction of his perfect looks or the knowledge that he loves me, but his threat no longer fills me with dread. This is my Fifty Shades; this is the way he is.

In other words, “When he threatens to hit me, I’m not scared anymore, because I’m so used to his threats. Also, he’s hot, so that makes this all okay.”

My hair is a mess, my face flushed, my lips swollen – I touch them, remembering Christian’s searing kisses, and I can’t help a small smile as I stare. Yes, I do, he said.

But not “I love you.” Keep that in mind, reader.

We have to wait with Christian and Ana while the valet gets the car, because this was written by someone who is so attached to their own work that they can’t imagine we wouldn’t all be super fascinated by the minutia of the characters’ every day lives, like getting dressed, eating breakfast, and waiting for the fucking valet. The sick thing? People actually are fascinated by these shitty details that make this book way too long.

As we cruise through traffic, Christian is deep in thought. A young woman’s voice comes over the loudspeakers; it has a beautiful, rich, mellow timbre, and I lose myself in her sad, soulful voice.

The car has a loudspeaker?

Christian is taking Ana to get a new car, so he pulls into the Saab dealership.

“Not an Audi?” is, stupidly, the only thing I can think of to say, and bless him, he actually flushes.

Better give him a derogatory nickname then, Ana.

Christian is going to buy Ana a Saab 9-3, which tragically dates this book already, because Saab went bankrupt and the US inventory of new cars was seized by GM’s finance division back in May. Since this version was published in April, it’s not like they could have done anything about it, but still, it made my heart go, “Awww, poor Saab.”

By the way, when I checked the copyright page to figure out when the Vintage version came out, I noticed this little gem:

The author published an earlier serialized version of this story online with different characters as “Master of The Universe” under the pseudonym Snowqueen’s Icedragon.

 Back in March, Jane at Dear Author excerpted a bit of a Washington Post article in which Vintage books asserted:

“It is widely known that E.L James began to capture a following as a writer shortly after she posted her second fan fiction story,” Vintage said in a statement. “She subsequently took that story and re-wrote the work, with new characters and situations. That was the beginning of the ‘Fifty Shades’ trilogy. The great majority of readers, including fan fiction aficionados, have found ‘Fifty Shades’ deeply immersive and incredibly satisfying.”

So, it’s a completely new and original work that was first published somewhere else! Thanks for the integrity, Vintage!

Anyway, back to the car search. Christian is going to get Ana a Saab 9-3 because there were no uglier cars available.

I resign myself to my fate. A Saab? Do I want a Saab?

Does it matter? He doesn’t let you order your own meals in restaurants, I highly doubt he’s going to let you pick what car you drive.

Troy Turniansky, the salesman, is all over Fifty like a cheap suit.

Why does the salesman have a last name? Or any name? Why do we even have to go car shopping with them? It’s not interesting at all, and I will skip a lot of it. The gist is, Christian asks Ana what color car she wants, then argues with her and overrides her choice, and when Ana points out the way he’s behaving, she instantly regrets it and tells him she’ll take the Audi instead. Then, they talk about getting the convertible model, which makes Ana horny in the pants and her inner goddess shows up again (drink!). While Christian gets the safety stats on the car from Troy Turniansky, the car salesman so important as to have a last name even though he’s in one goddamned scene, Ana thinks:

Naturally Christian wants me safe. It’s a religion with him, and like the zealot that he is, he listens intently to Troy’s well-honed patter. Fifty really does care.

Yes. I do. I remember his whispered, choked words from this morning, and a melting glow spreads like warm honey through my veins. This man – God’s gift to women – loves me.

On behalf of all women, I would like to return the gift.

I find myself grinning goofily at him, and when he glances down at me, he’s amused yet puzzled by my expression.

So, he’s amused and bemused at the same time? Come on, E.L., you missed such an opportunity there!

Christian produces his credit card, or is it Taylor’s? The thought is unnerving.

A lot of stuff unnerves Ana, I’m noticing. What does it matter if it’s Taylor’s card? Is she worried that Christian isn’t going to pay him back?

I wonder how Taylor is, and if he’s located Leila in the apartment. I rub my forehead. Yes, there’s all of Christian’s baggage, too.

For the life of me, I can’t figure out what she means by “all of Christian’s baggage, too.” In addition to what? Leila is part of Christian’s baggage. I’m so confused.

Back in the car (not the Saab they just bought, Christian’s car), Ana asks who the singer on the “loudspeaker” is, and Christian informs her it’s Eva Cassidy, then explains that she died young. And then he’s all, “Are you hungry,” so no, the conversation wasn’t a metaphor or anything, it’s literally just needless chit-chat. I’m not kidding, look how quickly he shifts gears:

“She died young.”

“Oh.”

Are you hungry?”

Well, not now, I’m not. Geesh. Nothing wets the appetite like the untimely death of a criminally ignored young talent. Mmm, let’s get porkchops! Why the hell was that conversation included?

Ana is all “uh-oh” when Christian asks her if she’s hungry, because she’s apparently afraid to admit that she wants to eat. Or she’s afraid to admit that she’s hungry, but how is she supposed to control that? It’s not like they had a buffet at the car dealership.

It’s another beautiful day in Seattle; it’s been uncharacteristically fine for the last few weeks.

Okay, this is funny, because Seattle in June usually is pretty nice (or so I’ve been told), but this year, the year this book made its debut, Seattle had an unusually cold and rainy June. So, it’s hilarious on two levels:

  1. It wouldn’t be unusual to have some nice days in June in Seattle.
  2. It makes it look like this book has some dark power to fuck with the weather. 

I put on my robe and wizard hat.
They’re driving now, so you know what that means: it’s time for Ana to think really deep thoughts about Christian Grey:

I am less nervous of his moods, confident that he won’t punish me, and he seems more comfortable with me, too.

I think what she meant to say was, “I’ve learned to modify my own behavior in order to keep from being physically abused by an angry man, and he likes that I’m acting exactly according his every whim.” I’m sure that’s what she really meant. And as confident as she is of her ability to not get beaten up, she still considers him somewhat threatening, because in the next paragraph, after they pull up to a marina, this happens:

“We’ll eat here. I’ll open your door,” he says in such a way that I know it’s not wise to move, and I watch him move around the car. Will this ever get old?

It got old two-hundred and seven pages ago. And yet…

Ana and Christian “stroll” through the marina, where Ana shows off her fancy college degree:

“So many boats,” I murmur in wonder.

So, just in case you’ve ever been wondering if there are a lot of boats on Puget Sound, there are, indeed, a lot of boats on Puget Sound.

Christian takes Ana to a bar on the waterfront where the barman knows Christian by name, and Ana has some more of her weirdly placed white guilt:

“Welcome to SP’s Place.” Dante gives me a friendly smile. He’s black and beautiful, his dark eyes assessing me and not finding me wanting, it seems. One large diamond stud winks at me from his ear. I like him immediately.

Remember how when she met the black receptionist, she was like, “I could be friends with her,” but when she meets anyone white, she has a derogatory name for them, like “Mrs. European Pigtails” or “The Charlatan?” There’s a lot of weird racial stuff in these books, now that I’m thinking of it. Like Edward calling Jose “boy,” and the above mentioned use of “savage.” I can’t be the only one seeing this, right?

Hey, you guys? You’re going to need this monkey again in a second:

“What would you like to drink, Anastasia?”

I glance at Christian, who regards me expectantly. Oh, he’s going to let me choose.

“Please, call me Ana, and I’ll have whatever Christian’s drinking.”

That’s right. He lets her choose something, and she defers to him. She’s so proud at how trained she is, it actually makes my heart sad. Not because I like Ana, but because I know how very common this is.

Christian orders their food – which Ana is totally okay with – and their meals are served with a side of self-centeredness:

He recounts the history of Grey Enterprises Holdings, Inc., and the more he reveals, the more I sense his passion for fixing problem companies, his hopes for the technology he’s developing, and his dreams of making land in the third world more productive. I listen, enraptured. He’s funny, clever, philanthropic, and beautiful, and he loves me.

Keep in mind that with the way Ana treats her friends, Christian could be Jesus and Buddha reincarnated simultaneously into the body of a 1950’s gay magazine pinup guy with the brain of Stephen Hawking, and it would mean squat if he wasn’t in love with her, because then it would have nothing to do with her. The only reason she’s so excited about how funny, clever, philanthropic, and beautiful he is, is because he fulfills a need for her.

Now, reread that paragraph excerpted above, and pay attention to the verbs used to indicate Christian’s sharing of information: recounts, reveals, hopes, dreams, either neutral or positive words. Now, when it’s Ana’s turn:

In turn he plagues me with questions about Ray and my mom, about growing up in the lush forests of Montesano, and my brief stints in Texas and Vegas. He demands to know my favorite books and films, and I’m surprised by how much we have in common.

Plagues. Demands. So, on Ana’s end, conversation about herself feels like a burden. I’m undecided if it’s because she finds herself genuinely less interesting than Christian, or if it’s just because she’s as deeply unpleasant as she has been throughout the series so far.

Oh, and for you Tess of The D’Urbervilles readers out there, here’s something you can go apeshit about in the comments (and please do):

As we talk, it strikes me that he’s turned from Hardy’s Alec to Angel, debasement to high ideal in such a short space of time.

He’s cured! Guess he doesn’t need to keep seeing the psychologist you don’t approve of despite not having any background in psychology, Ana. You’re just as smart as a doctor, and your magic hootchie cures all.

Now, I’m sure you’ve all guessed why Christian Grey drove out to the marina to have lunch with Ana. And you would be right. He has a boat, and he wants to take her sailing.

Holy cow. It must be at least forty, maybe fifty feet. Two sleek white hulls, a deck, a roomy cabin, and towering overhead an impressive mast. I know nothing about boats, but I can tell this one is special.

Drink every time Ana admits to not knowing about something, but makes a quality call, anyway.

He pulls me to the side so I can see her name: The Grace. I’m surprised. “You named her after your mom?”

“Yes.” He cocks his head to one side, quizzical. “Why do you find that strange?”

Because it’s not The S.S. Anastasia Rose Steele Magic Hootchie Express. Ana thinks that it’s weird because Christian doesn’t show much warmth when he’s around his mother, but she doesn’t say that. She just lets him ask her again why she thinks it’s weird, and then he’s all, she saved my life, the least I can do is name a boat after her, and Ana finally gets that, oh, hey. He loves his mom. And yet she doesn’t ask him why he’s not warm and friendly to the mother he loves and who saves his life, because if she did, she might get an answer. If she got an answer, we couldn’t have six or seven endless pages of her mulling over the mystery of Mr. Grey.

ALLITERATION! BOOM!

They go aboard and meet a man who I’m going to just imagine as Kurt Russel from Captain Ron, because that description is more interesting than the one in the book:

“Anastasia, this is Liam McConnell. Liam, my girlfriend, Anastasia Steele.”

Girlfriend! My inner goddess performs a quick arabesque. She’s still grinning over the convertible. I have to get used to this – it’s not the first time he’s said it, but hearing him say it is still a thrill. 

Yes, you do have to get used to it, Ana, because we don’t want to hear about that cupid stunt, your inner goddess, every time the word girlfriend comes up. Girlfriend! My inner goddess whips her sled dogs into a frenzy at the very mention of the word! I know we’ve been dating for four years, but I’ll never get tired of my mercurial, abusive Mr. Grey. Gag.

“How’s she shaping up, Mac?” Christian interjects quickly, and for a moment, I think he’s talking about me.

“She’s ready to rock and roll, sir,” Mac beams. Oh, the boat, The Grace. Silly me.

Yes, Ana, silly you. Not everything is about you.

Christian gives Ana a tour of the boat, and of course inside it’s all white and pale wood and blah blah blah just like the Escala, and then he shows her “oh…” the bedroom:

“This is the master cabin.” He gazes down at me, eyes glowing. “You’re the first girl in here, apart from family,” he says. “They don’t count.”

Because I can’t fuck them, they don’t count.

I flush under his heated stare, and my pulse quickens. Really? Another first.

Okay, so what happens when you’re not special anymore, Ana? When there aren’t any more firsts for you guys to do together?

“Might have to christen this bed,” he whispers against my mouth.

Oh, at sea!

No, in the fucking desert, where do you think, Ana? You’re on a fucking boat. No, in space, Ana. That’s where he means. I hope your inner goddess gets sea sick and pukes all over her dragon boat or whatever ludicrous metaphor you come up with.

“It’s a six-berth cat. I’ve only ever had the family on board, though. I like to sail alone. But not when you’re here. I need to keep an eye on you.”

Wait, that doesn’t make any sense. Of course he’s not going to sail alone if he’s brought another person along. It has nothing to do with keeping an eye on anybody, it’s just… I don’t know, science, or fact, or reality or something. If you bring another person, you’re not alone.

They have an absolutely maddening conversation as he puts a life jacket on her and they talk about straps and how he’s a pervert, but he’s her pervert, basically the same conversation they’ve had a bunch of times and the same conversation they will continue to have a bunch of times for the rest of the book. Then there is some bland innuendo about “rope tricks” regarding the rigging.

Mac comes scooting back down the side of the boat, grinning at me, and jumps down to the deck below where he starts to unfasten a rope. Maybe he knows some rope tricks, too. The idea pops unwelcome into my head and I flush.

And there you have more evidence that Ana is incredibly immature about sexuality. The only sexuality that is welcome is Christian’s sexuality, and hers, to a lesser extent. But once that pesky inner goddess starts casting her net a little wider, sex is once again icky and not good. Her subconscious even “glares” at her for reacting to another man, and Ana thinks about how it’s Christian’s fault. She’s not willing to own a single thing about her own sexuality, but remember, these books are somehow helping women own theirs? I don’t buy it. Those women who claim 50 Shades of Grey and the sequels have changes their lives are in exactly the same position, by the way. They’re not saying, “because of this book, I learned to accept and explore my own sexuality,” they’re saying, “because of this cultural phenomenon, I have permission to be horny.”

After they motor out of the marina:

“Sail time,” Christian says, excited. “Here – you take her. Keep her on this course.”

What? He grins, reacting to the horror on my face.

Ana is super nervous to drive the boat, which I don’t quite get, since she flew the glider with no problem. You’re way more likely to survive a boat crash than a glider crash. Ana steers the boat while Christian and Mac raise the sails:

Perhaps Mac is Fifty’s friend. He doesn’t seem to have many, as far as I can tell, but then, I don’t have many, either.

I wonder why that is, for both of you? You can tell that neither of them have any friends, because Ana seems to think it would be normal for Mac to call Christian “sir” if they were hang out buddies.

Well, not here in Seattle. The only friend I have is on vacation sunning herself in Saint James on the west coast of Barbados.

Yeah, for like, ever. At least, it seems like it. I wonder if Kate is going to show up in this book at all.

I feel a sudden pang for Kate. I miss my roommate more than I thought I would when she left. I hope she changes her mind and comes home with her brother, Ethan, rather than prolong her stay with Christian’s brother, Elliot..

Why? You won’t spend any time with her, anyway. And if you do, you’ll just complain about how terrible she is for being rich or wearing pajamas or being, horror, blonde.

Now, we reach a conundrum of POV. This book is written in first person, present tense. Not my favorite, let me tell you, to read or write, but sometimes a book doesn’t work any other way. If the story is a third person, past tense story, you can try all you want to make it work in a first person pov or a present tense, but it’s not going to work. I don’t know why that is, maybe it’s magic. Maybe it’s science. Maybe there is a reason for it in one of those craft books better writers take the time to study. But it is what it is. However, no matter what pov or tense you’re working with, you have to follow the rules, and one of the rules of first person, present tense is that you can only supply information your character has right now. Earlier on, Miss Anastasia Rose Steele says:

I know nothing about boats, 

so we, the readers, have to take her at her word. She knows nothing about boats.

If she knows nothing about boats, then how is she telling us this?:

Christian and Mac hoist the mainsail.

or:

They get to work on the headsail,

or:

He points with his chin toward Mac, who is unfurling the spinnaker –

It doesn’t make sense for her to know what any of this is, if she doesn’t know anything about boats. And if she doesn’t know it, she certainly can’t share it with us in first person, present tense, no matter how much rich detail it lends to the narrative.

Ana and Christian spend some time being lovey-dovey, and then Ana thinks:

Yes, you’re a lucky bitch, my subconscious snaps. But you have your work cut out with him. He’s not going to want this vanilla crap forever… you’re going to have to compromise. I glare mentally at her snarky, insolent face and rest my head against Christian’s chest. Deep down I know my subconscious is right, but I banish the thoughts. I don’t want to spoil my day.

I don’t want to spoil my day thinking about how eventually he’s going to need to either beat the shit out of me with a belt or dump me, fiddle dee dee, I’ll think about that tomorrow.

An hour later, we are anchored in a small, secluded cove off Bainbridge Island. Mac has gone ashore in the inflatable dinghy – for what, I don’t know – but I have my suspicions because as soon as Mac starts the outboard engine, Christian grabs my hand and practically drags me into his cabin, a man with a mission.

I find it highly suspect that Christian has never brought another girl here, but Mac just instinctively knows to get out so the boss can get down to fucking. Christian tells Ana to strip for him, then there is another scene of fresh-out-of-the-socks toe sucking (why?! why?!) and some deeply troubling inner thoughts on Ana’s sexuality:

I want to be sexy for this man. He deserves sexy – he makes me feel sexy.

Deserves? No one “deserves” for you to be anything, Ana. This is sick and sad.

I am wearing some of my new underwear – a white lacy thong and matching bra – a designer brand with a price tag to match. I step out of my jeans and stand there for him in the lingerie he’s paid for, but I no longer feel cheap. I feel his.

See, if you just have sex without it being true lurve, you’re a cheap, filthy whore. Thanks for confirming that and propping up yet another stereotype about women’s sexuality, E.L. You are truly a fucking sister.

Slowly, I slip my panties off, letting them fall to my ankles, and step out of them, surprised by my grace.

Bitch, you didn’t ribbon dance at the Olympics, you took off your panties. Get over yourself.

Standing before him, I am naked and unashamed, and I know it’s because he loves me. I no longer have to hide.

That’s right, ladies. If no one loves you, cover that shit up. No one wants to see it until you’ve done your duty as a woman and earned the love of a man, no matter how he treats you.

I step toward him, slip my fearless fingers inside the waistband of his jeans, and tug so he’s forced to take a step closer to me.

 For outstanding bravery in the field of undressing one’s boyfriend, awarded posthumously to Ms. Anastasia Rose Steele, killed in action.

“You’re getting so bold, Ana, so brave,” he whispers and clasps my face with both hands, bending to kiss me deeply.

See sarcastic Medal of Honor, above.

My intrepid fingers moves through his pubic hair to his erection, and I grasp him tightly.

Move over, Lewis and Clark. Take a hike, Sacajawea. Intrepid has a new meaning, and you better in be in awe of it.

There’s some kissing and other boring sex stuff, and then Ana gives what has to be the vaguest bj in all of recorded history:

I shift back, taking him in my hands, and I just can’t resist him in all his glory. I bend and kiss him, taking him in my mouth, swirling my tongue around him, then sucking hard. He groans and flexes his hips so that he’s deeper in my mouth.

Until I got to the flexing hips part, I had no idea she was sucking his cock.

And then they achieve simultaneous orgasm, and the chapter is over. Thank god.

I want to talk to you guys about Doctor Who and Downton Abbey.

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Okay folks, just a heads up here: this post is going to be spoilers. Just a whole, tangly, Medusa’s head of spoilers biting and snarling and slithering over each other. So here is my spoiler warning:

  • If you haven’t watched the latest Doctor Who episode, “Asylum of The Daleks” and you don’t want spoilers, stop reading this post. 
  • If you haven’t watched the Christmas episode from season 2 of Downton Abbey and you don’t want spoilers, stop reading this post. 
With that in mind, allow me to provide a little spoiler space for you:
That otter has literally nothing to do with the post, I just thought it was cute as hell. OMG, have you seen the video of the otter talking?
Sorry for the digression. Joe is actually watching me type this post and he said, totally exasperated, “So, what does this have to do with the Doctor or Downton Abbey?”
Nothing at all.
First, I have a mixed bag of feels about “Asylum of The Daleks.” I feel like the quality of the writing is not up to par with some of the classic Doctor Who episodes. I was watching The Aztecs the other day (one of my favorite First Doctor adventures), and it occurred to me that in recent years, the show has been less about the Doctor travelling through all of space and time and having adventures, and more about making the audience sad. I “discovered” Doctor Who in 1996. It wasn’t until the Tenth Doctor wiped Donna Noble’s memory that I could say, “Hey, remember that episode of Doctor Who that made me cry so hard I burst blood vessels in my eyes?” It just doesn’t seem right, to someone who came to the fandom through the classic series (prompted by Paul McGann’s epic turn as Eight in the tv movie), that the show should be such a downer all the fucking time. We came into this season with me fervently wishing we could get away from the melodrama about relationships and into more adventure.
But holy shit, did it throw me for a loop when the new companion showed up in this episode! I had no fucking clue she was going to be in there, and I have a google alert for news stories about Doctor Who. How did they keep that a secret? How did none of that leak? That’s fucking epic, and I quite like her.
HOWEVER.
If the Doctor does not save her from becoming a Dalek, if it’s all this bullshit about “I ruin people’s lives/I can’t change the past/Woe is me Time Lord,” I am going to roast the surface of this planet in my utterly incandescent fury. This is something they have to change. They have to undo that end to her story line, or I will never recover. Enough of Stephen Moffat writing Angst, Hurt/Comfort Doctor Who fanfic and foisting it upon us.
Feel free to discuss, in the comments. Tell me what you thought of “Asylum of The Daleks.”
Okay, onto Downton Abbey. I had a nightmare about Downton Abbey last night. Keep in mind that when I say “nightmare,” it’s like, a fangurl nightmare, not a dream that would be actually frightening or troubling to anyone who wasn’t a total freak about fictional happenings.
So, as you know (or don’t, but you DNGAF about spoilers), Mary and Matthew FINALLY GOT ENGAGED at the end of the Christmas episode. I was so relieved. I have been rooting for them to get together for the whole series (as the writers intended). When he proposed, I cried. I didn’t cry when Joe proposed to me, but I cried when Matthew proposed to Mary. Holy cow, did I cry, and squeal, and weep tears of genuine relief.
Last night, I dreamed that I was at Downton Abbey for a wedding. A huge, amazing wedding. Of course, I knew exactly who was getting married. Matthew and Mary! I was at their wedding, omg omg, how exciting, to be a part of all of it!
Until the bride showed up and she was not Mary. I started having a full-fledged panic attack, chest pains, sweating, crying, begging Matthew not to marry this woman that wasn’t Mary. That’s right. I pulled an “I object!” on behalf of someone else. And it was super embarrassing, interrupted the wedding, caused a huge scene, and I woke up the way people wake up from nightmares in movies.
It was super duper pathetic. I’m fully aware of that, and that’s why I’m sharing it with you all. As a kind of penance, I suppose.
Enjoy your holiday weekend, American readers, and a new recap will be posted on Tuesday.

A True Story About A Horrible Thing I Did At Epcot

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I was a really spoiled child. Like, had-a-Cabbage-Patch-Doll-in-1982-even-though-my-grandfather-was-working-two-jobs-to-afford-that-kind-of-shit spoiled. I had the set. up. let me tell you. My mom and I lived with my grandparents and assorted aunts and uncles, and then on the other side of the coin I had my other grandparents, who let me do shitty things like eat only the middles of Oreos and rub a brick of cheese on the front of the refrigerator because I had an “independent spirit.” So, basically when I wanted something, I ended up getting it.

One of these things was a trip to Disneyworld, which I got during Christmas of 1985. I had just turned five, and things could not be better for a five-year-old than to spend actual Christmas fucking day at Disneyworld. Now, I’m not telling you all this stuff about my totally entitled childhood to make you super jealous. Although you should be, because my childhood was rad. I am just telling you all this so that you understand what was going on in my mind the day I did this horrible, horrible thing.

It went down at Epcot center, in the World Showcase section of the park. My grandparents and I were dining in the Aztec pyramid that represents Mexico on the tour of nations assembled around the vast central lagoon. As a five-year-old from the midwest who had been exposed to every variation of cheese-and-potato-potluck-dish under the sun, my palate was not impressed at the variety of flavors present in my Mexican dinner, so I asked my grandparents if I could leave the table and visit the little gift shop we saw on our way in.

Because my grandparents are too trusting of the world in general, they said, “Sure, Jenny, totally go to that little gift shop full of grown up strangers and breakable merchandise.” And so, I went. The gift shop was very much like any Disney gift shop, full of toys and light up shit and t-shirts, but it also had a section of hand-worked glass items. I guess people are really optimistic about their chances of carrying an insanely fragile spiderweb of glass threads woven into the shape of a swan out of the park, into their luggage, through the airport and home. But it’s not my place to judge what other people spend their money on.

I knew better than to touch. Lord, I knew better. I’d had my hands smacked at the grocery store more times than I could remember, and that was from touching yogurt and poking the beef tongues through the packaging. I couldn’t help it then, can’t help it now. I like the squish. But the point is, I knew so much better than what I was about to do. In fact, I wasn’t even tempted to touch anything. It was a bunch of boring glass stuff.

Then, I saw it. A tiny glass unicorn with a gilded horn winking seductively up at five-year-old me. It had wings, too, so I guess that made it a pegasus. A unisus? A pegicorn? Something like that. It was a winged unicorn, and around the base of each wing dangled a wreath of glass flowers in sparkling, translucent pastels. This was pure magic, and I was totally unsupervised.

Well, unsupervised except for the lady standing next to me. I can remember everything about this woman. She had a long, brown trenchcoat on (remember, it was the week of Christmas, so it was actually kind of cold out), and her hair was that oddly unnatural honey-gold-brown color all the moms were dying their hair in 1985. It was long and swept up and into a banana clip. The nearest comparison I can give you to really illustrate what she looked like is, “Imagine Natalie from Forever Knight, but give her worse hair somehow.” As she perused the glass objects, she would carefully pick one up, turn it this way and that, and then set it carefully back down, all the time sparing distrustful glances for the unsupervised five-year-old standing waaaaay too close to all this glass shit.

I decided that the best way to touch the unicorn and look like a serious customer would be to imitate what this lady had been doing. I reached out with authority, picked up the unicorn, turned it this way and that, and then, out of nowhere came an explosion of glass at my feet. In my careful turning about and examination of the unicorn, one of the little flower wreaths slipped off the wing and smashed spectacularly at my feet.

Now, I reached a critical moment, a time when seconds seemed to last for years. I had no idea how much the unicorn could possibly cost. A hundred dollars? A thousand? Three cents? I was five-years-old, I had no fucking clue how much baloney cost, let alone a stunningly crafted glass Epcot unicorn. I had these horrible visions of having to sit on a time-out chair in a circle of cold white light, while the dark, indistinct shape of Mickey Mouse loomed over me, demanding answers. Or would they send the big guns? Would they send Mary Poppins to shame me? Nothing could have frightened me more than the idea that Mary Poppins herself might show up to express her displeasure.

I put the unicorn down with the speed and dexterity of a 19th century urchin picking pockets, pointed my chubby little finger directly at the lady beside me (who had seen the entire thing go down) and shouted at the top of my lungs, “WHAT DID YOU DO?!”

Every eye in the gift shop turned to this poor lady, holding a miniature spun glass teapot, who was standing awfully close to a lot of broken glass on the floor. That was my moment. I ran out of the shop as fast as I could, and never looked back.

I’m aware now, as an adult, that the consequences for breaking that unicorn at Disneyworld were probably going to be somewhere between “nothing” and “extra nothing.” It’s Disney. They expect there will be kids there, and I’m sure they expect that shit is going to get broken. But I didn’t know that at the time. And just to be sure, when we took my son to Disneyworld in 2007, we cautiously avoided the Mexico pavilion.

50 Shades Darker chapter 8 recap, or “I won’t participate in the plot, and you can’t make me!”

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Welp, it’s official. Life fucking sucks and we’re all doomed: 50 Shades fanfic is being published as a novel. As J Bridger suggested in the comments section of the last recap, perhaps E.L. James will sue for copyright infringement. Also, maybe this is the year I quit writing and start working in a cigarette factory because that industry has some integrity compared to my industry right now.

Oh. There’s also a magazine now. So, the seas should be turning to blood at any minute.

We last left Ana standing outside of Chedward’s apartment, as Chedward, Taylor, Ryan Reynolds and that guy from Lost combed over it in search of a mysterious intruder.  No, wait, Sawyer had to stay in the hall with Ana, that’s right, because this happens to him:

“Taylor, Mr. Grey has entered the apartment.” He flinches and grabs the earpiece, pulling it out of his ear, presumably receiving some powerful invective from Taylor.

This is how I imagine Taylor’s sweep of the apartment, by the way:

But of course we don’t get to see any of that. No, we have to stay in the foyer with Ana, while Taylor has amazing adventures without us.

“Sorry, Miss Steele. This won’t take long.” Sawyer holds up both hands in a defensive gesture. “Taylor and the guys are just coming into the apartment now.”

Wait, Christian went into the apartment ahead of his security team? So, why is he bothering to pay them to protect him, if he won’t wait for them to do their job? Talk about control freak, he’s willing to bet his life on it.

Oh. I feel so impotent. Standing stock still, I listen avidly for the slightest sound, but all I hear is my aggravated breathing.

I don’t know, Ana, your posture seems kind of stiff to me. (Click here, you know what’s coming)

I have no idea how much time passes, and still we hear nothing. Surely no sound is good – there are no gunshots.

What about in the beginning of The Professional, where Leon slips a garrote around the dude’s neck and kills him silently? I can think of a bunch of ways to kill Christian Grey that wouldn’t be loud. Poison, smothering, slit his throat before he can yell, break his neck, chloroform him and drag him to a secondary location where I’ve got a Dexter-esque plastic wrap set-up waiting for him…

Look, it’s not like I’ve been thinking of this a lot, or anything.

Full disclosure: when I wrote the part about the garrote, I thought to myself, “You know, it’s been a long time since I’ve seen that movie… it’s possible that Leon doesn’t use a garrote at all. I should check that out. To the DVDs!”

Self shame is often the most effective type of shame.
He totally does, though. On a guy wearing a bolo tie.
Because waiting in tense silence for someone to possibly kill your boyfriend is a super bummer, Ana decides to walk around the foyer and look at the pictures on the wall.

I’ve never really looked at them before: all figurative paintings, all religious – the Madonna and child, all sixteen of them. How odd.

You haven’t really looked at them before because E.L. James suddenly needed a device to “foreshadow” information about Christian’s mother. Ana noticed so many little details about the art, the lighting, the layout, etc. on the first time she was in the apartment, I’m no longer buying that she just “hasn’t noticed” different rooms or, you know, huge art collections in the first fucking room off the elevator. Because I will not humor bad writing. If he had a mansion or a castle, I get not noticing something. If she didn’t constantly comment on the art everywhere she goes, I would buy, “Oh hey, I just never looked at them.” But in the real world, people tend to notice little shit like, “Oh hey, the guy I’m dating has sixteen paintings of the Virgin Mary in his foyer.” You notice, because that really is kind of strange.

Christian isn’t religious, is he? All of the paintings in the great room are abstracts – these are so different.

If they’re so different, a girl as astoundingly bright as Ana should have noticed them.

Abruptly, the doorknob moves. Sawyer spins like a top and draws a gun from his shoulder holster.

He spun like a top, did he? So, he’s whirling around in circles, gun drawn? I wish I could see it, because just imagining it is hilarious.

Christian comes out the door and gives the all clear, because he’s apparently a security guy now. Why not?

“Taylor is overreacting,” Christian grumbles as he holds out his hand to me.

Dude, you’re the one who hired him. It must be awesome to work for Christian. “You must protect me, I am in grave danger. You have no idea how very grave the dangerous danger I am in is, but I assure you: it is quite grave. The graviest. You must protect me, big, strong Taylor.” And then, the second some shit goes down and Taylor just does his job, it’s all, “Taylor, you big silly fraidy cat, there’s no danger! And now your overreaction has delayed my fucking!”

What a tool. I hope Christian fires Taylor, and then Taylor can get a better job. One fighting the Predator in South America.

Ana is so relieved that Christian isn’t dead, she has to spend a paragraph rhapsodizing about how hot he is. Then she bitches a little about how difficult his exes are, then they go into the apartment. Then Christian says:

“Taylor and his crew are checking all the closets and cupboards. I don’t think she’s here.”

So, the apartment hasn’t even been checked out yet, and you still brought Ana inside? While Leila, the totally off-the-rails ex-sub who may or may not have a gun could still be hiding inside? That’s totally sensible of you.

“Why would she be here?” It makes no sense.

“Exactly.”

Ana and Christian should never try to open any kind of detective agency. Here’s why:

IF SHE IS TRYING TO KILL CHRISTIAN, THE FIRST PLACE SHE WOULD GO IS TO HIS APARTMENT. WE KNOW THAT THIS IS WHAT SHE WOULD DO BECAUSE SHE HAS DONE SO BEFORE.

Ana asks Christian if Leila could get in, and Christian shoots that down, calling Taylor “overcautious.” Well, funny how it works, Christian, when you hire someone to be cautious on your behalf in matters of life and death, they tend to do exactly that. Because if you die, not only do they lose their job, it also looks terrible on their CV. “Last guy I guarded died.” Well, not hiring him, then, am I?

And here’s another, even more confusing aspect to this sudden, “Taylor sucks at his job and he’s way too careful” angle that Christian is trying to work. As an author, it’s E.L. James’s job to make the reader feel the tension of the situation. We’re supposed to really feel that Ana is in danger here, aren’t we? Otherwise, what is the point of the entire Leila plot? But if you’ve got the main characters saying, “Well, there’s really nothing dangerous happening here,” then you’re destroying that tension. Or, making them look really, really stupid. In this case? She’s managing to achieve both.

Ana asks Christian if he searched his playroom:

Christian glances quickly at me, his brow creasing. “Yes, it’s locked – but Taylor and I checked.”

I bet the reason Taylor knows about the playroom is that Chedward bottoms for Taylor all the time. You just know that Taylor is a Dom.

For the second time on this page, Christian suggests that Ana go to bed. “There might be someone hiding in your closed, but sweet dreams!” Amiright? He takes Ana to his bedroom and she gives him the note from Mrs. Robinson. Because now, when your car has been vandalized and a killer might be in your boyfriend’s apartment, now is the time to discuss this?

“Are you going to call the police about the car?” I ask as I turn around.

He sweeps my hair out of the way, his fingers softly grazing my naked back, and tugs down my zipper.

“No. I don’t want the police involved. Leila needs help, not police intervention, and I don’t want them here. We just have to double our efforts to find her.” he leans down and plants a gentle kiss on my shoulder.

This should be a big clue to Ana that the bodies of the other subs, the ones who didn’t escape after faking a suicide attempt in front of the housekeeper, are buried in the walls of the apartment. Otherwise, why on earth wouldn’t you call the police over a vandalized automobile and a possible stalker/intruder?

You know why? Because the plot is half-baked, so the only option in order to keep the book going is to have the characters actively resist participating in said plot in any meaningful way. It’s clear at this point that the Leila subplot is, like all the other subplots in this book, just there to fill out time between lackluster sex scenes. The outcome is rigged, and the main characters clearly know it, because they won’t take even a half-hearted stab at self-preservation. There is no reason for the reader to invest in their peril, because we already know that it’s not going to be perilous. It would get in the way of the fucking.

Later, back at the ranch:

I wake with a jolt, disoriented. Have I been asleep? Blinking in the dim glow the hallway casts through the slightly open bedroom door, I notice that Christian is not with me. Where is he? I glance up. Standing at the end of the bed is a shadow. A woman, maybe? Dressed in black? It’s difficult to tell.

Ana screams for help, and the security team comes running. Just kidding!

In my befuddled state, I reach across and switch on the bedside light, then turn back to look but there’s no one there. I shake my head. Did I imagine it? Dream it?

No, it was probably this guy:

Who could be Christian, for all we know, given the BDSM context of the story.

Ana sits up, looks around the room, decides she’s alone and goes out to look for Christian. Not to tell him that there was a person standing at the foot of his bed on the same night there was a possible B&E at his house, oh no. She just wants to know where he is, and blames the figure at the end of the bed on her overactive imagination.

Ana finds Christian in his study, on the phone:

“I don’t know why you’re calling at this hour. I have nothing to say to you… well, you can tell me now. You don’t have to leave a message.”

I stand motionless by the door, eavesdropping guiltily. Who is he talking to?

“No, you listen. I asked you, and now I am telling you. Leave her alone. She has nothing to do with you. Do you understand?” 

He sounds belligerent and angry. I hesitate to knock.

“I know you do. But I mean it, Elena. Leave her the fuck alone. Do I need to put it in triplicate for you? Are you hearing me?… Good. Good night.” He slams the phone down on the desk.

Raise your hand if you actually believe Elena called Christian in the middle of the night. I know that’s how it’s written, but holy hell, can I see that going down in reverse and making way more sense based on what we know of the characters.

What is the obsession with Christian repeating everything twice? He told Ana to go to bed twice, he’s telling Elena to leave Ana alone twice… this book could be a lot shorter if Christian wasn’t so into repeating himself.

This chapter really made something jump out at me. See where she says Christian sounds “belligerent and angry?” Okay, those are pretty much the same thing. Belligerent means hostile, and anger is “a strong feeling of displeasure and usually antagonism.” So, why both? Because someone bought E.L. James a Word-A-Day calendar, and now we all have to suffer for it. There are ten dollar words awkwardly shoehorned into this entire book, but it’s never so evident as in this specific chapter.

Ana gets up the courage to knock on the door, and Chedward is so angry it frightens her. But then he tells her she looks beautiful in his t-shirt, so everything is magically okay. And Ana still doesn’t mention that, hey, there was a fucking intruder in your bedroom. Even if you think you imagined that, wouldn’t you mention it? Just in case?

NO! Because it would get in the way of the fucking!

He rises slowly out of the chair, still in his white shirt and black dress pants. But now his eyes are shining and full of promise… but there’s a trace of sadness, too.

How is wearing a white shirt and black pants in any way contradictory to the look in his eyes?

“Do you know what you mean to me?” he murmurs. “If something happened to you, because of me…” His voice trails off, his brow creasing, and the pain that flashes across his face is almost palpable.

Only if you’re touching his face. But if he’s seriously that worried about it, he could call the police.

I reach up and stroke his face, running my fingers through the stubble on his cheek. It’s unexpectedly soft. “Your beard grows quickly,” I whisper, unable to hide the wonder in my voice at this beautiful, fucked-up man who stands before me.

This kind of makes it sound like she thinks it’s fucked up that his beard grows quickly.

I trace the line of his bottom lip then trail my fingers down his throat, to the faint smudge of lipstick at the base of his neck. He gazes down at me, still not touching me, his lips parted. I run my index finger along the line and he closes his eyes.

Hold up a second. Was this the lipstick line she traced over his body like two chapters ago? So that he was wearing a skin-colored vest? What the hell, how is it still there? They’ve had sex twice, then went to a party at his parent’s house where there was dancing and more fucking, so that’s three times having sex, wearing clothing that’s rubbing all over while you’re dancing, then all the way home and into the house, I’m sorry, NO. The lipstick would not still be there. Also, he never took a fucking shower before he went to the party at his parent’s house? The big, fancy, raise-a-million-dollars black tie party, and he couldn’t be bothered to wash? He’d had sex with Ana twice before they got to that party. Not only would the lipstick line not be there, you know what would be there? Stink lines, the kind that come off smelly cartoon people. That’s what would be there. And the smell would probably be fantastic, like honeysuckle and lollipops, because that’s what Ana’s perfect hooch smells like.

Seriously, I know that long wear lipstick exists. My son walked around our seven day Disney vacation with a kiss on his forehead that he got from Snow White on day one. Every picture we have of that vacation looks like it happened on the same day, because that lipstick was staying put. But you know what else? It was on his forehead, and he wouldn’t let us wash it, like, at all. It would have come off, if he hadn’t treated his forehead like a fucking shrine to Snow White’s eternal promise to marry him (which, by the way, it totally was). What I’m saying is, unless Christian Grey had the same steadfast determination as a four-year-old autistic to avoid sweating, rubbing, or general touching of that lipstick on his skin, it’s not going to be there.

Ana slowly takes Christian’s shirt off, and then she orders him into the bedroom where, gosh, it’s a little chilly. I wonder why… oh, THE BALCONY DOORS ARE OPEN.

I don’t remember doing that. I recall scanning the room when I woke. The door was definitely closed.

I don’t remember you looking at the door, and I’m literally in your head. But whatever you need to build suspense, Ana.

Ana FINALLY gets around to telling Christian that, oh, hey, there was a person standing at the foot of your bed and I didn’t mention it until now. Christian makes Ana get dressed in his sweatpants because it’s far too dangerous for her to go upstairs to where the wardrobe he bought her is. It wasn’t too dangerous for her to come into the apartment before it was checked out by security, though. He gets on the phone:

“She’s still fucking here,” he hisses down the phone.

Well, wait. If the balcony doors were closed when Ana woke up, and now they’re open, doesn’t that mean that she left? But be super careful now, Christian, it will make up for you not giving a shit earlier, when you almost got your girlfriend killed.

Approximately three seconds later, Taylor and one of the other security guys burst into Christian’s bedroom. Christian gives them a precis of what has happened.

“How long ago?” Taylor demands, staring at me all business-like. He’s still wearing his jacket. Does this man ever sleep?

Does this man ever stop being interesting?

But it makes sense that Taylor would have stayed on the night of a home invasion. At least someone was taking it seriously. I’m looking at you here, Christian Grey.

“She knows the apartment like the back of her hand,” says Christian. “I am taking Anastasia away now. She’s hiding here somewhere. Find her. When is Gail back?”

“Tomorrow evening, sir.”

“She’s not to return until this place is secure. Understand?” Christian snaps.

Wait, wait, wait. It was totally okay for your girlfriend to enter the apartment before it was secure, but not your housekeeper? And what happened to this all being an overreaction, she would never come to the apartment, she couldn’t get in, anyway, and Taylor was being too careful by checking to see if she was hiding? None of this makes any sense.

Taylor asks if Christian is going to go to his parents’ house, and Christian doesn’t want to bring trouble to them, so he asks Taylor to book him a hotel. And then it’s Ana’s turn to be stupid, because she hasn’t had a chance in oh, so very, very long:

“Aren’t we all overreacting slightly?” I ask.

Christian glowers at me. “She may have a gun,” he growls.

She may have a sword. Or a potted plant.

“Christian, she was standing at the end of the bed. She could have shot me then if that’s what she wanted to do.”

Shooting someone in a dark room isn’t as easy as you might think, Ana. Also, it doesn’t matter why she’s there, it’s pretty freaking hostile to break into someone’s house and watch them sleeping.

 Oh dear, how did this get here?

Christian disappears into his closet while the security guy watches me. I can’t remember his name, Ryan maybe. He looks alternately down the hall and to the balcony windows. Christian emerges a couple of minutes later with a leather messenger bag, wearing jeans and a pinstriped blazer. He drapes a denim jacket around my shoulders.

“Oh, hey, there wasn’t enough time for you to not be wearing my sweatpants and the t-shirt you slept in, but plenty of time for me to put on a blazer and pack.” Unless that’s a bug out bag. That would be hilarious, if he had such a history of mentally unstable girlfriends that he actually had a bug out bag in his closet at all times.

“I can’t believe she could hide somewhere in here,” I mutter, staring out the balcony doors.

“It’s a big place. You haven’t seen it all yet.”

What the fuck? Is it the TARDIS? The only reason she “hasn’t seen it all yet” is because E.L. James wants to leave her options open, in case she wants to add some new place for them to fuck later. How on earth are people not seeing this?

Yesterday, I tweeted that I was so furious at this book, I couldn’t finish the recap. I’m sure that a lot of you who read that tweet thought that I was angry about the abusive relationship or the forced birth control, or some fresh hell I’d yet to share with you. Nope. I was mad because the writing is so pathetically bad, and people are arguing that it isn’t. There are really people out there who think this book is super well-written, and that plunges me to such depths of crushing despair that I could not continue writing the recap.

But now I’m fresh and invigorated, so let’s keep going:

“Why don’t you just call her… tell her you want to talk to her?”

“Anastasia, she’s unstable, and she may be armed,” he says irritably.

And with the crushing despair, again. Cheward already told Ana earlier in the chapter that he didn’t want to involve the police, because Leila is mentally not all there and doesn’t need “police intervention.” Christian wanted to find her and deal with it himself. Now, Ana is saying, “Why don’t you just deal with it yourself,” and he’s saying, “No, because that’s too dangerous.” But rather than call the police, he’s going to go on the run with Ana. This is not a viable option, Christian. You can’t just keep running away until she gets tired of chasing you. You either have to call the police or deal with it yourself. Those are the options, and you’re rejecting both. Why?

Drumroll please…

There isn’t enough plot in this book to sustain it over the five hundred (yes, five fucking hundred) pages it’s sprawled across. If Christian had called the police when she tried to kill herself in his house, or filed a PPO when she showed up outside of Ana’s workplace (the suicide attempt, approaching Ana, and getting a concealed carry license would have been enough for them to grant a restraining order), then most of this would already be handled. But this is a Twilight fanfic, first and foremost. When the vampire James is stalking Bella, the Cullens can’t involve the police, so as Leila the ex-sub is stalking Ana, so must the police also not be involved. The problem is, E.L. James (and apparently her editors as well) didn’t understand that when the characters aren’t vampires, this plot doesn’t work. The characters just bumble around in a trap of their own making, while the reader keeps wondering, “Hey… why not call the cops?”

“Supposing she tries to shoot Taylor?”

“Taylor knows and understands guns,” he says with distaste. “He’ll be quicker with a gun than she is.”

“Ray was in the army. He taught me to shoot.”

Christian raises his eyebrows and for a moment looks utterly bemused. “You, with a gun?” he says incredulously.

“Yes.” I am affronted. “I can shoot, Mr. Grey, so you’d better beware. It’s not just crazy ex-subs you need to worry about.”

You know what’s funny about shooting, Ana? You need a gun to do it. Since Leila has one (I guess?) and you don’t, your ability to shoot carries about as much weight as a hummingbird’s fart in a stiff breeze. But look at how quick Christian is to express “distaste” over the idea of his bodyguard knowing how to use a gun. What the fuck was he supposed to be protecting Christian with all these years? Long range karate? Is this The Pink Panther?

Because Taylor is a better boyfriend than Christian, he’s packed Ana a suitcase of her own clothes. Yup, that’s right. Christian went and packed for himself, but he was going to leave Ana twisting in the wind. It’s our dream man Taylor who did the polite thing and thought of Ana. And because of this, this exchange happens:

Before I can stop myself I hug him, hard. He’s taken by surprise, and when I release him, he’s pink in both cheeks.

“Be careful,” I murmur.

“Yes, Miss Steele,” he mutters, embarrassed.

Christian frowns at me and then looks questioningly at Taylor, who smiles very slightly and adjusts his tie.

I don’t know if I’m more annoyed that Taylor appears to genuinely like Ana (Taylor, how could you?!), or that Christian is irritated by his girlfriend being concerned about another human being’s life.

Taylor gives Christian a credit card, and then agent Ryan takes Christian and Ana down to the garage, where Ana surveys the damage to her Audi. Then this happens:

“How could she have known it was my car?”

He glances anxiously at me and sighs. “She had an Audi A3. I buy one for all my submissives – it’s one of the safest cars in its class.”

Ana points out that it wasn’t a graduation present, if he gives them to all of his submissives, and he argues that since she never actually submitted, it was a graduation present. Ana asks Christian if he still wants her to be his submissive, and, um, not really the time, Ana. You’re sort of on the run from a crazy vampire from a crazy ex.

I gaze out of the window, trying to rationalize my exhausted, overactive mind. If she’d wanted to hurt me, she had ample opportunity in the bedroom.

Leila can’t hurt you in the bedroom, she’s a sub. (Click here)

Christian tells Ana that he no longer hopes that she’ll be a sub for him, and Ana is worried that she’s not enough for him.

“You’re more than enough. For the love of God, Anastasia, what do I have to do?”

Tell me about yourself. Tell me you love me.

Or you could ask him about himself, or tell him that you love him, instead of just waiting for him to volunteer this shit.

She does ask him something, and that was why he thought she would leave him if Dr. Flynn had told her “everything”:

He sighs heavily, closing his eyes for a moment, and for the longest time he doesn’t answer. “You cannot begin to understand the depths of my depravity, Anastasia. And it’s not something I want to share with you.”

You wanted to before, remember? Like when you were wailing on her with a fucking belt? Have we forgotten that?

“And you really think I’d leave if I knew?” My voice is high, incredulous. Doesn’t he understand that I love him? “Do you think so little of me?”

This is a nifty trap an abuser sets up. What happens is, the abuser thinks so little of himself (or pretends to think so little of himself) that the victim immediately rushes to the position of, “I don’t care how fucked up you think you are, I am not like the other girls, I will stay with you.” Once the abuser has the victim in that position, the victim can’t leave. If she leaves, it’s giving up. It’s throwing in the towel. It’s quitting. And those are all things that strong, independent women of the world don’t do, right? Also, by leaving, the victim is letting the abuser down, and confirming all of those negative things the abuser thinks (or pretends to think) about himself. And since the victim loves the abuser, she doesn’t want to hurt him. At this point, Ana is trapped. She has to be with him forever, or break out of the victim mindset.

I bet I know how it ends:

“I know you’ll leave,” he says sadly.

“Christian… I think that’s veyr unlikely. I can’t imagine being without you.” Ever…

Probably best not to mention that last “ever…” while you’re both actively fleeing his psychotic stalker ex. Might make him a leeeetle bit jumpy.

“You left me once – I don’t want to go there again.”

Okay, is it really “leaving” someone if you didn’t live together and you had only been dating for like, two weeks? I think of “leaving” as being in a committed relationship and separating your belongings and shit like that. Not breaking up after two weeks of dating. And they weren’t even really dating, they were just fucking due to sex contract.

Ana asks Christian if he saw Elena after the breakup, which Christian denies:

“I didn’t go anywhere last weekend. I sat and made the glider you gave me. Took me forever,” he adds quietly.

Wasn’t that a kid’s model?

My heart clenches again. Mrs. Robinson said she saw him.

Did she or didn’t she? She’s lying. Why?

“Contrary to what Elena thinks, I don’t rush to her with all my problems, Anastasia. I don’t rush to anybody. You may have noticed – I’m not much of a talker.” He tightens his hold on the steering wheel.

Maybe you should have gone to her for help with the glider, if it took you that long. His comment about not being a talker leads to Ana asking him about what Carrick told her re: Christian not talking after his mom died, which he doesn’t confirm. He does talk about Mia and how much he loves her, to which Ana makes some comment about Mia trying to keep them apart at the banquet.

Oh, and all this time they’re driving on the highway, just in case they’ve been followed. Now I’m starting to think they’re being a little overcautious, myself.

Ana asks Christian about his relationship with Elena, and he reasserts that it was all consensual and good for him. Then he complains that Ana is able to “inveigle” information out of people. Except, “inveigle” means getting information out of people with deceit or flattery… Ana is actually pretty straightforward when she’s talking to people. She’s certainly being straightforward in the scene.

They get to the hotel, where Ana is pretty sure that the valet looks surprised at their arrival because they’re so late. If it’s so unthinkable that people would arrive late, why does the hotel have a third shift valet? They go inside to check in as Mr. and Mrs. Taylor, where the requisite stunned female waits to ogle Christian hungrily:

Of course, she’s overawed by Christian. I roll my eyes as she flushes crimson and stutters. Even her hands are shaking.

“Do… you need a hand… with your bags, Mr. Taylor?” she asks, going scarlet again.

So, here we have Ana criticizing another woman for acting exactly the same way she acts all the freaking time. How dare this slutty, slutty slattern FLUSH CRIMSON in the presence of Christian Grey! It’s unconscionable!

When Christian refers to Ana as his wife, Ana actually hides her hands because there’s no ring on her finger. I love how Ana naturally assumes that the girl at the desk is going to a) check out her finger to see if it’s true and b) call her on it.

By the way, I have never once checked into a hotel where I didn’t have to show photo identification to get a room. So, I don’t know how this whole “I’m Mr. Taylor” thing is working.

Ana refers to the receptionist as “Miss Flushing Crimson,” which actively makes me want to reach into the book and slap the shit out of her. Are you kidding me with this? You’re going to give her a derogatory name for something you do all the time? That would be like me calling someone a pothead in a negative way. It would be pothead/kettle.

In the room, Christian pours them some drinks and they stand by the fireplace, making infuriating conversation:

“You never cease to amaze me, Anastasia. After a day like today – or yesterday, rather – you’re not whining or running off into the hills screaming. I am in awe of you. You’re very strong.”

NO. NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO. Just repeatedly having a character say the same thing over and over about Ana does not alter her characterization. It doesn’t pull the wool over my eyes. It shouldn’t pull the wool over anyone’s eyes. Ana isn’t strong. She wasn’t able to successfully stay broken up for more than five days. She hasn’t picked up the phone and called the police to protect herself, because she’s waiting for Christian to protect her. And how fucking often are we going to have to read Christian saying, “I am in awe of you.” What is there to be in awe of? Her mind-boggling stupidity at every turn of the page? Her inability to think for herself? Her towering misogyny? Tell me, please, Chedward, tell me what is so awe fucking inspiring about your  too stupid to live girlfriend, because I am DYING to know.

Oh, Christian, what do I have to do to make you realize how I feel?

Let him beat you, my subconscious sneers.

Oh hey… maybe I’m Ana’s subconscious.

To lighten the mood, Ana brings up Jose. Actually, she asks where Christian is going to hang Jose’s pictures, and then it’s time for the sexy:

Very bravely – emboldened by the brandy, no doubt – I take Christian’s hand and pull him toward the bedroom.

So, just be aware, ladies, the bar for bravery has been lowered for us. It used to be “rescue a toddler from a burning building,” now it’s “fuck you boyfriend.” In other news, words don’t mean anything anymore.

They start to get down, and the lipstick is still on him (bullshit), and then there is another astounding feat of bravery for us to be “in awe” at:

Taking a deep breath and beyond courageous, I reach for the hem of my t-shirt and lift it over my head so I am naked before him.

Courageous. Used to apply to pulling unconscious drivers from burning, wrecked automobiles, now means getting naked in front of your boyfriend (who has seen you naked plenty of times). Also, words continue to not mean a goddamned thing anymore.

They have sex, the word “avaricious” is used, and then it turns into a Kathleen Woodiwiss novel:

“You’re going to unman me, Ana,” he whispers suddenly, breaking away from me and kneeling up.

Unman? I literally have not seen that used in romantic fiction since the very, very early ’90’s. In historical romances.

This is how I am imagining Christian now.
No, I lied. Fabio seems like a really nice guy. He doesn’t deserve that.

Christian tells Ana that she’s “the best therapy,” which sounds really healthy to me. Using other people to forget your problems is probably the best path toward mental health, right? Then they have orgasms and there’s a paragraph break. When we return:

His head rests on my belly, his arms wrapped around me. My fingers forage in his unruly hair, and we lie like this for I don’t know how long.

Pictured: Ana, “foraging” through Christian’s hair.
Ana reflects on her relationship with Christian:

He’s come a long way, as have I, in such a short time. It’s almost too much to absorb. With all the fucked-up stuff, I am losing sight of his simple, honest journey with me.

Words continue to not mean things, and also I cry tears of blood. He hasn’t come a long way. He hasn’t really come anywhere. No matter what Ana says, Christian still is getting everything he wants. He’s still manipulating her. And she hasn’t come a long way, she’s exactly the same person as she was when we first met her on page one of Fifty Shades of Grey. Just now, she’s had sex. Big whoop.

When they wake up in the morning, Christian informs Ana that Dr. Greene will be there shortly. Because even in an apparently life threatening stalker emergency, Christian Grey will see that the needs of his penis are met.

Ana thinks about how she doesn’t want another Audi, but that she doesn’t have a choice. If I were her, I would ask for a better car. But if I were her, I wouldn’t be dating Chedward, either. She goes to the dining room of the suite and finds Christian eating breakfast. He tells her she’s going to need her strength today. I’m thinking he doesn’t understand what a gynecologist visit entails, if he thinks you need to bolster your strength for it. Then he tells Ana he just plans to go out and get some fresh air. Since Ana is a frail and wilting Victorian, she clearly is going to need to eat so that she doesn’t faint dead away from such physical exertion. Or something. Then Dr. Greene arrives.

We’re in the bedroom, and Dr. Greene is staring at me openmouthed. She’s dressed more casually than last time, in a pale pink cashmere twin set and black pants, and her fine blonde hair is loose.

“And you just stopped taking it? Just like that?”

I flush, feeling beyond foolish.

“Yes.” Could my voice be any smaller?

“You could be pregnant,” she says matter-of-factly.

Wait, what? That’s not how the pill works. You don’t take it to avoid spontaneous pregnancy, and if you stop taking it you get pregnant. She would have had to have unprotected sex, which they did, but I believe she was on her period at that time. Now, I realize that it’s technically possible to have unprotected sex on your period and still get pregnant, but the pill wouldn’t have been effective then, either, because she’d just started taking it. And after she and Christian got back together, they were having protected sex. So, yes, I suppose she could be pregnant, but it seems pretty fucking unlikely.

Still, we have to go through the agony of Ana taking a pregnancy test and worrying about what “Fifty” will do when he finds out that she’s preggers. Only after the pregnancy test does Dr. Greene ask when Ana’s last period was, and then she shames Ana for her irresponsibility before giving her the results of the test:

“You’re in the clear. You’ve not ovulated yet, so provided you’ve been taking proper precautions, you shouldn’t be pregnant. Now, let me counsel you about this shot. We discounted it last time because of the side effects, but quite frankly, the side effects of a child are far-reaching and go on for years.” She smiles, pleased with herself and her little joke, but I can’t begin to respond – I’m too stunned.

Okay, the part about “You’ve not ovulated” and “you shouldn’t be pregnant,” those could have happened before telling Ana she could be pregnant and taking a pregnancy test. OB/GYNs know this shit. It would have been the first thing she asked. Plus, how is she telling whether or not Ana has ovulated based on a pregnancy test? And wait a second… any good doctor would have asked Ana if she wants the shot, rather than take her boyfriend’s word for it, right? So, I’m guessing Dr. Greene isn’t a very good doctor.

Dr. Green launches into full disclosure mode about side effects, and I sit paralyzed with relief, not listening to a word. I think I’d tolerate any number of strange women standing at the end of my bed rather than confess to Christian that I might be pregnant.

Then you need to not be having sex. Or grown up relationships. No, wait, not having sex, because as you’re sitting there thinking, “Gosh, it would be super icky to have to tell Christian I’m pregnant,” you’re ignoring what the doctor is telling you about the medicine you are relying on to not get pregnant.

There’s another page of needless and overwrought drama about how Ana could have been pregnant, but isn’t:

He furrows his brow at me, puzzled. “My reaction? Well, naturally I’m relieved… it would be the height of carelessness and bad manners to knock you up.”

“Then maybe we should abstain,” I hiss.

Yes, you should, because you’re not emotionally ready for the responsibility of sex.

He gazes at me for a moment, bewildered, as if I’m some kind of science experiment. “You are in a bad temper this morning.”

Force birth control does that to a person.

“Ana, I’m not used to this,” he murmurs. “My natural inclination is to be it out of you, but I seriously doubt you want that.”

Your “natural inclination” is to beat her? WHY ARE SO MANY WOMEN SO IN LOVE WITH THIS BOOK?

They go and take a long and stupidly drama-filled shower, in which they argue over whether or not Christian is worthy of love:

“I can’t hear this. I’m nothing, Anastasia. I’m a husk of a man. I don’t have a heart.”

Okay, this is where I separate the nerd men from the nerd boys (even though I suspect the readership of this blog is mostly female…). When Christian says he’s a “husk,” the first thing I thought of was:

“It was like breaking up with the Joker.”

If you don’t get it, that means you’re cooler than I am, so good for you.

“Yes, you do. And I want it, all of it. You’re a good man, Christian, a really good man. Don’t ever doubt that. Look at what you’ve done… what you’ve achieved,” I sob. “Look at what you’ve done for me… what you’ve turned your back on, for me,” I whisper. “I know. I know how you feel about me.”

Okay, yeah, Christian Grey has achieved a lot. But so did like, Hitler, Mussolini, Pol Pot, Franco, Peron, they all achieved stuff and I don’t see people lining up to love them into wellness. And what has he done for Ana, really? He’s beaten her, he’s made her cry hysterically at the drop of a hat, he’s earned her a stalker, he’s controlled her career, he bought her a bunch of shiny toys that serve as leashes, he’s isolated her from her friends and family… and what else? Nothing of value. Oh, he gave her orgasms. I forgot about those. Orgasms trump everything. And what did he supposedly give up? His fetish. That’s what he gave up. She gave up her family, her friends, her emotional well-being, her independence, but he doesn’t get to cane anyone, so it all evens out.

By the way, the way he feels about her? He loves her. She says he loves her and he agrees, and the chapter is over.

In the past, I have tried to put up a recap twice a week. Unfortunately, I have a looming deadline. It’s actually not looming. It’s sort of… passed. So, I’m late with a book. I need to get it finished, so count on one recap per week for the next couple of weeks, until I get my work done.

How To Shame Your Husband

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Today, my friend Warnement was telling me about this funny website where owners shame their dogs. I was like, “Shave their dogs?” and he was like “Shame them,” and I was like, “Aha, Joe! I told you yesterday when they were talking about this on the radio in the car that the dj said ‘shamed’ and you were like, ‘he said shaved, why don’t you get the wax out of your ears?’ and look who is flying high now on a rainbow of promises. This foxy lady right here!”

There may have been a celebratory dance involved.

If you are unfamiliar with what I’m talking about, there is a website where people submit photos, more like mugshots, if you will, of their guilty looking dogs beside hand written signs that explain what it was the dog did bad. Sometimes, the dog is pictured at the scene of the crime, or with evidence of his or her doggy wrong doing. Some of them don’t look guilty at all, which is even better. There is actually a chihuahua who looks like a hardened criminal facing a long sentence, but who has a tattoo of the Chinese character for YOLO. The site is here, but it’s not safe for work. The first link on the right hand side is of a woman getting her butthole tatooed. And apparently, she loved it. Emphasis mine.

You get the idea, right? Well, I decided that if it worked with dogs, it has to work with humans, right? And there are all these annoying things my husband does. So, I decided to call him out on them. And he was a great sport about it:

“I clean floors before I clean the surfaces.”

“I’ve never read Jen’s books. 🙁 ” *

“I try to tell Jen how to cook.”

“The only time I tell Jen I love her is when I fart in the car.” **

“I leave my stubble from shaving in the sink.”
*This is true. Joe has never read any of my books all the way through. He read the first three chapters of The Turning, and occasionally he will read the sex scenes from my books aloud as he chases me through the house.
**Look how not guilty he looks about this one. And it’s also true. He will turn to me with such tenderness and say, “I love you.” My heart will start to melt. And then I smell it.

Your heart might kill you. Heads up.

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So, I wasn’t planning a post for today, because I have copy edits to do and books to write. But a friend just sort of casually posted something on facebook, to the tune of, “Oh hey, you might not have realized it at the time, but I totally had a heart attack three months ago.”

WTF?!

He’s in his 30’s!

He couldn’t possibly have had a heart attack!

WTF?!

Well, he did have a heart attack, and he’s written about it on his blog, Open Source Judaism. Please go and check it out, because while I’d heard of people having a heart attack in their 30’s and 40’s, I always assumed it would never happen to me. No matter what age you are, go read his scary story, get a bead on your very real mortality, and take better care of yourselves, because I like you.

Yes, you personally.

50 Shades Darker chapter 7 recap, or “Nothing says romance like forced birth control.”

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Okay, some links for you all.

50 Shades Generator, courtesy of Tanya Eby, AKA Blunder Woman. Actually, her husband found it. So, you know, they’re good for something, am I right, ladies?

This is the funniest 50 Shades twitter parody.

In The Beginning, There Was Fanfic: From The Four Gospels To Fifty Shades is a really cool article on fanfiction, how it got started, the way the community functioned before the internet, and touches on the 50 Shades phenomenon. The author raises an interesting point:

 As one leading fanfic site claims, “the majority of Twilight fanfic is porn”. Many of these stories will sound spookily familiar. In one: His Personal Assistant (2009), “Bella Swan, personal assistant to handsome, rich, successful Edward Cullen, decides to make oblivious boss fall in love with her”; in another (2009) “Edward is a millionaire obsessed with Isobella Swan”. One, The Submissive by Tara Me Sue, is described as “37 chapters of juicy graphic detail”, “Think Story of O meets Twilight minus the vampire stuff”. This story, which can be found on fanfiction.net, like the others above, predates the publication of Fifty Shades by two years and was not written by EL James.

So, not only is 50 Shades of Grey plagiarized from Twilight, it’s actually plagiarized from other Twilight fanfiction. Really let that sink in a moment, the fact that people are all:

and they’re doing it over a book that isn’t just ripped off from the source material, but ripped off from another rip off the source material. And keep in mind, E.L. James has already had the gall to try and shut down someone on fanfiction.net for plagiarizing 50 Shades. Is this the Matrix? Is this hell?
Finally, the awesome Julia Burns left a comment on my last recap, imagining what MST3K would look like if it really was the sequel to Good Will HuntingThis is what it would look like. It’s all coming together for your old friend Jen. It really is.
When we last left Bella Swan and Edward Cullen, they were at a charity ball at the Cullen mansion. Ana just bid the $24k that Christian deposited in her account on a weekend at Christian’s property in Aspen. Okay, but you realize that you’re not giving the $24k back, right, Ana? It’s for charity, it’s not like he’s going to get that money back. And if you’ve got your shots handy, it’s time for the “Drink When Ana Drinks” drinking game:

Holy shit, did I really just do that? It must be the alcohol. I’ve had champagne plus four glasses of four different wines.

Shots! Shots shots shots shots! EVERYBODY!

Ana looks at Christian, and notices that he looks happy, but she knows he’s going to be really angry.

My subconscious has finally decided to make an appearance, and she’s wearing her Edvard Munch The Scream face.

I bet E.L. James has that poster in her office. Think of how much calmer this entire book would have been if that poster had just been Monet’s Water Lilies.

Now, I’ve noted a few places in this book and the last where an otherwise fine paragraph or sentence will be ruined by something utterly creepy. To illustrate this point, I’m going to show you two excerpts out of order. This is the excerpt that is just fine. It’s actually pretty well written, and something that would get me hot in any other book:

“I don’t know whether to worship at your feet or spank the living shit out of you.”

Oh, I know what I want right now. I gaze up at him, blinking through my maks. I just wish I could read what’s in his eyes.

“I’ll take option two, please,” I whisper frantically as the applause dies down. His lips part as he inhales sharply. Oh, that chiseled mouth – I want it on me, now. I ache for him. He gives me a radiant sincere smile that leaves me breathless.

“Suffering, are you? We’ll have to see what we can do about that,” he murmurs as he runs his fingers along my jaw.

See? Taken out of the context of Chedward and Anabella, that’s actually some pretty good sexual tension. So, what was it that completely destroyed that entire passage for me? This one, that came directly before it:

Christian leans over to me, a large, fake smile plastered across his face. He kisses my cheek and then moves closer to whisper in my ear in a very cold, controlled voice.

So, read that, and go back and read the other passage, so that they’re in the correct order. Literally everything that comes after large, fake smiles and cold, controlled voices is sinister and creepy. All of it.

Things do not get better. While sitting at the same table as his sister, parents, and grandparents, Christian takes Ana’s hand and…

Slowly and surreptitiously, so I don’t realize his game until it’s too late, he eases my hand up his leg and against his erection.

His parents. His grandparents. Same table.

Taking full advantage, I slowly caress him, letting my fingers explore. Christian keeps his hand over mine, hiding my bold fingers, while his thumb skates softly over the nape of my neck. His mouth opens as he gasps softly, and it’s the only reaction I can see to my inexperienced touch. But it means so much. He wants me. Everything south of my navel contracts. This is becoming unbearable.

It sure is, Ana. Seriously, wouldn’t all of this be painfully obvious? I get that there is an auction going on, and people are watching it. But I think I would notice if someone at my table was gasping because he was getting an under-the-table-handy. No auction is that enthralling, that anyone would miss that subtle detail. Also, I don’t think Ana’s touch can be accurately described as “inexperienced” anymore. They have sex almost every chapter. Of course, as the sex piles up (lol, “sex piles”), her euphemisms do seem to be getting more general. “Everything south of my navel,” could be her cunt, but it could also be her knees. I’m kind of imagining her legs stiffening up rigor mortis style and Ana toppling from her chair.

Now, let’s learn about pronoun agreement!

A week by Lake Adriana in Montana is the final lot for auction. Of course Mr. and Dr. Grey have a house in Montana, and the bidding escalates rapidly, but I am barely aware of it. I feel him growing beneath my fingers, and it makes me feel so powerful.

Do you see it? Let me give you a hint:

A week by Lake Adriana in Montana is the final lot for auction. Of course Mr. and Dr. Grey have a house in Montana, and the bidding escalates rapidly, but I am barely aware of it. I feel him growing beneath my fingers, and it makes me feel so powerful. 

Yup. Due to clumsy writing, Ana is now jacking off Christian’s father. Or both of them. Maybe she’s got one in each hand? That has to attract some attention at the dinner table.

Ana and Christian want to sneak off and have sex, because they are at his parents’ house, after all, but Mia ruins their plan by bringing up the First Dance Auction.

“The first dance will be with me, okay? And it won’t be on the dance floor,” he murmurs lasciviously into my ear. My giggles subside as anticipation fans the flames of my need. Oh yes! My inner goddess performs a perfect triple Salchow in her ice skates.

That bitch can do it all!

Christian gives Ana a kiss, and gives us all something to think about:

Glancing around, I realize that our fellow guests at the table are astonished. Of course, they’ve never seen Christian with a date before.

So, if they’re all astonished about that kiss on the cheek, what are the chances that they saw Ana fondling his dongle? Pretty high, right? He’s never appeared in public with a date before, so everyone is going to be watching him. It wouldn’t be a big deal if he was a womanizing billionaire like, oh, Tony Stark, right?

 Look at this suave motherfucker. It’s not just unsurprising, it’s damn well expected that someone will jack him off under the dinner table.

But Chedward isn’t Tony Stark, he’s the opposite. He doesn’t flaunt his conquests, so when he’s with a woman, it’s going to draw a lot of attention.
No, this whole comparison wasn’t just an excuse to work a picture of RDJ into my blog. Shut up. You don’t know.
Ana and Mia join ten other women – including Lily the requisite jealous bitch – on the stage, where horrible clarity dawns on Ana:

“Gentlemen, the highlight of the evening!” the MC booms over the babble of voices. “The moment you’ve all been waiting for! These twelve lovely ladies have all agreed to auction their first dance to the highest bidder!”

Oh no. I blush from head to toe. I hadn’t realized what this meant. How humiliating!

Okay, she didn’t realize what it meant when, on the last page, Mia said:

“The First Dance Auction. Come on!” 

What else could you possibly infer from the words “first dance auction”? It’s one of the most cliche fundraising events of all time, too. Seriously, what did Ana think was going to happen up on that stage?

“It’s for a good cause,” Mia hisses at me, sensing my discomfort. “Besides, Christian will win.” She rolls her eyes. “I can’t imagine him letting anyone outbid him. He hasn’t taken his eyes off you all evening.”

Mia senses her discomfort because Alice is psychic.

So, you’ve probably already deduced that this is going to be yet another chance for Ana to prove her Mary Sueishness by earning the highest bid for her first dance. You might think that you are prepared for the cliche that is to come, and that you will be able to weather the storm. You are wrong. It’s so much worse than you could have imagined.

You are going to need this again.
First of all, there is the angst: 

Yes, focus on the good cause, and Christian is bound to win. Let’s face it, he’s not short of a dime or two.

But it means spending more money on you! my subconscious snarls at me. But I don’t want to dance with anyone else – I can’t dance with anyone else – and it’s not spending money on me, he’s donating it to charity. Like the $24,000 he’s already spent? My subconscious narrows her eyes.

How dramatic can one person reasonably be about how another person spends their money? Or about dancing with someone else? Ana, you’re just going to dance with someone, not fuck them. And it’s going to raise money for drug addicted parents of small children, let’s not forget that.

“Now, gentlemen, pray gather around, and take a good look at what could be yours for the first dance. Twelve comely and compliant wenches.”

Jeez! I feel like I’m in a meat market. I watch, horrified, as at least twenty men make their way to the stage area, Christian included, moving with easy grace between the tables and pausing to say a few hellos on the way.

Okay, maybe I was wrong, because this is starting to sound like a really, really fancy gang bang. “Comely and compliant?” That’s a bit creepy, isn’t it? Wasn’t there a scene like this in the movie where Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman pretended to be into each other sexually, and no one was buying it? That had masks in it, didn’t it?

 Okay, there were masks. Maybe not an auction scene, maybe not credible heterosexuality, but definitely masks.

The MC announces each woman with little made up biographies. The first two women, Jada and Mariah, go for $5,000 and $4,000, respectively, and during this part of the auction, Mia mentions that she hopes Christian wins the first dance with Ana, so that there isn’t a “brawl.” 

Christian is watching me like a hawk. Brawler Trevelyan-Grey – who would have known.

“How long ago?” I ask Mia.

She glances at me, nonplussed.

“How long ago was Christian brawling?”

“Early teens. Drove my parents crazy, coming home with cut lips and black eyes. He was expelled from two schools. He inflicted some serious damage on his opponents.”

Okay, the first time I read this chapter, I totally missed the part where Mia said that there might be a brawl, so it looked like the conversation was coming out of nowhere and I was super confused. So, for all the people who say, “Who has the time to read a book multiple times just to bitch about it?” this is one of those cases that proves that if you’re going to rip something absolutely apart, you have to read it a few times or risk criticizing an element of the work that isn’t actually flawed.

However, holy fuck, is this flawed. First of all, they’re on a stage in front of three hundred guests. And they’re having this conversation about something intensely personal. Guess what, you’re not invisible, ladies. Someone is going to see you talking, someone is going to pay attention to what you’re talking about. Second, oh, hey there proof that Christian shouldn’t be involved in BDSM. If you have serious anger issues, to the point that your frequent physical assaults of other people had actual medical consequences, maybe being a Dom isn’t for you. Just saying.

We don’t find out how much the next girl goes for, because Ana stops paying attention, but the bidding is up to $4,000. Let’s recap:

  • Jada went for $5,000.
  • Mariah went for $4,000.
  • Jill’s only mentioned bid was $4,000.

So, what do you want to bet Mr. Grey bids for Ana?

“Beautiful Ana plays six musical instruments, speaks fluent Mandarin, is keen on yoga… well, gentlemen -” Before he can even finish his sentence Christian interrupts him, glaring at the MC through his mask.

“Ten thousand dollars.” I hear Lily’s gasp of disbelief behind me.

Did Lily bid? Also, why is Christian glaring at the MC? The MC is doing his job.

“Fifteen.”

What? We all turn as one to a tall, impeccably dressed man standing to the left of the stage. I blink at Fifty. Shit, what will he make of this? But he’s scratching his chin and giving the stranger an ironic smile. It’s obvious Christian knows him. The stranger nods politely at Christian.

OMG.  Is it Taylor? OMG. Is it Jack Hyde? OMG OMG OMG.

“Well, gentlemen! We have high rollers in the house this evening.” The MC’s excitement emanates through his harlequin mask as he turns to beam at Christian. This is a great show, but it’s at my expense. I want to wail.

Full disclosure: this post took me super long to write, not because of the stuff I’m writing, but because I spent literally two hours looking at each and every “Look at all the fucks I give” macro on the damned internet because I give so few fucks about Ana’s mortification that I had to get the exact. Right. One. There were Doctor Who ones, there was one of Renee Fleming, I’m telling you, there were a lot to choose from. There was a Darth Vader in a kilt riding a unicycle and playing the bag pipes one. But ultimately, MST3K won, because they seriously do not give a fuck and neither do I. Oh, poor Ana! You’re the belle of the ball again. That must be absolutely humiliating, to have two men fighting over a dance with you to the tune of tens of thousands of dollars, while the other women have all gone for like, four. Oh, how horrifying, that such attention is being called to you, because you don’t like it, even though you fucking thrive on it, because you’re a Mary Sue so Mary Sueish that they’ll have to retire the goddamned term and start using “Anastasia Rose Steele” instead. Poor. Poor. You.

“Twenty,” counters Christian quietly.

The babble of the crowd has died. Everyone is staring at me, Christian, and Mr. Mysterious by the stage.

“Twenty-five,” the stranger says.

Could this be any more embarrassing?

I don’t know, Ana. You could be watching it happen. Second hand embarrassment is often more crushing than actual embarrassment. Trust me, I’m having it right now, for both you and the author.

Christian stares at him impassively, but he’s amused. All eyes are on Christian. What’s he going to do? My heart is in my mouth. I feel sick.

“One hundred thousand dollars,” he says, his voice ringing clear and loud through the tent.

Okay, fine. She’s embarrassed. And it is kind of an embarrassing thing. But you know what’s more embarrassing? Being the girl who went for $4,000, when Ana went for $100,000. Just saying. I know that it buys into the whole patriarchal thing of a woman being worth what a man believes she’s worth, but this is a fun, albeit cliche, activity to raise money for a charity that helps parents of small children get off drugs. Maybe keep that in focus, take the ego stroke, and shut the fuck up about it. No one forced you to participate. Mia is overbearing, but if you had said you didn’t want to do it, she wouldn’t have made you.

Ana asks Christian who the other bidder was, and he says that he’ll tell her later. They have time for a quick fuck before the first dance actually happens, so he spirits her away to Edward Cullen’s bedroom:

“This was my room,” he says quietly, standing by the door and locking it behind him.

It’s large, stark, and sparsely furnished. The walls are white, as is the furniture; a double bed, a desk and chair, shelves crammed with books and lined with various trophies for kickboxing, by the look of them. The walls are hung with movie posters: The Matrix, Fight Club, The Truman Show, and two framed posters featuring kickboxers. One is named Guiseppe DeNatale – I’ve never heard of him.

Wait, has she heard of the other one? I love how Ana’s mind works, like she expects she’s going to have this knowledge of kickboxing because she knows fucking everything because she’s so “bright.” “Oh, Guiseppe DeNatale? I’ve never heard of him. I should comment on how I’ve never heard of him, because the reader obviously trusts that I have encyclopedic knowledge of every subject on the planet, and I wouldn’t want to mislead them. With great intelligence comes great responsibility, to paraphrase Spiderman.”

“I’ve never brought a girl in here,” he murmurs.

Oh, play her the lullaby you wrote for her, Edward! Please do!

They have a brief discussion about how she wants him to spank her, but he won’t because he said he wouldn’t do the punishment thing anymore.

“I vowed to myself I would not spank you again, even if you begged me.”

“Please,” I beg.

Well, clears that up, right? He’s down to spank her if she promises to use the safe word if she needs to. And then, it’s on to our latest installment of Word Rep Theatre. Emphasis mine:

He swallows, then takes my hand, and moves toward the bed. Throwing the duvet aside, he sits down, grabs a pillow, and places it beside him. He gazes up at me standing beside him and suddenly tugs hard on my hand so that I fall across his lap. He shifts slightly so my body is resting on the bed, my chest on the pillow, my face to one side. Leaning over, he sweeps my hair over my shoulder and runs his fingers through the plume of feathers on my mask.

Sometimes, word rep is unavoidable. Not these times. None of those times. It could have easily read:

He swallows, then takes my hand and moves toward the bed. Throwing the duvet aside, he sits. He gazes up at me and tugs me down, so that I fall across his lap. He shifts slightly so my body is resting on the mattress, my chest on a pillow beside him, my face turned away. Leaning down, he sweeps my hair over my shoulder and runs his fingers through the plume of feathers on my mask.

Nothing of value is lost by losing the word rep. This is actually a very common mistake a lot of writers make, thinking that they have to spell things out like assembly instructions, when it’s often just a few key words that get the description across. If you don’t believe me, read Tolkien’s Fellowship of The Ring and try to find the exact description of Rivendell. Then go look at what it looks like in the movie. Hardly any of the stuff you see in the movie is described in detail by Tolkien in the novel, but everyone had the exact same image of it in their heads, so that when they went to see the movie, they saw what they had seen when they’d read the book. It might be unfair to compare any author to Tolkien, but it’s just an example. Like J.K. Rowling with Privet Drive. She doesn’t go into a lot of detail about Privet Drive, but it still showed up in the movies as looking exactly the way people imagined it in the books. It’s not about using more words or more description, it’s about using the right words. Well, that and not repeating the same words over and over and over when it can be avoided.

Christian asks Ana if she really wants to be spanked, and why:

I groan as soon as his hand makes contact with my skin. I don’t know why… you tell me not to overthink. After a day like today – arguing about the money, Leila, Mrs. Robinson, the dossier on me, the road map, this lavish party, the masks, the alcohol, the silver balls, the auction… I want this.

Let’s pick out the bad reasons from the good:

Good reasons to want to be spanked:

  • All geared up from Ben Wa balls.
  • Inhibitions lowered by alcohol (now, this would be a bad reason to be all, “cane me!” but a light spanking with a bare hand would probably be okay).
  • The roleplay mystery of wearing masks at a fancy party gets you all revved up.

Bad reasons to want to be spanked:

  • Because you feel inferior in comparison to his ex-girlfriends who were more willing to explore BDSM fantasies, and to whom you’re afraid you’re going to lose him.
  • Because you argued about money.
  • Because he profoundly invaded your privacy.

I have no problem with Ana getting spanked, but let’s make sure it’s because she’s horny and wants it, okay? Not because she’s trying to prove that she can be just as good at getting spanked as his exes were.

He spanks her and fingers her for the next page, and then they have sex, and it’s super sexy, with Christian saying things like:

“This is going to be quick, baby,”

Oh, how I’ve longed to hear a man say that to me, let me tell you.

“Ana, shit,” he hisses as he comes, and the tortured sound sets me off again, spiraling into a healing orgasm that goes on and on and wrings me out and leaves me spent and breathless.

“Healing orgasm” sounds like it comes directly from one of those orgasmic birth books.

So, they get done and Ana notices a picture of a woman on a bulletin board in Christian’s room. She looks familiar, but it isn’t someone she can immediately place, and Christian won’t tell her who it is.  So, it’s probably his bio mom.

They go back out to the dance floor for the first dance, and halfway through, the mysterious other bidder cuts in. It’s Dr. Flynn, Christian’s psychologist, so it’s super professional of him to be at a party at Christian’s parents’ house, right? I suppose one could make an argument that he’s a friend of  the family, but in that case, shouldn’t he not be Christian’s doctor? We have a psychologist friend of the family, and she won’t work with any of us because of ethics or whatever. Or maybe I’m wrong, maybe we’re just way too cray for her. But I’m betting it’s not cool for a psychologist to hang out with patients in their down time.

The band strikes up another song, and Dr. Flynn pulls me into his arms. he’s much younger than I imagined, though I can’t see his face. He’s wearing a mask similar to Christian’s. He’s tall, but not as tall as Christian, and he doesn’t move with Christian’s easy grace.

Just in case you were wondering, Christian is still the most handsomest, most graciest, most awesomest.

What do I say to him? Why is Christian so fucked-up? Why did he bid on me? It’s the only thing I want to ask him, but somehow that seems rude.

I like that she thinks of two things she wants to ask him, but it’s singularly “only” the “only” thing she wants to ask him. She’s so “bright.”

“I’m glad to finally meet you, Anastasia. Are you enjoying yourself?” he asks.

“I was,” I whisper.

What a charmer, ladies and gents. And to think, it only costs $100k to dance with her.

Dr. Flynn asks if he’s the reason she’s not having fun anymore, and her answer is even more gracious:

“Dr. Flynn, you’re the shrink. You tell me.”

He grins. “That’s the problem, isn’t it? The shrink bit?”

I giggle. “I’m worried what I might reveal, so I’m a little self-conscious and intimidated. And really I only want to ask you about Christian.”

I’m not a mental health professional, but I think it must get really annoying to have everyone around you feel so certain that their brains are utterly fascinating to you and that you’re going to constantly be analyzing them. I bet Dr. Flynn has heard this kind of thing so many times that he wishes he could shoot lasers out of his eyes and incinerate anyone who jokes about the fact that he’s a psychologist.

He smiles. “First, this is a party so I’m not on duty,” he whispers conspiratorially. “And second, I really can’t talk to you about Christian. Besides,” he teases, “we’d need until Christmas.”

I gasp in shock.

“That’s a doctor’s joke, Anastasia.”

I flush, embarrassed, and then feel slightly resentful. He’s making a joke at Christian’s expense. “You’ve just confirmed what I’ve been saying to Christian… that you’re an expensive charlatan,” I admonish him.

You wanna back the rude train up a fucking minute, Ana? First of all, you were totally down with Dr. Flynn spilling intimate personal details about Christian if it would help you in your quest to be OMG THE BEST GIRLFRIEND EVER WHO FIXES HIM YAY!, but when he won’t break with doctor/patient confidentiality for you, you believe he’s crossing a boundary by making a joke?  So, it’s totally okay for you to go behind Christian’s back and ask his doctor for personal info, but his doctor making a joke about it is so totally inappropriate that you call him a “charlatan?” And not just calling him that, saying that you’ve called him that in the past, when you have no idea how he runs his practice, what his methods are, or if he’s actually helping Christian at all. You decided he was a charlatan because you think you can fix Christian better, with the magical healing power of your super vagina.

Of course, rather than get offended, Dr. Flynn is utterly charmed by Ana, because this book makes no goddamned sense:

Dr. Flynn snorts with laughter. “you could be on to something there.”

Ana grills him on where he’s from (England) and why he came to America (he doesn’t tell her).

He snorts. “No, Anastasia. that you don’t give much away.”

“There’s not much to give away,” I smile.

No shit.

Their dance finishes and Christian comes back to claim her from the sinister Dr. Flynn.

“It’s been a pleasure to meet you, Anastasia.” He gives me his warm smile again, and I feel like I’ve passed some kind of hidden test.

Yes, because as I mentioned before, your brain is so fascinating that Dr. Flynn couldn’t help but analyze you outside of office hours.

Ana jokingly tells Christian that Dr. Flynn told her everything about him, and it turns into angst-o-rama times:

Christian tenses. “Well, in that case, I’ll get your bag. I’m sure you want nothing more to do with me,” he says softly.

I stop. “He didn’t tell me anything!” My voice fills with panic.

Christian blinks before relief floods his face. He pulls me into his arms again. “Then let’s enjoy this dance.” He beams down at me, reassuring me, and then spins me around.

Why would he think that I’d want to leave? It makes no sense.

Does anyone else feel like they’re reading about high schoolers? And not like, one high schooler and one really immature hundred year old dude who is a vampire, I mean like, two fourteen year olds? “I can’t dance with anyone else!” “You want to leave me now!” “I don’t want to leave you!” Ugh. You’re at a swanky party with lots of swanky people. Why don’t you just shut the fuck up and enjoy yourselves, already?

Ana goes to the bathroom, and on the way she gets sidelined by Mrs. Robinson, who wants to also act like a fourteen year old. She tells Ana that Christian is in love with her:

I am reeling. Christian loves me? He hasn’t said it, and this woman has told him that’s how he feels? How bizarre.

A hundred images dance through my head: the iPad, the gliding, flying to see me, all his actions, his possessiveness, $100,000 for a dance. Is this love?

No, it’s not love. He bought you the iPad to avoid telling you how he feels. He took you gliding because it’s an activity he enjoys. He flew to visit you in Georgia, yes, but he did it after you told him not to, because you wanted time away from him. He paid $100,000 for a dance because he wanted to display to everyone that he owns you. Possessiveness is not love. Nothing he has done has been an expression of love.

But on to Mrs. Robinson acting like a fourteen year old:

“I’ve never seen him so happy, and it’s obvious that you have feelings for him, too.” A brief smile flits across her lips. “That’s great, and I wish you both the best of everything. But what I wanted to say is if you hurt him again, I will find you, lady, and it won’t be pleasant when I do.”

Yeah, Ana. Now that you’re with him, you’re with him forever, because if you break up with him and hurt his feelings, Mrs. Robinson is going to beat you up. Because this is high school.

She stares at me, ice-cold blue eyes boring into my skull, trying to get under my mask.

Taken literally, that sentence is really funny, and implies that Ana is wearing the mask under her skull.

Just when I thought this entire chapter was just going to be one long, slow backslide into alcoholism for me, this happens:

“I’m laughing at your audacity, Mrs. Lincoln. Christian and I have nothing to do with you. And if I do leave him and you come looking for me, I’ll be waiting – don’t doubt it. And maybe I’ll give you a taste of your own medicine on behalf of the fifteen-year-old child you molested and probably fucked up even more than he already was.”

BOOM. Atomic burn. I’m even going to ignore the fact that Ana kind of threatens to molest Mrs. Robinson there, because she called her a molester to her face. Good for Ana!

Ana leaves the tent all angry, and still needing to pee, and Christian intercepts her, wanting to know what’s wrong. Ana tells him to ask Mrs. Robinson, and Christian says he’ll talk to her:

“You will do no such thing.” I cross my arms, my anger spiking again.

Okay, so what do you want him to do here, Ana? Because you’re mad at him for what Mrs. Robinson did, which doesn’t make a lot of sense. He can’t control whether or not she approaches you. But are you saying, “You will do no such thing,” because you don’t want him to confront his molester, or are you saying it because you don’t want him to talk to a woman who you feel is competition for his affection? I think it’s the latter. Yet, you somehow want him to make this situation right by you. The only way he can do this is by speaking to her, and yet if you ask him to do this, you’re asking him to defend you against his rapist.

Obviously, in this situation the only thing to do is say, “Look, she’s way too possessive of you. I’m not going to try and cross her path again, let’s just avoid her and let the cray cray die down.” So that’s what they do.

HA! No, I’m totally kidding. Ana calls Mrs. Robinson “old” (I thought she was forty) and then goes to the bathroom, and then when she comes back out:

Christian is on the phone some distance away and out of earshot of the few people laughing and chatting nearby. As I get closer, I can hear him. He’s very terse.

“Why did you change your mind? I thought we’d agreed. Well, leave her alone… This is the first regular relationship I’ve ever had, and I don’t want you jeopardizing it through some misplaced concern for me. Leave. Her. Alone. I mean it, Elena.”

Wait a second… aren’t they at the same party? Why is he calling her?

Christian and Mrs. Robinson on the way to homeroom.
Christian gets off the phone, and Ana has to make another crack about Mrs. Robinson’s age:

“How’s the old news?”

Har har. We all remember Ana’s description of Mrs. Robinson, right? That she looked like she was in her late thirties or early forties? You’re not going to be twenty-two forever, Ana. Your youth and ability to wear low-waisted jeans will fade. And when that day happens, I hope Christian dumps your ass for a twenty-two year old blonde with pigtails and lipstick you don’t approve of.

Christian asks Ana if she wants to stay for the fireworks, and she is all about fireworks, so they’re going to stay.

“We’ll stay and watch them, then.” He puts his arms around me and pulls me close. “Don’t let her come between us, please.”

Well, that’s really not Ana’s responsibility, is it? Mrs. Robinson is actively trying to come between the two of you. She’s the one to blame. The best course of action is to ignore her, not call her the second Ana goes to the bathroom. He goes on to say that Mrs. Robinson is a good friend. How good a friend can she be if she took sexual advantage of him as a child? And if Christian rejects the idea that his relationship with Mrs. Robinson is wrong, then wouldn’t it be his job to make sure Mrs. Robinson doesn’t come between them? The fact that Christian feels helpless and unable to control the situation with Mrs. Robinson only reinforces what we already knew, that she’s a creeper and Christian is her prey. So now Ana and Christian and Mrs. Robinson are locked in this chain of abuse. Mrs. Robinson has abused Christian, so Christian reacts to her as though she were an abuser, Christian is currently abusing Ana, so Ana reacts to him as though he were an abuser.

Christian’s dad wants to dance the last dance with Ana (I guess to pay her back for the under the table bad grammar action earlier in the chapter), and to feel her out to make sure she can afford the $24k bid she made during the auction.

“I’m delighted to be able to contribute. I unexpectedly came into some money. I don’t need it. And it’s such a worthy cause.”

He smiles down at me, and I seize the opportunity for some innocent inquiries. Carpe diem, my subconscious hisses from behind her hand.

How does someone “hiss” a phrase with no sibilant consonants? And you know, if my son was a billionaire, and his broke ass college student girlfriend was so casual about dropping $24k, I would be on full gold digger alert. Especially if I knew she lived rent free with a roommate whose parents have supported her financially all through college.

“Christian told me a little about his past, so I think it’s appropriate to support your work,” I add, hoping that this might encourage Carrick to give me a small insight into the mystery that is his son.

Way to carpe that diem, Ana, in a totally passive way.

Carrick tells Ana that he’s never seen Christian so “buoyant,” and that it’s clearly all Ana’s doing. He tells her that Dr. Grey was on duty when Christian was brought into the emergency room, and that he didn’t speak for two years after his bio mom’s death. Playing the piano was what made Christian start to come out of his shell, as did the addition of Mia to the family.

“He’s always been such a loner. We never thought we’d see him with anyone. Whatever you’re doing, please don’t stop. We’d like to see him happy.” He stops suddenly, as if he’s overstepped the mark. “I’m sorry, I don’t mean to make you uncomfortable.”

I don’t know if it’s that Carrick “overstepped the mark” or that the author just showed her hand. You know how when you start filling up a glass of water when you’re really thirsty, halfway is good, full is better, but it gets to that point that the glass is overfull and if you try to take a drink, you just get water everywhere? This chapter. This chapter is equivalent to exactly that. If one person had commented, “Hey, you guys make a cute couple,” I wouldn’t have noticed so much. If maybe one other person had also commented on Ana and Christian’s relationship, it would have still seemed like the characters were reassuring Ana that they liked her and her involvement with Christian. but somehow, when Carrick does it, near the end of a chapter that has been an endless parade of “You’re so good for him/you’re totally saving him just like you wanted to/you guys are going to get married and have babies forever!” I suddenly snapped and realized that this is the author trying to force the reader to accept them as a couple. “All these fictional characters think the relationship is love everlasting,” I imagine E.L. James screaming at the computer as she mashes two paper doll characters together in front of the screen, “so you have to, as well, reader! Because I say so!”

Well, that’s not how it works. Nothing really happens in the bulk of this chapter, apart from Ana showing up at this party and impressing everyone (making a huge bid, having a huge sum of money bid on her), and then having little side conversations with people who reassure her that she’s the best thing that ever happened to Christian. Even Mrs. Robinson, who does it in a jealous way, is moved to threaten physical harm should Ana ever bar access to her magic hootchie and its healing powers from Christian Grey. That’s the entire point of this chapter, in fact, to clumsily show the reader the magical power of the love between Chedward and Anabella without actually doing the super hard work of building their personalities and forging their relationship in an organic way.

What’s even more enraging is that once the dance ends and Christian comes back to claim Ana, this happens:

“I think my dad likes you,” Christian mutters as he watches his dad mingle with the crowd.

“What’s not to like?” I peek coquettishly up at him through my lashes.

“Good point well made, Miss Steele.” He pulls me into an embrace as the band starts to play “It Had to Be You.”

Just in case you missed it, reader, Ana is amazing. She charms or threatens everyone she meets, by virtue of being super duper awesome. And in case you’re still not getting it, she’s going to pretend false modesty in the vein of, “Aw, shucks, I know nobody really likes me, so it’s okay if I say they do,” and then a song about how fucking perfect she is starts playing.

This woman. This fucking woman.

I also want to take this opportunity to point out that before she dances with his father, Christian tells Ana the fireworks are going to be in five minutes. Then she dances an entire song (“Come Fly With Me”) with Carrick, and she’s now going to dance to another song and then start walking toward the firework display after the paragraph break. So, it seems like that would all take longer than five minutes. Nit. Picked.

Everyone takes off their masks to watch the fireworks by the dock, and Ana spots the security team:

Christian has his arm around me, but I’m aware that Taylor and Sawyer are close by, probably because we’re in a crowd now. They are looking anywhere but at the dockside where two technicians dressed in black are making their final preparations.

That’s right. Look everywhere BUT at the guys with tons of explosives. They seem legit.

Unfortunately, no one is hit with a stray firework, and it’s the most glittering and amazing fireworks display ever, obviously. The MC tells the crowd that the benefit has raised $1,853,000, and then Christian and Ana are ready to leave, to get home to more sexy times, probably.

He glances up again, and Taylor is close, the crowd dispersing around us. They don’t speak but something passes between them.

 Just heads up, I’m never going to get tired of using the telepathic conversation pictures. NEVER.

Taylor makes them wait until the crowd disperses, because he’s like, on high alert or something:

“I think that fireworks display probably aged him a hundred years,” he adds.

“Doesn’t he like fireworks?”

Christian gazes down at me fondly and shakes his head but doesn’t elaborate.

 OMG. You guys, Taylor is really coming together. I bet he was a Navy SEAL or something. OMG.

Oh, this is a good time to clear something up:

“You were quite overcome, Miss Steele. A most satisfactory outcome, if I recall.” He smiles salaciously. “Incidentally, where are they?”

“The silver balls? In my bag.”

Okay, so here’s the thing. Last recap, everyone was like, “What did she do with the balls?!” And I feared it would turn out like the panties thing, where I didn’t remind everyone in the one chapter that Christian still had Ana’s panties, and people were all, “How did her panties magically reappear?” I never mentioned it, because 1) I can’t reproduce every line of these books, that would strain the boundaries of fair use. So please, don’t use these recaps to find continuity errors. If there is a continuity error, I will probably point it out, unless I miss it, but unless you’ve read the books and found it that way, don’t be all, “She had these silver balls and they just disappeared!” Because then some anonymous commenter comes in (as they did with the panties) and claims that I’m purposely not excerpting bits of this book in an attempt to make it look worse than it is. Which is not the case. Actually, leaving out huge chunks of text makes the book more readable. And 2) I usually will only excerpt things that are problematic or move the story along. Ana putting the Ben Wa balls in her purse didn’t fulfill either requirement, so I didn’t mention it. So, you know. Just so we’re all on the same page here.

Mia wants Ana and Christian to stay for the after party, but Christian says they can’t, because they have a big day the next day. Ana doesn’t know what he’s talking about, but she goes along with it. Then Mia invites Ana to go to the mall, and Ana graciously accepts:

“Sure, Mia.” I grin, though in the back of my mind I’m wondering how since I have to work for a living.

I have to work for a living, too, Ana, but I can still grin. Seriously, how shitty is it to respond to an invitation with that thought? Way to belittle Mia, who is just trying to be friendly, by immediately thinking she’s lazy and too rich.

We can’t leave the party without one more reassurance that Ana is OMGSAVINGCHRISTIAN’SLIFE! and that OMGEVERYONEWITHAVAGINAISSUPERJEALOUS!:

“I like seeing you happy,” she says sweetly and kisses him on the cheek. “Bye. You guys have fun.” She skips off toward her waiting friends – among them Lily, who looks even more sour-faced without her mask.

 Lily was giving her the “You’re dead to me” look.
I’m going to include this next part, so you can play “Is It A Plot Point, Or An Entirely Useless Sentence” as we go along:

I wonder idly where Sean is.

Christian and Ana say goodbye to his parents, but not his grandparents, who, Ana must remind you, she does not care for:

Fortunately, Grace’s parents have retired for the evening, so at least I am spared their enthusiasm.

Ugh, I know. It’s so fucking terrible when people like you and behave in a way that makes you feel welcome. Guh.

As they walk to the car, Ana asks Christian what he means by “big day tomorrow,” and his answer (and her response to it) should probably turn you into a quaking ball of rage:

“Dr. Greene is coming to sort you out. Plus, I have a surprise for you.”

“Dr. Green!” I halt.

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Because I hate condoms,” he says quietly. His eyes glint in the soft light from the paper lanterns, gauging my reaction.

No matter how romantic the soft fucking light from the paper fucking lanterns is, I’m sorry, E.L., but you cannot make forced birth control sexy. I feel like I’m rapidly approaching that line between hating the book and hating the author as a person for all the terrible shit she’s feeding to women everywhere. How romantic, ladies! The hero of your dreams refers to going to the gynecologist as having a “big day” and thinks you need to be “sorted out” because your pesky fertility is interfering with his sexual pleasure. I’m so wet. Oh, that’s because I started drinking at about seven-o-clock last night and didn’t stop for breakfast because I’m in a state of alcoholic despair about the way women in the western world clamor to be treated like fucking livestock and we as a culture throw handfuls of money at the stupid jerk asses who feel that this is the romantic ideal, so I missed my mouth when I tried for that last swig of cheap wine.

Lucky for me, before I can have a moral quandary about crossing that book/author line, E.L. does me a solid and pushes me right the fuck over it:

“It’s my body,” I mutter, annoyed that he hasn’t asked me.

“It’s mine, too,” he whispers.

Oh, shit is that a rich white guy telling a woman he has ownership over her body? I would call Chedward a Republican Conservative, except he seems to like feeding poor people, so maybe he’s a Libertarian?

I gaze up at him as various guests pass by, ignoring us. He looks so earnest. Yes, my body is his… he knows it better than I do.

BECAUSE YOU’VE KEPT YOURSELF PURPOSELY IGNORANT! There are tons of resources out there for women to learn about their bodies, but you’re one of the women who apparently has no hinderance like a strict religious upbringing or prior sexual abuse or any of the other horrible circumstances that keep women ignorant of their bodies who simply CHOOSES TO BE FUCKING STUPID ABOUT YOUR BODY! BECAUSE YOU WERE WAITING FOR A MAN TO TELL YOU WHAT IS UP!

This book. This fucking book.
Oh, by the by? That’s it. That’s her decision. Immediately followed by Ana untying his bow tie and saying:

“You look hot like this,” I whisper. Actually he looks hot all the time, but really hot like this.

IT’S OKAY THAT HE WAS GOING TO FORCE ME ONTO HORMONAL BIRTH CONTROL GUYS, BECAUSE HE’S REALLY HOT ALL THE TIME.

They go to the car, and Sawyer gives Ana an envelope. Guess who it’s from? You know who. It’s from Mrs. Robinson:

I may have misjudged you. And you have definitely misjudged me. Call me if you need to fill in any of the blanks – we could have lunch. Christian doesn’t want me talking to you, but I would be more than happy to help. Don’t get me wrong, I approve, believe me – but so help me, if you hurt him… He’s been hurt enough. Call me: (206) 279-6261

She even signs the note “Mrs. Robinson,” meaning Christian told her all about his conversations with Ana. That’s probably healthy. But maybe I’m “misjudging” a grown woman who would fuck a child. I need the blanks filled in. Someone call that number, I’m dying to know if it’s a real phone number, but I don’t have the balls to call it myself, lest it be some kind of high-frequency mind control noise that will trick me into liking this book.

In case you were wondering if Ana really sees Mrs. Robinson as a rapist or competition, when Christian says he’ll deal with her on Monday, Ana thinks:

And though I’m ashamed to admit it, a very small part of me is pleased. My subconscious nods sagely. Elena is pissing him off, and this can only be good – surely.

Ana falls asleep in the car, and Christian wakes her up when they pull up to his building. Due to yet another grammatical error, Ana has a little conversation with Sawyer. Emphasis mine:

As we stand in the elevator, I lean against him, putting my head against his shoulder. Sawyer stands in front of us, shifting uncomfortably.

“It’s been a long day, eh, Anastasia?” 

I nod.

“Tired?”

I nod.

“You’re not very talkative.”

I nod and he grins.

“Come. I’ll put you to bed.” He takes my hand as we exist the elevator, but we stop in the foyer when Sawyer holds up his hand.

So, there you see some pronoun confusion. Sawyer is the last male character with an action before the dialogue, so it looks like Sawyer is the one speaking. But then we find out after the fact that it was Christian, and good thing, because I’m betting if Sawyer said he was going to put Ana to bed, Christian would have him killed. Probably by Taylor.

Ana and Christian find out that the tires on Ana’s Audi have been slashed, and someone threw paint all over it. Obviously, Leila did it, and now they’re concerned she’s gotten into the apartment. Well, everyone except Christian, who says, “She can’t get into the apartment.” Which is not true, because she did it before, when he was in Georgia. But whatever. The chapter ends with Ana standing in the hallway while security guards (their names are, I shit you not, “Ryan” and “Reynolds”) check the apartment for intruders.