Lighter Shades of Grey (15 page)

The Christian Grey scale of acceptable stalking behaviour

Covert installation of tracking software on phone =
who hasn’t?

Kidnapping woman you’ve met twice from a bar =
for her own safety. Totally cool

Finding out where she lives by means other than asking her. Twice =
How else am I supposed to
get her drunk
send her champagne?

Hacking into the airline’s computers and upgrading her flight =
a nice gesture

Turning up uninvited when she’s out with her mom =
I missed her, okay?

Finding out the address of a publically listed company =
I would never do that. Ever. Because that would be wrong

Conversations that would never happen

“Christian, could you interfere in my career please?”

“Of course, my beloved. What would you like me to do?”

“Um…”

A little late to the party

Kneeling by the door, I am naked except for my panties…Closing my eyes, I try to calm myself down, to connect with my inner sub. She’s there somewhere, hiding behind my inner goddess. (p484)

This is why you have no room in your head for your Inner Self-Esteem, your Inner Common Sense, your Inner Filter On What Comes Out Of Your Mouth, your Inner Ability To Control Your Facial Expressions and your Inner Sense Of Self-Preservation.

Christian Ties Ana Up And Puts Earphones On Her

Okay. A musical interlude. Not what I was expecting. Does he ever do what I expect? Jeez, I hope it’s not rap. (p487)

Ana, have you ever in your life managed to focus on the things that really matter?

Christian at the piano

Shrouded in darkness, Christian sits in a bubble of light as he plays. (p495)

What, like David Vetter?

Photo: Björn Söderqvist [flickr]

Ana is psychic

He looks naked, though I know he’s wearing his PJ bottoms. (p495)

So are his PJ bottoms rendered invisible in the right lighting?

Ana remembers something important

“It’s eight in the morning for me. And I need to take my pill.”

He raises his eyebrows in surprise. “Well remembered,” he murmurs, and I can tell he’s impressed. (p497)

Depressingly, I can actually see his point here.

Assault and battery

He…grabs what looks like a belt from the rack beside the door…

“…I am going to hit you six times, and you will count with me.”

[He starts hitting her. There is nothing erotic about it.]

…”Five.” My voice is a choked, strangled sob, and in this moment I think I hate him…

“Six,” I whisper…and he’s pulling me into his arms, all breathless and compassionate…and I want none of him. (p506)

Women of the world. Your hero.

For the first time in over five hundred pages, Ana makes a good decision

I have to go. That’s it…I have to leave. He’s no good for me, and I am no good for him. (p507)

Hell yeah.

I just have something in my eye

Tears course unbidden and unwelcome down my cheeks…Taylor holds out a linen handkerchief for me…this small discreet act of kindness is my undoing. I sit back in the luxurious leather seat and weep. (p513)

1. Technically, Ana, you already were weeping.
   

2. But you’re sad, so I won’t be too mean about it.
   

3. Oh, look, even I feel a tiny bit sorry for you now. He was a terrible boyfriend, okay? You did the right thing in leaving. You’d be better off with Kate.
   

Ana retires to bed. Probably for several months

...hanging limply at the end of my bed, is a very sad, deflated helicopter balloon. Charlie Tango, looking and feeling exactly like me. (P514)

I bet Christian’s private name for his penis is “Charlie Tango”.

Things that sound good until you picture someone actually doing them (11)

I grab [the balloon] angrily off my bedrail, snapping the tie, and hug it to me. (p514)

I prefer a teddy-bear myself.

Or a bi-curious friend of four years’ standing.

If only

The pain is indescribable… (p514)

And yet you’re describing it.

Aristotle is not pleased

Physical, mental…metaphysical… (p514)

1. Physical pain makes sense. The bastard hit you with a belt six times (damn it, every time I write that I feel like I ought to be coming round to yours with a cup of tea and a cuddle).
   

2. Mental pain also makes sense. You thought you were in a relationship and it turned out you were just someone to abuse.
   

3. Metaphysical, on the other hand, means “based on speculative or abstract reasoning”, and “highly abstract, theoretical, abstruse”. Your ass hurts because he hit you, and your heart hurts because you thought he loved you. Nothing abstract, speculative, theoretical or abstruse about that.
   

4. Still, two out of three ain’t bad. See? You only left him half an hour ago, and already you’re thinking more clearly!
   

Photo: zimpenfish [flickr]

If you’re feeling kind of sorry for Ana, I wouldn’t be too worried. There are two more books to come. And if it’s following the trajectory of the Twilight quartet, by the end we can expect to see Ana and Christian blissfully in love, happily married, raising rugrats and probably still having red-hot multiple-orgasm sex every six pages.

Let’s do a little more analysis of what we’ve just seen.

Oh my, holy cow, his pants are hanging from his hips in that way

All writers need editors. Editors make our books better. They point out the things we can’t see for ourselves, and force us to confront and overcome our very worstest writing habits. (For the record, my fatal errors are a guilty addiction to ellipses, and the Oxford comma.)

Unfortunately, once you pass a certain threshold of success, publishers seem to stop editing your work - after all, they know you’re going to sell in the squillions anyway. This is how the world came to contain the Quidditch World Cup and the opening ten chapters of “Under The Dome”.

And if you’ve made the big-time by self-publishing, and you only get picked up
after
you’ve become a huge viral success…well, don’t expect much editorial support to shield your literary crimes from the world.

Let’s have a look at some statistics.

Distinctive words and phrases

“Oh my”

Number of times Ana uses the phrase “Oh my”:
49

That gives an average per chapter of:
1.8

Or to put it another way:
Once every 10.4 pages

Wow. That’s a lot, isn’t it?:
Quite a lot, yes. But come check this out:

“Holy…”

Number of times Ana uses the construction “Holy…”:
147

That’s an average Holy Somethings per chapter of:
3.49

Which gives an overall average of:
One every 3.5 pages

Number of times Robin said “Holy Something, Batman” in the classic 1960s Batman series:
360 times

Which averages out at:
Three times an episode

Ana’s rate of “Holy”ing expressed as a percentage of Robin’s:
116%

(and the Batman writers were doing it on purpose)

“Crap”

Number of times Ana uses the expletive “crap”:
63

And the per-chapter average:
2.4

Put that into pages for me?:
Once every 8.2 pages

“Crap” usage expressed as a percentage of “oh my” usage:
128%

(and most critics agree that her “Oh my” habit is excessive)

Annoying habits

Eye-rolling

Number of times Ana rolls her eyes:
14

Number of times everyone else in the book rolls their eyes:
8

Ana’s eye-rolling frequency, expressed as a percentage of the frequency of everyone else’s added together:
175%

I’m starting to see Christian’s point

Lip-biting

Number of times either Ana or Christian bites Ana’s lip:
43

Average bites per chapter:
1.65

Another way to look at it:
1.7 times a day

Let’s hope she has a chapstick

Gaping

Number of times Ana gapes, jaw-drops or feels her mouth pop open:
23

Number of times everyone else in the book has the same experience:
17

That means someone in the book will gape at an average rate of:
1.6 times per day

(Just out of interest, when was the last time you saw anyone do this?)

Ana’s definitely the worst offender, though

Ana’s gaping frequency, expressed as a percentage of the frequency of everyone else’s added together:
135%

Ana’s gaping frequency expressed as a daily occurrence rate:
0.92

Ana Lurves Christian

Christian’s hair

So what’s the deal with Christian’s hair, anyway?

“Fifty Shades of Grey”:
repurposed Twilight fan fiction

Christian Grey:
Edward Cullen

Edward Cullen:
Robert Pattinson

Robert Pattinson:
Distinctive “Twilight” hairstyle

Robert Pattinson’s hair:
Object of cultic adoration for the Twiharders

Ergo Christian Grey’s hair:
Subject to obligatory fetishisation

Okay, glad we cleared that up. What does that mean for the reader?

Number of times Christian’s hair is mentioned:
43

Or alternatively:
1.6 times per chapter or once every 11.9 pages

(almost as often as Ana says “Oh my”)

Number of times Christian’s hair is overtly eroticised:
20

Well-hung pants

Pants that hang from hips. That’s palazzo pants, right?:
Well, I’d say so, yes

And this is sexy how?:
Hey, I just work here, ‘kay?

And here are the stats:

Number of times Christian’s well-hung pants are mentioned:
10

That’s not nearly as many as some of the other things:
True

But its utter ludicrousness gives it additional standout

Ana needs help

Blushing

Number of times Ana blushes:
127

Did I read that right?:
You did; 127, I counted

That’s a daily blush-count of:
5.1

Crying

Number of times Ana cries:
21

How long is the time-frame of this book again?:
25 days

So Ana cries just under once each day?:
0.8 times a day, yes. Which is a shame, I think

She’s as mad as a box of frogs, but she deserves better

The voices in her head

Number of times Ana engages in dialogue with her Subconscious:
77

Number of times Ana engages in dialogue with her Inner Goddess:
53

Making a total number of conversations with imaginary people of:
130 or 5.2 conversations a day

Total number of imaginary people living in Ana’s head:
4

(her “Inner Ray” and her “Inner Sub” are non-speaking extras)

Chances Ana is suffering from a serious mental illness:
Quite high.

Hearing voices is a sign of a number of mental disorders including psychosis, bipolar disorder and schizophrenia.

Ana’s relationship with alcohol

“I might even get drunk! I’ve never been drunk before.” (p54)

How much alcohol does Ana drink?

The action of “Fifty Shades of Grey” takes place over a period of just under four weeks. During this period, Ana frequently makes reference to drinking alcohol.