Bad Sex In Fiction Awards: ‘Fifty Shades Of Grey’ Not Nominated For Dubious Prize
Fifty Shades Of Grey may be the most famous erotic work of fiction at the moment but EL James was not nominated for the Bad Sex Awards.
According to Jonathan Beckman, the senior editor at the Literary Review, Fifty Shades Of Grey was not included because the Bad Sex Awards exclude “pornographic and erotic literature.”
The Guardian reports that JK Rowling’s first post-Potter novel The Casual Vacancy also missed out on the shortlist. The Literary Review received several nominations for The Casual Vacancy but Beckman said that Rowling’s effort didn’t meet the committee’s vigorous criteria. Basically, apart from a few “queasy moments” in the book, Rowling’s writing wasn’t bad enough to warrant an award.
But don’t worry, there was plenty of bad sex in fiction this year.
The annual award is given to the writer with the best (worst) description of sex in a novel. Beckman said that the award started “to draw attention to the crude and often perfunctory use of redundant passages of sexual description in the modern novel – and to discourage it.”
But after nearly two decades of shaming writers with the Bad Sex award authors are still writing extremely cheesy sexual passages. The award is akin to the Razzies for movies and has been won by some fantastic authors. 1993. Norman Mailer, Sebastian Faulks and several other award winning authors have won bad sex awards.
Here are the nominees for this year’s bed sex award.
- The Yips by Nicola Barker
- The Adventuress by Nicholas Coleridge
- Infrared by Nancy Huston
- Rare Earth by Paul Mason
- Noughties by Ben Masters
- The Quiddity of Will Self by Sam Mills
- The Divine Comedy by Craig Raine
- Back to Blood by Tom Wolfe
Here are some passages that earned these books their nominations.
#LRBadSex2012 “Yanking me forward by the belt buckle, fingertips grazing the underside at the top of my boxers, Abi’s lip confronted mine.”
— Literary Review (@Lit_Review) November 21, 2012
#LRBadSex2012 “He threw his arms around her ass and clung to her, upside down, as if to a lifebuoy.”
— Literary Review (@Lit_Review) November 21, 2012
#LRBadSex2012 “She is topped with melted apricot jam. It makes her shine. Beneath that: the spong gold, the give, the softness.”
— Literary Review (@Lit_Review) November 21, 2012
#LRBadSex2012 His ejaculate jumped the length of her arm. Eight diminishing gouts. The first too high for her to lick. Right on the shoulder
— Literary Review (@Lit_Review) November 21, 2012
