Did not finish at 16%, I chucked in the towel after the bar scene. I’m done, get this filth away from me.
Disclaimer: This is going to be a really rantDid not finish at 16%, I chucked in the towel after the bar scene. I’m done, get this filth away from me.
Disclaimer: This is going to be a really ranty review because I absolutely hate this book series, and the purpose of my Mother challenging me to read it, was just so I could actually pull proof from the book as to why I hated it so much… Hope y’all ready for receipts sips tea
I’m sure nearly everyone by now has heard of 50 Shades of Grey, the erotica series that outsold Harry Potter and started off as Twilight fan fiction from a dream that James had. I’m sure also nearly everyone has heard by now, about the countless police officers, psychiatrists, and such that have condemned this book, referring to Christian Grey as abusive, as a psychopath. My personal favourite? “If there were a fourth book in this series, Ana would be dead in a ditch somewhere and police would be investigating her murder.”
Let’s not forget the tons of rapes this book has inspired:
I could go on with receipts from real life, but lets get on with receipts from the book shall we?
First of all, James’ writing is pretty poor. Although it flows well enough, it’s not gripping in anyway at all. It sounds rather like a teenager writing her first ever fan fiction and I couldn’t stop rolling my eyes to the point I think I actually strained my optic muscles. It’s ganky and she puts too much detail in, and mixes long, professional words with shorter more formal formats that just put a bad taste in my mouth. Stick to one format and stay with it. Switching through them both makes it much harder to focus on the story, and to flow with it, and it’s one of the most infuriating things in a book and also such a rookie mistake.
Within the first eighty pages of this, I am disgusted. Ana goes to a bar with her friends to get drunk to celebrate graduating her course. Drunk, she calls Christian. He asks her repeatedly where she is, she tells him no and doesn’t tell him where she is. Shortly, as Ana is being forced into a kiss that is hinted very much to lead onwards to rape, Christian shows up. A man that rejected her, and she purposely did not tell him her location, tracked her phone, just because she was drunk… in a bar with her friends and for all he knew, was perfectly safe. Later on, the sentence that leaves a terrible taste in my mouth.
”You didn’t eat, you got drunk, you put yourself at risk.”
After Ana is almost raped by José, Christian tells her in more words, that it is her fault, because she decided to get drunk and have a good time. It’s the first time she’s ever been drunk.
E. L. James. Do you have a single ounce of women for women inside of your body, at all? She had a good time, she got drunk. It’s not her fault if someone decides they want to try and force her. It is never a woman’s, man’s, anyone’s fault for being sexually assaulted, or almost assaulted, in any way, shape or form.
And the fact she got saved because Christian decided to be a Knight in Shining Armour and track her goddamn phone when she purposely did not tell him where she was because she didn’t want to see him. Am I meant to fall in love with Christian at this point? Where he literally stalks her, just because he happened to stalk her and show up at the right time to stop the assault occurring? Sorry, that’s meant to be hot? Or sexy? Or a gentleman? No, a gentleman would have stayed away when she said, I’m not telling you where I am, I don’t want to see you. There were more than enough people in that bar to stop it from happening, and she had numerous things she could have done to get attention and get some help. Someone stalking her who just happened to show up at the right time isn’t a romantic knight in shining armour situation. It’s creepy as hell. If a guy did this to me, I’d kick his ass to the curb in seconds.
This is just after hitting exactly 80 pages. I’m already considering dropping it at this point, but forced myself to carry this on because I did make a bet with my Mom to read the whole book. Already at this point, it should just be renamed 50 Shades of Disgust.
And this is where I give up, sigh heavily, down a coffee, refill my coffee, pour in some whiskey, and try and black out to forget the memory of ever reading 80 pages of this. I've never actually felt sick whilst reading a book, and lemme tell you, I read a LOT of horror, a lot of stuff a lot of people couldn't bear. I can happily eat whilst watching movies such as Cannibal Holocaust. And here I am, literally gagging at the thought of this book, and trying to continue it because the mere thought makes me uncomfortable, thinking about a man treating my sister, my mother, my cousins, my aunts like this. I have literally thrown up thinking about a man treating the women in my life this way, at only 80 pages in. I'm done, I don't think I can read the whole series like my mom challenged me to....more
Emerson loses his phone. It doesn’t seem like too big a deal. But then, mild terrorist and racist posts start appearing on his Facebook page. Then, things start getting tense.
I wasn’t expecting this to be so good after reading another in this series that I wasn’t so keen on. I admit that, I went into this with some really low expectations.
First of, please, if you’re feeling suicidal, please talk to someone:
Samaritans (UK): 116 123 -- also for bullying, sexual assault, anything of the sort Suicide Prevention Hotline (US): 1-800-273-8255
This started off pretty vaguely. I was really bored with it, maybe because it’s currently one in the morning. I didn’t really like the idea of it, and the tone of this sort of annoyed me at first. But then, we’re introduced to a brand new plot point in this story.
The suicidal angle was treated with so much respect. I’m in awe. Honestly, I am in shock. The abuse of a child and the abuse of a girlfriend are also dealt with so, so beautifully and respectfully. I wasn’t expecting this at all. When I started reading it, I was taken aback and had to keep reading it over and over again. I have to wonder if John Choi has gone through something like this himself because it was all so true to life and so beautifully written, I have nothing but praise for him.
I never read the blurb for this so I had no idea what was going on, in all honesty. (I prefer going into books “blind” for lack of better wording).
Honestly I think this is all my review is really going to be about because Choi did it so damn well, I am in shock. As a suicidal teenager, I thank you, John Choi, for such a beautiful, inspiring representation of suicidal thoughts and suicidal behaviour. I also thank you for a beautiful, well written, true to life representation of a psychiatric evaluation, a hospital stay for a suicidal person, and the beautiful friendship between Max and Emerson. Personally, I needed to read something like this tonight.
Our characters are well developed, and I feel like I know them personally. There isn’t much that could be done about this at all, I personally can’t find any flaws. This is a stunning book – and I think a lot more people should read it. This has a really strong, and inspiring, message behind it.
You can read this book now on Netgalley - here – in return for an honest review....more
I picked this up years ago, after finding it on my mother's bookshelf. I was only around eleven at the time, and my mother snatThis was a brutal read.
I picked this up years ago, after finding it on my mother's bookshelf. I was only around eleven at the time, and my mother snatched it away from me, telling me I could read any of the other 'adult books' on the shelf but this one. She put it away in her bedside table and me, being the little brat that never did what I was told, began to sneakily read it.
I was totally taken aback by this book. Even as mature as I was at eleven, I had no idea such things like this happened in the world, which was strange, given my childhood. Dave's story has been one that has stuck with me for so, so long, and it still haunts me now, three years after reading it for the last time.
Every time I read this, I am struck with so many feelings. Deep sorrow. Pure anger. Utter disbelief. It's hard to believe a parent could treat their child like Dave's mother spent years treating him. I am angry. I am so angry every single time. How could she even do something like the horrendous things she does to him? How could anyone treat a human being, let alone their own child, like they are nothing more than scum on the bottom of their shoe? I have cried so many times in this book. Reading and rereading this. I have shed so many tears. The pain in Pelzer's writing is real. It reads quite disconnected, and I don't blame him, and I wouldn't expect a massive amount of serious emotion when recalling what has more than likely seriously traumatised him for life. But even with the disconnected writing, you can still feel the childlike confusion, the pain and the hurt. The anger at how he was treated.
I think it was the way this was written that really sticks with me.
First of all, it takes an enormous amount of courage to write a book like this, let alone to consider publishing it, and then to go through the long process of getting it published, doing tours, having to answer questions that are probably some of the hardest questions to answer in his life. This isn't even considering the backlash of the non believers, telling him he's made it all up for a good book and some attention. (That is completely ridiculous. The feeling in this book is real. I have no doubt in my mind that this was Pelzer's childhood.)
This book is just. Horrendous because of it's contents. The way his abuser treated him for so long utterly disgusts me and my heart bleeds for him, it truly does. Having your childhood completely snatched away really changes someone, and luckily for Pelzer, it changed him for the better (as seen in the third book in the series, A Man Named Dave.)
This book is one of those you wish you had never read, but want to read over and over. This is a definite book so many people should read. People need to understand such horrific things like this happen, and it could be happening in a family you know. This truly stuck with me, and reading it so young really changed me. I became a lot more aware and a lot more mature. I understood a lot more. It changed me for the better as well.
I give this book five stars, for the way it changed me, the feeling behind the writing, and the massive amounts of courage Pelzer had to go through to write and publish this book, and his series. I have so much respect for this man....more
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