Fifty Shades of Spade

Let's call a spade a spade, here. Fifty Shades of Gray is merely the effort of a morally bankrupt scribbler to sell mental slag to the slavering masses. Do yourself a huge favour and count yourself out.

I actually had my finger on the button to buy this book when something told me to check out its reviews. Wow am I glad I did. Not saying that every review is completely accurate and kind, because they sometimes aren't. One inaccurate or unkind review can sink a writer. I know from experience. But this is someone who has made it big. And there were many reviews, such that I got a pretty good idea of what this book contained.

Buying this book would have been like answering my doorbell on a dark night, expecting company, and finding instead a flaming bag of dung on my porch. The book had been so sensationalized and I've heard so many acquaintances say they've read it, that I nearly jumped. I'm glad I didn't. I should have saved my time as I did my money.

Why spend your money on something so malignant as S&M? There are far more books out there (mine included) which do not scrape away your humanity and leave you raw, bleeding, and soulless.

Find solace in something that will build you up and fill you with light and hope. Find something real and healthy. Find something to which to aspire. Fifty Shades will leave you empty and dark.

I'm personally looking for examples of beautiful love stories in which the characters truly love each other and demonstrate that fact in how they act with their loved one. I want to see them treat each other with respect and understanding (at least by the end, after the misunderstandings and speed bumps all good books need). I want to know that the woman involved feels like a queen after her guy leaves for the night, not a beaten down slave.

Beat-downs are for cage fighting, not bedrooms.

Immerse yourself in Jane Austen's layers and layers of wordplay. Find buried treasure in Shakespeare's sonnets and Mark Twain's comedic brilliance. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote far more than just Sherlock Holmes (fun reads in themselves). Sir Walter Scott and Rudyard Kipling are stellar examples, as are Dumas, the Bronte sisters, and Dickens.

If you want something more cutting edge, look to the huge and growing market of newer authors trying to make it in a cutthroat world against this peddler of smutty murk.

Your mind and time are much too precious. Fill them with treasure, not barf.