Fifty Shades of Grey was Erika Leonard's first novel. You might know her better as E.L. James, as that is the pseudonym that she chose to write under. For the purpose of this review, I'll review to her as E.L. So moving on. This was her first novel, so I was not familiar with her, of course. Doing a bit of research, I discovered that E.L. describes Fifty Shades of Grey as being her mid-life crisis, and all of her fantasies put down on paper.

I also found that she once worked as a television executive, and that she had two teenage children. She's also a British author -- which kind of explains why her dialogue for her American characters just seemed a bit off.

I didn't care much for her writing style. It seemed very juvenile -- to the point that I was shocked that she was born in 1963. Along with being juvenile, I also found her writing to be very redundant.

Her own personal website says that she is working on another love story. Good for her for becoming a well published writer, but I won't be anxious to purchase anymore of her books after reading the Fifty Shades of Grey trilogy.

When you to go read this book, it's important to keep in mind that this book is incredibly mainstream. They discuss it on the news, you can find it in just about any bookstore you go to, and chances are that you've seen people reading it in public. In fact, my very first exposure to this book was flipping the news on to see them talking about how this book was causing the sale of BDSM toys to increase.

Now, the fact that book is encouraging the sale of sex toys is kind of cool, but you still can't really expect a dark kinky sex story from such a mainstream book. If you open this book expecting to read something really dark, the chances are that this is going to disappoint you. On the other hand, if you've no exposure to the world of kink, this might be a nice introduction -- though the novel tends to leave out some important aspects of BDSM relationships (trust, for instance). But, to give you an idea of how intense this novel gets... the most intense, dark, kinky thing is when Christian hits Anastasia with a belt 6 times, after she asks for him to do his worst to her.

Serious BDSM lifestylers are likely to be highly irritated by this book. I'm involved in a BDSM relationship - albeit one that I'd describe as being "light" -- and even I found myself irritated by the way this book approaches BDSM.

Let's get into some things that really annoyed me about this book, and that may annoy you, too.

1. Christian Grey. Every time I hear women discussing Christian Grey, they seem to paint him as some romantic hero. A co-worker of mine recently told me that she wants to find her own Christian Grey, and a few of my clients have told me that they think they love him. To which I say.... seriously? There are times in the book when I do like Christian's character, but in general? He's a stalker. He tracks Anastasia down at her work, and shows up out of the blue. He immediately seems to be possessive of her, before she even agrees to be his. He uses her cell phone to track her location down, and shows up out of the blue. He even shows up to surprise her at a bar in another state, when she's visiting her mother. Sorry, ladies, but that is not romantic -- that's creepy. Let's not mistake stalking for romance, okay?

2. Anastasia Steele. Ana is in her early 20's, and she's a virgin until Christian. She is constantly battling with her subconscious and her "inner goddess." Her subconscious wants her to stay away from Christian, whereas her inner goddess encourages the relationship. Her general character just has a tendency to get very annoying.

3. The term inner goddess itself. It used over and over again in the book, and it makes me roll my eyes every time I read it.

4. The actual writing! Oh my god, the writing. It's repetitive, and it reads like a teenager might've written it.

5. The story seems to make it look like trust is not really an important aspect of a BDSM relationship. Ana tells Christian she trusts him, but she is almost constantly in fear of him. Christian knows Ana is unsure of their relationship, and though it troubles him, he continues anyway.

There are other things, too, but you get the idea.

I actually read this in e-book format, but I did have a chance to look over the book design. The book is discreet, though it's so well known that everyone will know just what you're reading about.

As I said above, there are things that really annoy me about this book. That being said, there are things that I did enjoy about it. There were a few scenes that did turn me on, and there are parts that made me smile.

As a result, I'm kind of throwing my hands up saying, I just don't know what to think about this book! In the end, I'm going to say that I think this book is worth a read as long as you know not to expect a great kinky novel, or a well written novel. There are much better novels out there, though.