Eva Bradley: Hot read found wanting

Okay, so fess up. Who's read it? And if you haven't, you're planning to, right? And if it's neither of these two you're at least wondering: what's all this?

And I'm not just directing this question at women. Men too seem to be well and truly enthralled.

Erotic romp Fifty Shades of Grey has broken just about every publishing record in history. And thanks to e-books, every unpublished record too. At the same time it has also broken all the rules about what good girls ought to be reading and broken a few long dry spells in slightly withered marriages to boot.

I'm happy to admit, I was as curious as the next slightly sheltered but moderately adventurous girl when I kept hearing about the new book that was whipping up controversy and comment over the water cooler and the airwaves.

In possession of a new e-reader and eager to try out the technology, it wasn't a hard sell to get me clicking the download button on the first of the trilogy about naive little Anastasia Steele and her manipulative and somewhat deviant billionaire boyfriend Christian Grey.

A lover of books, especially the sort that take me away from the humdrum of real life into a fantasy world where men on white chargers (well endowed with trust funds and, eherm, other things) are a dime a dozen, I was not unfamiliar with the concept of erotic fiction.

But even I began to blush as the unrelenting sexual trysts between Grey and his young minion got started and then for the next several hundred pages, didn't stop. Eventually, however, I did.

It may not be socially (or sexually?) acceptable to confess this, but just how much sex can any one person read about, regardless of its creativity, before it becomes a little boring?

Perhaps it is the English major coming out in me, but surely even the most adventurous of erotic fiction should at least make a nod towards good plot and prose?

Even when the sex is great, I've never known anyone to respond with "Holy Cow!" or "Gee Whiz!". And with barely a paragraph of plot development between each large chunk of long and steamy smut, reading Fifty Shades of Grey is both exhausting and boring at the same time.

Perhaps the author might be instructed to send the simpering Anastasia down the hall after her education in the S&M; room to a small space where some bespectacled old boffin could brush up her vocab skills before the next edition goes to print?

Although men the world over would heartily disagree, I know I'm not the first woman to admit that when it comes to sex, you can get too much of a good thing, whether between the covers of a bed or a book.

And although men claim to be reaping the downstream benefits of what their womanfolk are reading, I can't help but chuckle at the irony that - once again - the age-old excuse of "darling, I would but I'm reading a REALLY good book" must still be getting a workout.

Halfway through reading Fifty Shades of Grey, I gave up. They say those that can't, teach. Is it presumptuous to suggest those who won't ... read about it?

Although Mr Grey is undoubtedly an imaginative bloke, when it comes to what I get up to between the sheets, I prefer to write my own script.