E.L. James's Fifty Shades of Grey has to be the funniest thing I have read this summer. The erotic fiction that is setting fire to the best sellers list and ladies loins alike is amazingly bad. I read Fifty Shades to see what the hype was about and since I am a fan of erotic fiction; boy, was I in for a surprise. The book reads like a fan fiction, which makes sense since it is based on one.

The characters in the Fifty Shades series are probably the funniest part. The main girl is your stereotypical mousy virginal college student who the twenty seven year old billion(yes I said billion)aire falls for when she literally falls into his office. Thus begins their strange master/slave relationship. If you like unbelievable cookie-cutter fan-fiction characters, this is the book for you. The many different facets of Christian Grey's character just get annoying with time; he is perfect looking, loaded (self made billionaire), well hung, a lover of Casanova proportions, is trying to end world hunger by himself, and is also a troubled soul who is self described as being fifty shades of fucked up. I am not even going into his language skills, pilot abilities, live-in servants and amazing collection of cars. Anastasia is even worse to talk about.

Overall the book is amazingly cheesy; it is not great but it makes for a good poolside read on a lazy summer afternoon. Once you get over the writing, it is a fair story that is entertaining at least. Don;t expect super hot sex scenes since they are not. There is also almost no bondage in this book, a bit of being tied up and spanking but nothing super exciting. In all if you like cheesy, dime-store romances Fifty Shades of Grey is the book for you.