2. E.L. James
For some reason the smutty, S&M driven book trilogy has become immensely popular and has sold a remarkable 70 million books world-wide. Anastasia "Ana" Steele is a 21-year-old college student who writes for the student paper. She does a favour for a friend and interviews the wealthy, attractive 27-year-old businessman Christian Grey. From there, Christian plucks Ana from her plain old life and they start a Sadio-mastic sexual relationship. For an example of why James is so bad, just open up to the first paragraph of the first book. "I scowl with frustration at myself in the mirror. Damn my hair it just won't behave, and damn Katherine Kavanagh for being ill and subjecting me to this ordeal. I should be studying for my final exams, which are next week, yet here I am trying to brush my hair into submission. I must not sleep with it wet. I must not sleep with it wet. Reciting this mantra several times, I attempt, once more, to bring it under control with the brush. I roll my eyes in exasperation and gaze at the pale, brown-haired girl with blue eyes too big for her face staring back at me, and give up. My only option is to restrain my wayward hair in a ponytail and hope that I look semi presentable." That is just lazy writing, what a horrible way to start off with the book. It might as well say "I'm a plain and boring and have everyday problems but everything will be changed if I meet a man." What it does is set up the character, her dilemma and the solution to her problem. There is no subtly, just a ham handed introduction. This is high school level amateur writing. One thing you may notice, is that Fifty Shades of Grey has a remarkably similar plot line to the Twilight series and you'd be right! That's because E.L. James, who is a British T.V. Executive, originally write 50 Shades of Grey as Twilight fan fiction. In the original version, the characters were actually called Bella and Edward. Now, speaking of Twilight...