OUR FIRST TIME🤭… Reading 50 SHADES OF GREY! | Book 1 Review & Summary | Bonus Minisode

Guess What? It’s gonna be grey…

It is grey! It’s Fifty shades of May over here on the Besties and the Books podcast. Welcome to our spring mini episode series all about the extremely popular yet widely discredited book series: Fifty Shades of Grey by E.L. James. 

If you’ve been following along and watched our “Dark Romance Enters the Chat” episode then you know, we trace romance novels wayyy back to their origin so we can discuss what societal conditions helped to produce this canon of works mostly written by women, for women, with women’s stories, pleasure, and lived experiences at the center. We examine what influence romance books have had on literature and the publishing world as a whole, and then specifically discuss what impact Fifty Shades had on the genre! It just happens to be a BIG bonus that Ashley and Liz have never read it before. So this is all new information to us.

We think that whether you find these books problematic or not, credit must be given where credit is due. The fact that these books have been stigmatized, criticized, and repeatedly knocked down is indicative (we think) of a larger societal problem: misogyny. Because as a society, it seems we just can’t stand it when women are successful… or when they enjoy something. Whether it’s objectively “good” or “profitable” or not. 

Episode 1 covers book 1: Fifty Shades of Grey by E. L. James. The first five-ish minutes are spoiler free with our one sentence rapid star and spice ratings. Then we jam pack this mini episode with an entire plot summary in five sentences (with a special classical surprise!), discuss what our faves and fail characters and plot points are, our feelings, notable quotes, red flags, problematic elements, and end with a fun piece of Fifty Shades trivia.

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Check out these author interviews? ⬇️

We interviewed Callie Hart all about her NYT Bestseller Quicksilver! Watch it here! https://youtu.be/CED5s7qDBdQ?si=8xtIRO1IzX6Rsld4

Check the official Author Interview with Lindsay Straube of Split or Swallow! Now a Barnes & Noble & Amazon best seller titled: Kiss of the Basilisk!  https://youtu.be/fknhocSNIKM

Looking for your next murder mystery Romantasy? Preview This Monster of Mine with our interview with debut author Shalini Abeysekara! | https://youtu.be/dMoOSLW1vTE?si=n6z3RXxSutNXN2o

Shop bookish apparel worn in this episode!

Ashley is wearing: “I’m a Book Dragon” Clash of Tides tee from the Author Alivia Maar @livesbookshelf (Gifted in PR.)

Liz is wearing “Good Girls Read Smut” Crew by *Shop Closed* and “Praise Me” Tee by @darkanddisturbedshop | Use Code: VEGAN10 to save! | https://darkanddisturbedshop.com/products/praise-me-tee?_pos=2&_sid=a2aa935cf&_ss=r

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Chapters

• 0:00 Spoiler Free Intro
• 5:38 50 Shades of Grey Book 1 Review
• 8:38 Shades of Grey Summary and Deep Dive
• 15:40 Favorite and Least Favorite Things book 1
• 37:20 Unanswered Questions
• 40:07 Notable Quotes in 50 Shades of Grey
• 56:00 Red Flags in this Book
• 1:07:30 50 Shades of Grey Fun Fact!

Transcript

0:00

[Music] it's a big Welcome to the Besties in the Books podcast i'm Ashley and I'm Liz and today is officially the kickoff of our newest mini episode series hey Ashley hey Liz do you know what it's going to be it's going to be gray let's go guys that's right it's officially 50 Shades of May over here i We hope to rebrand your brain to be now 50 Shades of May 50 Shades of Gray it's going to be gray it's going to be May all those things that Justin Timberlake prophesized that was many years ago so good it's the best meme of all time it's literally the best meme of all time i especially like that he's mad about it now you know like it came out last year that he really doesn't like it so we're going to go that much harder guys yeah oh my gosh anyways well yes as we've said today is the day it is going to be the start of our fivepart 50 shades of gray minis episode series over here that will be debuting every Friday so make sure your notification bells are turned on just but just let you know anyways you may have noticed that our last fulllength episode was all about dark romance and the romance genre in general we traced it all the way back to some of its origins and we did a little deep dive on what works and authors we can credit with giving us this amazingly transformative genre that is mostly written by women for women with women's pleasure in mind h and that paved the way for dark romance to come onto the scene okay and then we talk about how dark romance changed the game was this iconic trilogy of Fifty Shades of Gray partially responsible for putting dark romance ideas into the mainstream and the main populace interesting interesting is it problematic can it be both positive and negative contributions to the canon we'll be releasing a mini episode like I said every Friday so stay tuned for that all three books we're going to be covering there are some spin-off books with alternate point of views we're not going to be doing those at this time but we will be doing a fourth episode that'll be a little surprise treat at the end and then of course our fifth episode just as we always do will be a full wrap-up of the books our thoughts and opinions and because there's movies involved with this series that has been released we will compare the movies as well we'll do a ranking too I think maybe like The Hunger Games because that seemed to be very people really liked when we ranked them so we'll definitely do that again oh can't wait can't wait so today we're going to be giving you all of our thoughts on book one so book one in the original trilogy Just Fifty Shades of Gray by Eel James so why are we doing this why are we doing this why are we covering this series so we cover a ton of romance here over here on the podcast so whether that's romanty dark romance contemporary romance we think it's hugely important and we never read these never neither of us nope nope so follow along if you're curious to hear our thoughts on all things Fifty Shades of Gray and read along with us on Fable over at Besties in the Book Club so check out our romance episode that Ashley was talking about if you're wanting to know more about the history of the genre why it's loved hated stigmatized and yet hugely successful and how we've managed to make it to a point in history you know where dark romance books like Fifty Shades of Gray can exist in the mainstream so as I said here in my notes what a day to be alive yes yes um and as per usual over here for these many episodes uh first fiveish minutes will be spoilerfree with our basic star and spice rating for you guys if you don't want the spoilers because I don't know maybe it's your first time reading them too uh but before we get into that we just wanted to say thank you so much for being here thank you guys so much for being here and if you're just now finding out that we're going to be doing this series and you're like "Hey wait i want to read this too or even reread it we got Fable chats going on right now and they'll stay up for the foreseeable future." So if you go to the Fable app which is free to download you can search Besties and the Book Club and there you will find a plethora of book clubs and buddy reads that you can join including of course 50 Shades of Gray and it is a hoot over there so if you want to see like some extended commentary that we have on each chapter and keep it spoilerfree you can check out that because it is the most active book club that I think we've had so far cuz there's a lot to say about each thing that pops up good bad and the ugly all of it in between so yeah definitely check us out there make sure you like follow and subscribe anywhere listen to your favorite podcast including YouTube we're hanging out over there live it's not a blank screen or anything we're just we're chilling with our books and the things that we love candles and stuff so chill candles yeah chilling with our candles also we're on Instagram and Tik Tok at Bessies in the Books podcast for some extended fun little content so we'll see you there or we won't see you another time we'll see you there gosh darn it come on over hang out oh okay so here we go spoiler-free one-s sentence review of 50 Shades of Gray book one in this trilogy do you want to kick this this off or do you want me to kick it off let's go ahead and uh let you kick this one off all right it's like Dirty Twilight and for that reason I'm obsessed with it four stars great and since you're our spice girl Liz what is the spice level of peppers how many bell peppers does this get okay I kind of struggled with this i gave it four spices and that was mostly there was a little bit of taboo content but like mostly it was for the frequency yeah okay interesting yeah i mean if I'm comparing it if I'm comparing it to like other dark romance because that's what I typically will do is like weigh the scales um within it scales of justice scales of justice within its own genre um for me I mean we'll get into this later for me it could be construed as taboo to some but on the scale of dark romance taboo it really wasn't in my opinion that out of the realms um but the frequency was often so I gave it a four but I did struggle between a three and a four but I settled on four interesting okay so I'll start with my spice rating then since I don't read a lot of spicy books um and a lot I don't I mean I think I've only read what would be considered a dark romance just a couple of other ones so coming from that side of things if you're more like me on that side I was struggling between a four and a five bell peppers interesting so because of the frequency the what would be in society considered taboo and you also have trauma that we're dealing with so Yeah that's where I toggle between so somewhere in there i don't believe in halfies so you're not going to get it from me no half bell peppers it's all nothing four or five so because I'm not well-versed I would say I would land on a four i trust Liz's judgment four spicy bell pepper there we go what about your What about your review okay let's refresh your guys's memory real quick here right Liz and I have never had this before we do come from a biased mindset coming into this book right but I let those biases go and I go into it with an open mind so I'll preface it by saying that however for me for me I'm going to have to go with three stars for Fifty Shades of Gray mostly because her inner monologue kept pulling me right out so it was difficult a difficult read for me for that reason and that is as much as I can say right now before getting into spoilers yep okay should we get into spoiler section let's go snap whip chandler chandler yeah that means spoilers are coming you guys go on get if you don't want to read or sorry listen to any spoilers go get to reading and then come back save it to your playlist come back another time and listen to our thoughts and opinions on this very um negatively thought of book i'm going to say yeah mhm yeah i want to say polarizing because I think for unfortunately you know even though I'm giving it three stars it had a lot of negativity which I don't know if it was deserved because for the reasons I don't like it it's very petty well yeah that's the thing that we'll Yeah get into definitely like uh does it deserve all the hate it gets cuz really in the grand scheme of things i don't know i I felt like it was pretty fairly benign but whatever we'll we'll get into that later you know okay so let's just start off with the five sentence summary i'm ready okay i'm ready to go let's go all right anastasia Steel is a clumsy and awkward yet smart and independent What is even happening you guys know what's happening a musical instrument is coming out that's like a legit violin though what oh you pillaged your daughter's collection for that right okay oh yeah of course okay i don't She's finishing fourth grade here in a minute i don't know how much longer I have access to a violin and so when I was talking to them about what musical instrument I'm going to use tomorrow my daughter said "Use my violin." And she taught me some notes just I can't wait i can't wait okay all right all right here we go so this miniseries shall feature a violin great for the minis so the five sentence summary guys are you guys ready i'm excited to watch i'm not classically trained and I'm probably holding this so wrong and she was so serious about it yesterday you look you look legit to me too legit to quit sorry Liz will you start from the top of that i'll start from the top i'll start from the top for you know continuity purposes yes of course someone if you're just stumbling upon this video and you're like "What?" Yeah yes you are seeing and hearing what you are seeing just subscribe it's fine it's going to be fine it's going to be fun and it's going to be great and it's going to be May let's go okay all right anastasia Steel is a clumsy and awkward yet smart and independent young woman who is just about to graduate college who meets Christian Gray the billionaire CEO of his own company and the commencement speaker for her school in a chance encounter where she steps in to interview him for her sick journalism student and BFF roommate Kate i'm trying to do it's going to be me can you hear it[Music] tell me you hear it no I mean I do because you told me that but otherwise I I'd have no idea what that was otherwise I got It's so entertaining i will let it slide it's so distracting oh my god that's so good okay okay watch me improve over the next four weeks though jokes on you guys okay they seem to have an instant connection which is fully realized when she helps with a photo shoot involving Christian for the student newspaper at which he asks her out to coffee still not fully convinced the super hot 27-year-old billionaire is into her Anastasia gets drunk for the first time after graduation and drunk dials Christian he comes to her rescue when her quote unquote friend Jose tries to kill tries to kill her like wait I didn't read that part of the book it took a drastic turn um tries to kiss her against her will it's so hard[Music] okay boom two great great okay they continue to date christian lavishing her with gifts like first editions of her favorite books a new Audi and a MacBook when he tells her they need to discuss his interests because he wants to be clear about his intentions with her[Music] it still does not sound like it's going to be May but it's getting better it sounds like Yeah good job good job okay uh Christian explains that he is a dominant which means his only interest in a relationship with her would be as a submissive no other strings attached per the contract he sends to her she reviews the contract negotiates it but recognizes it is not actually legally binding and does not officially sign it and says she's willing to try all of these things in his contract in order to be with him[Music] h that sounded better even if not tonally accurate yeah yeah but it did sound better it sounds like the little beginning of a song you're making up for us so that's great great just for you guys so that's four how you going to wrap this up Liz yep heat is on christian realizes Anna is a virgin so he decides to have quote unquote vanilla sex with her to start and seems to enjoy doing all of the typical boyfriend things in their relationship also so he says he'll try his best to give her more she's very into him and is mostly okay with the things they've done in his quote red room of pain so far but is still afraid of his dark side and wants to know how bad he can get before she commits so he punishes her by spanking her with his belt six times which traumatizes her to the point of breaking up with him i shouldn't be laughing sorry when you sum it up it's just okay nope nope great a round of applause going to be gray it's going to be great i mean honestly you like learned how to play the violin oh my god that's Liz's treat there you go guys there you go there you go a little treat for your ears i hope let it be known that the violin is way harder than it looks uh I mean it looks really hard it looks so hard it's so sensitive you have to be so careful okay oh my god back to our serious podcast oh yeah 100% because these books are so serious also let's just start with our least favorite and our most favorite parts okay let's just talk let's let's warm ourselves up before we start talking about you know the problematic nature of this book i guess I might be bringing up some problematic stuff right here right now i can't wait okay go tell us tell us all the things starting with our least favorite and most favorite part so my favorite part here's the the light happy version my favorite part is the Seattle landscape and the millennial core built into this novel because it's based in 2011 so I loved the like you know seeing of the Blackberry you know and its popularity iphones don't exist and social media doesn't exist so it's different and you hear you you know we talk about the fashion that she's wearing and stuff and it's just very nostalgic so that was like a those were cute little moments that I enjoyed and the Seattle I love Seattle so totally um and then talking more deeply into this these themes take it a little bit more seriously i do love how Gray encourages her to harness her own empowerment and her own pleasure you know and embrace that and talks a lot about letting go of that shame that she's grown up feeling around her sexuality so that's my favorite part okay least favorite part again superficially just her inner monologues and weird quirky sayings that she constantly says to herself and I have a list of words that I no longer enjoy because of this book so I can't wait yeah we'll wait for that and then um my other least favorite thing is it felt like and it doesn't necessarily mean that's what it is but it just felt to me that this book felt like it needed did to justify why Gray enjoyed the things that he did in the bedroom we'll say I'm trying we're trying not to use too many like triggering words to the algorithm because it'll get censored but um yeah I just felt like you know do we need you know it's you it was it's horrific so yeah but we haven't read the other books you know we don't know where those lead to where the things lead to but it just felt like he had to justify the way he was instead of just saying this is the way I am you know yeah yeah I I agree with you i didn't like that either it felt very like you had to be damaged to be into what he's into and that's not okay or at least that's how I feel like you should just be able to be into what you're into because you're into it like you it doesn't have to come from some terrible historical backstory you know what I mean well and it's not to say that people that have gone through those things like it's not there is a representation there there is a demographic that it probably does help but yeah I guess for a book that have gotten as popular as it did I just wished it was because the stuff that we read now you know the people that just enjoy it because they enjoy it so totally yeah it did feel like a weird justification at times i agree yeah but it's 2011 too so I tried to look at it from that lens as well yeah true so uh my least favorite part was finding out that Christian was abused in general but is in denial about it yeah yeah uh-huh i didn't like the fact that he's like "No it was it wasn't like that it was totally fine i was 16 and she's like I do like the fact that Anastasia is like "No no no." Yeah this lady is a predator and that's not okay literally yeah um so I did like that kind of counterbalance she didn't just like go along with it you know what I mean totally i thought that was good um my other least favorite part in a more light-hearted sense was "Girl what are you doing?" Like when she's like "He booked the extra seat next to me on the plane because he's so controlling and doesn't want anyone sitting next to me." I'm like "Girl that sounds amazing let him book the seat next to you so no one sits by you." Oh he wants his driver to pick me up and like take me places i'm like girl why are you complaining he bought me a MacBook he bought me a car like what is wrong with you you silly girl like just take the presents in this economy yeah seriously so that was definitely like she annoyed me in that respect because I'm like I get it you're trying to be like a strong independent woman but it's like you can be a strong independent woman and still accept the gifts yeah all about And for her it was trying to break out of those um that mindset of what is it it's as a transactional exchange as opposed to him just giving her gifts because that's that's his love language you know yeah I could see that like she didn't want to feel like she was basically being paid for sex exactly um but at the same time get over it get over it like literally get over it it's like one of those things where it's like you know and I feel like this this needs to be brought up because it's important to say and I was thinking about it earlier today when I was on my run because this is these are the things I think about when I'm running like men literally sell their bodies to physical labor to the military-industrial complex to you know what I mean but then the second a woman wants to quote unquote sell her body for anything it's like no you know what I mean so it's like I feel like that's also an important piece of that too where it's like if he wants to give you gifts and you have sex with him even if it's transactional or not like literally who cares you know what I mean like I get that you care but it's like that she cares but still I feel like there's a whole stigma around that that also needs to be kind of There is and I mean even with even if that mindset take the sex out of it of that that gold digger so let's say she was more concerned about that being perceived as that way i constantly anytime it comes up somebody's trying to say so and so is a gold digger and it's like this old man with a young hot girl and it's like that is just a different type of transaction he wants that too he's not going for her or maybe he is but for what we can perceive we can pass just as much judgment to him as we are her sure she's getting the money sure she's getting all these things want you don't think he's getting what he wants even if it's literally just a trophy girlfriend or wife even if it's not even anything to do with sex he is getting This is a transa everything's a transaction everything transaction so it's like if you're going to pass judgment on this lady for receiving gifts you better pass judgment on this man for giving them yeah well not only that but it's like I mean to go back to the gold digger comment mhm why are women always the ones who are pointed out for being gold diggers when they are you know let's say accepting money but men are never held accountable when they're extracting a tremendous amount of physical emotional labor from women that's also gold digging yep so yep hey there's that too anyways we digress hey the books like this get us to these conversations and that's why they're important yep it's very important mhm so my favorite part I just put Christian's Dom moments like in everyday life so like call it what you will I will not be ashamed things like tracking her phone to come save her upgrading her to first class and buying the seat next to her having her favorite foods ready and insisting she eat them buying her clothes like I don't know things like that to me like because of the fact that he's so upfront about who he is like I think that he is and he isn't and we'll get into that later but at least at this point in the book in the beginning when he's like trying to lay it out for her like this is who I am this is what I expect you can either engage in this uh relationship or not I'm laying it all out there for you um I appreciate the clarity i appreciate the honesty and I really like how he just he is who he is like I feel like yes it is very transactional but he's also not trying to hide that it's transactional yeah um and I just I like the fact that he just has that inclination to just like take care of her like that's nice what about characters least favorite most favorite my favorite character was her roommate i think it's Kate Catherine Kate Kavanaaugh roommate BFF i loved that she was grounding for her and it just felt like a very realistic character to me so I enjoyed her i did meet though where she was like "I'm a journalist i'm a journalist." I'm like "Please stop it it's burning my soul no one this yeah i mean honestly not there weren't a lot of characters that I loved so it was Slim Pickins to me personally um so my least favorite character was obviously Miss Robinson the Pedo so no so that's what I saved for that's also my least favorite part obviously my least favorite character and how he's still in contact with her he doesn't see anything wrong with it it's really unsettling it's really sad unfortunately I think these things do still happen in our everyday lives or people that are manipulated into thinking that it's it's fine it's fine she helped me become who I am or they or he and it's not fine it's not okay i do appreciate that anna Anna whatever it is um is pushing back on that and that might be his first time that he's had that and has had to deal with that maybe we'll see that in more books having to actually unravel that but yeah it sucks it's sad it's horrible and that's part of what made the book less enjoyable for me is because I don't know if it's the writing style whatever it is cuz obviously I read about traumatic horrible stories all the time but for me it just really pulled me out and made me sad for the whole situation yeah so I don't know how to like word it or phrase like how my feelings were maybe cuz I was blindsided i guess I just didn't see that coming i guess I just thought I was reading more of like a happy golucky you know frisky little taboo book you know as we say when it's like you know it's just this level that I wasn't expecting to have to like unravel so it took me out just straight out i wonder and just to like play the devil's advocate for a second or just like inquire because we as you said read books with trauma in them all the time right it's like one of kind of like the markers of like a dark romance um and even in romantic like a lots of times those people's origin stories come from a dark place um do you think that it bothered you more because it was in this case him that had the sexual assault history and it wouldn't have bothered you as much as it if it was her or do you think that it just like didn't matter just cuz it felt like it came out of nowhere i think because he hasn't been able to realize or accept that that was bad and that wasn't good and that person needs to be in jail you know and that he still has a relationship with that person because I've read lots of stories about other all types of people male female whatever that have this kind of trauma but I think cuz they know it's bad and they're trying to move past it and sometimes they still do enjoy these things of doing you know things the way they do in Fifty Shades but because they acknowledge that and I think because he's in such denial then it hurts me because because then I have to constantly ask myself does he like this because it is what you know for that reason or does he genuinely like it he hasn't had that moment yet to figure it out for himself either that we know of and so it's just really hard for me to read about you know you bring up a good point because I feel like one of the things that I kind of struggled with was the fact that he's so rigid about his uh contract we'll call it right we know it's not legally binding but let's just call it the contract but yet is so willing to negotiate the contract because of the fact that Anastasia wants to change change things which is in my opinion good but also bad because I think it goes back to what you're saying to where if he was truly I think because also this is not my lifestyle so I can only speak for what I know of this book if he was truly interested only in having this very transactional relationship with women um then I don't think that he would be so willing to compromise it so that leads me to believe that perhaps it is not the only way that he would like to exist but that's just what he knows and that does make it problematic for sure exactly and I think subconsciously that's those tones are coming up to me as I'm reading it because yeah I thought about that like oh that's great that he's compromising but then wait why is he compromising so easy you know yeah it's almost like he hasn't been given a chance to explore what he really likes because he was taught this as his first time and if you know this is a very touchy subject so this is trigger warning for anybody who can't listen any further it's okay if you have to go we're not going to get too in depth here But there are things that happen when this happens to somebody that creates a trauma response you know in people totally and how they process relationships moving forward and it's just really sad that this character hasn't been given the chance to figure out what they really truly like so yeah going back to it could be something he truly likes or maybe not cuz yeah he's willing to be the boyfriend also now which nobody has ever given him any push back before so this is the first person it sounds like who's been like "Wait wait whoa whoa whoa hang on." You know and he's slowly opening up and peeling the layers which we will we'll see how that unfolds because people sometimes don't react well to that obviously and totally sometimes they are receptive so yeah it was just it was difficult you know and people change too so it could be as simple as that he is in consistent I think like weekly therapy so we don't know how much about Yeah yeah or if the therapist is even it might be Mrs robinson's freaking suggestion you know what I mean that he go to this person so we don't know the details yet um but I think that that's a good point that you bring up too because I did notice that he was very like easily wavered and I feel like if that's truly like how you want to live your life then you wouldn't so easily compromise but maybe not i don't know like we'll see future future books will probably tell us more about that yeah what about you so for my least favorite character least most favorite character yeah i'm like what are we doing where are we uh my most favorite character was Christian hands down nice um I mean I you know one of the things that I loved that I didn't talk about as my favorite part is the fact that it's so similar to Twilight like literally it is so dang similar like sometimes you're like "Oh like with the him saving her from a bike accident as opposed to the car accident or like you know what I mean it's just very like parallel." Um so I like that a lot so for that reason Christian was definitely my favorite because yeah he's just a little bit more scandalous version of Edward in my opinion at this point anyway yeah I could definitely see the fanfic coming through with adjustments because they're definitely Bella and Edward um like so much so that it's like I wish Bella's monologue in this so Anna was a little more mature it did feel very adolescent at times immature at times that it was just kind of like okay she's supposed to be like 22 at this point like get a grip and so that for me that's really what brought the three stars down was just her internal monologue i struggled with and this was a book that I really had to motivate myself to pick back up cuz I wasn't having the best time we'll see like as books go on if the stars can go up for me it just depends if some of these issues are solved including her inner monologue um and then uh we also have Jose Jacob i actually loved that she really painted him the author as like fully anti-team Jacob this is funny yeah i mean I that's what I put under because I don't want to use the same um character that I disliked the most so obviously I dislike Mrs robinson she's basically the only villain at this point right um but I also put Jose i don't like Jose and I could not stand Jacob either this was perfect it wasn't like a Jacob redemption story so that was good no no i was like "Oh here he goes gross." I'm like I immediately dislike him um but yeah to go back to almost the same even that was crazy totally yeah I really liked that part actually too yeah I just I like the parallels a lot i find it really amusing and I think that makes Anastasia's inner monologue more palatable to me because to me it's almost like I'm reading Bella um although you know in the group chat Renda brought up a good point that it's like and I think you know cuz I can find myself being like this and so I think that it makes it slightly more relatable for me i tend to not be able to convey my ideas very clearly or concisely verbally um but in writing I usually can and so I feel like that comes through a lot in this book because she sounds like a completely different person during their emails yeah um and so that to me made a lot of sense and while her inner monologue is very cringey for sure at times um and then the way she talks to Christian is pretty cringey at times it's like I almost kind of like relate to the fact that like okay I see you're kind of not super eloquent but then yeah when she's writing those emails it's like she's a completely different person and I like her a lot that's true so and also you know even though she's not a teenager she is still really young and I think that's part of the issue is like both of them are I mean he's older but not by much they're both pretty young still too um so they're figuring it out yeah i wonder if that's why I didn't have a problem with the emails cuz I usually hate reading books with text messages and emails but it was fine because of the way they were talking it was fun it was fun i liked the emails so it was like witty banter like I like it was more we got to know them more through their emails than being in person yeah and I think that just comes from the fact that she's probably super intimidated and shy and she hasn't dated anyone really you know um and he can and he can back it up like you know what I mean it's like that's the thing is like he's actually super ridiculously successful and accomplished and so that has to be intimidating stepping into that world especially from someone who's completely inexperienced so I could see that so how did this book make you feel icky yeah uncomfy cringey yeah what about you though uh I loved it yeah that's great i'm happy for you it made It just made me feel totally like enthralled in a very simple story like you know that's like there's not very many books that like I can do like quote unquote after dark reads you know like and I feel like I was just able to kind of like float away into space and just read 50 Shades of Gray and just have a good old time you know what I mean um so I loved it for that reason it just made me feel like it was easy on the brain after coming off of uh Hunger Games you know it was just like something that I could just kind of chill and and read and laugh at also because because there is so many like cringy things about it just try not to take it too seriously I guess see that's the thing though is like I didn't want to take it seriously but then we had this like really serious situation that was happening that for me was like I'm just trying to have a good time you got to ruin it i think you know and it might just be the author's way too of trying to make him a more complex character um because he's so unwilling to divulge information about himself at this time you know what I mean uh what about unanswered questions you want to know more about at this point i want that girl to go to jail so you know that's the main thing yeah i mean we want to know more about his history you know I just want to see what happens next kind of what about you yeah yeah un unanswered questions no not really you know what I mean it's like I feel like there's not really too much mystery going on here um but yeah I just I want to see what's going to happen you know I've heard from a couple people who have reached out that he goes more in the direction of like how to say this like he gets softer like he want he just falls madly in love and gets softer and I'm like that's sweet i don't like that i'm like great i like him how he is now is he going to like start icking me out if he turns into too much of like a boyfriend figure so we'll see how it goes but I'm just enjoying the ride like literally that's it i'm not thinking too hard into it i'm just enjoying it for what it is yeah so then would you say you're excited for the next one oh yeah for sure great mhm yeah i had to pause because I flew through the first book super quick i had to pause because just of our filming schedule and like book priority schedule um to read another series in the meantime so I have it on the back burner but I would be lying if I said that I wasn't thinking about it often there you go like wondering like what's going to happen i'm excited to read it i'm assuming for you you're like whatever like could probably go either way i'm not excited but I'm going to do it for you guys i mean at this I sure I will have a little bit of curiosity moving forward but it's just uh her inner monologue just drives me nuts so it's just hard for me that's all that's the main thing i can't remember did Bella's inner monologue really bug you no it was fine but to me I could justify it she was in high school so it was like if this is Bella because Bella started really maturing towards the end you know of Twilight so obviously this isn't supposed to be a continuation fanfic it's more of a retelling as older consenting adults so it's just I don't know it's just hard it's hard so sue me like I just couldn't stand her but no I loved Bella so yeah you know that's what I thought yeah i liked the little homages like the music playing a role you know things little little he plays the piano with his long fing oh golly gross we'll talk about that in a sec okay do you have any like notable quotes that you highlighted or just like cringy quotes you know I just couldn't bother with it anymore i kept reacting in the fable chat so you guys can definitely go there and check some stuff out but um things that I hate I'll say okay cuz this is a quote as it is i don't know what you call these saliloquies whatever yeah I So I now really hate long fingers and that Oh my god cuz she says long fingers all the time all the time not big hands and Liz and I talked about this in a recent episode it's long fingers and I just think of salad fingers the little YouTube meme of millennial years oh I couldn't stand it and the most So then what took over the hate for that i don't know which one I hate most match of past you got to choose one um inner goddess where this weird turn that happened on chapter I don't know 20 19 where it became Lizzie Maguire okay in not a fun way so you know Lizzie Maguire comes up with the cartoon character all the time in the show and so that's what I never watch that show i don't watch Lizzie McGuire wow the more you know learn the new things about your best friend every day okay so Lizzie Maguire has her character it's like the It's almost like the the good angel the bad angel you know but it's just one personality so it's like a cartoon Lizzie Magcguire that comes up and like talks her through it and like narrates stuff mhm and like would be like mad on screen when a best friend's talking to you and getting lying about something so the little character is all mad and and the way she's describing it is exactly like that so I just imagine like a cartoon version constantly during these intimate moments and I'm just like I'm out again i'm like okay this is fine everything's fine cuz I'm fine with all the stuff that was going down until she starts oh my inner monologue is screaming i even hate saying it i want to throw up okay yeah no it was super cringey to me too but what's funny about that is that cuz I I thought it was monologue that I talked to all the time no little the whole Yeah oh my god imagine no the the goddess thing i hated it for sure but Rinda liked it that's good good for you guys that liked it because it didn't ruin it for you like it did for me yeah i mean I didn't like it at I didn't like it at all well I kind of figured it would be cringey to like everyone but then literally Rinda commented repeatedly in the fable chat that she really enjoyed it so look at that there's something for everyone yeah there is you know and we're not here to yuck anybody's yum like the inner goddess for me it's a pass yeah Cass for sure yeah any quotes that stuck out to you um okay so there definitely was like the long fingers thing was really getting to me for sure because it's so many times so many the other thing is she says "Oh my" all the time and I'm like literally just oh my like why like who says "Oh my." Oh and then so the author also did this thing where I think she would discover a word and then she would use that word for the next like two or three chapters and it would be like a awkward word like endeavor i couldn't endeavor to explain myself and then it came up and then it never did again you know it just felt like interesting it made me like weird words that would just come out of nowhere and then be used and then disappear again that's how I felt about the word beguiled yes that was another one that did it yes that one was like through the whole book though it was like I was beguiled by him so many I'm like this is literally not the 17th century i don't understand what's happening right now who says beguiled anymore it was those like unusual words that were put in regular speaking that didn't make sense so it took me out like it lost its it was like a Joey with a thesaurus situation yeah it's like are you just a cringy young naive girl or like you are and you're just trying to sound smart every once in a while but then even him too it was the same thing with him like he would just be talking normally and seductressy and then he would add this random word in there that just didn't didn't fit yeah didn't fit yeah um there was that uh there was the infamous toothbrush situation which literally had me crawling out of my skin there is nothing more gross to me than using someone else's toothbrush yep okay yep it is a nogo it's not okay it's a hard line and like literally she says something to the degree of like I'm sure I like highlighted the quote but I don't know what it where it is but she says something to the degree of like "Oh I eye Christian's toothbrush it would be like having him in my mouth." Nope don't like that and then he even brings it up later later on he says "You can use my toothbrush." And listen I know some people don't care some people like it we don't m we do not uh glancing guilty over my shoulder at the door I feel the bristles on the toothbrush they are damp he must have just used it grabbing it quickly I squirt toothbrush or toothpaste on it and brush my teeth in double time i feel so naughty it's such a thrill i love that this is the quote that you want to discuss that stuck out to you okay it stuck out to me so much because I just Okay it's like multi-layered because it's I find it really personally I find it gross okay whatever but then there's also this element of like she feels so naughty cuz she used his toothbrush oh my gosh the bar is low yeah the bar is low the bar is low so that cracked me up for sure uh you know me and my husband were laughing pretty hard because there was a point in time where they're just having a normal conversation then she just slips in i love ships i love ships it just like came out of nowhere i'm like "Okay that was so weird." And I even like read it out loud to my husband to make sure I wasn't just like imagining that it was weird and he was like "No that was weird." I'm like"Okay." So yeah just like silly things like that there was the whole like lip biting thing like "Oh constantly." We get We get it she bites her lip and it turns you on cuz all the time he's like "Stop biting your lip stop fighting i'm like "Oh my god I can't with you." Um but yeah no there was I mean there was definitely a lot of cringy moments for sure but I feel like that just made the book more kitsy and funny to me like at the end of the day um so yeah I really enjoyed it i'm trying I'm looking through my quotes to see if there was any like actual serious ones that I highlighted and there was so many just corny ones taking up all of the space that I don't know I have this one if you want to do a more serious one it was Gray's first red flag for me that was on the red flag list so we'll see and like real life red flags not main character red flags cuz those are totally different okay if a real man if a real person said this to me okay gray says "I don't have a philosophy as such may be a guiding principle." Carnegies "A man who acquires the ability to take full possession of his own mind may take possession of anything else to which he is justif just justly entitled." A very singular driven i am very singular driven i like control of myself and those around me so you want to possess things you are a control freak i want to deserve to possess them but yes bottom line I do yeah it's a very like outroach or approach I feel like to the world and he's also very upfront about it though so you got to appreciate that he is see I think that's why it doesn't bother me because I feel like for the most part he is laying it all out there for her to make her choices that she sees fit like he's not I thought we were going to get into this book and the reason why it was so problematic is because he was going to be manipulative and um you know yeah covertly controlling and all this kind of stuff it's like no I literally am giving you this Yeah i'm totally fine with this paper that has all the information on it take it or leave it you know what I mean um so I I do like it for that reason cuz I do not feel like he's manipulating her at all at this point i mean he might be secretly if we don't know but at this point it seems like he's not yeah we're back but you guys didn't know we were gone hey what's up again uh Liz and I couldn't finish the episode cuz life gets in the way you know so we're back here later and you wouldn't know it by listening to us but if you're watching YouTube video you might be like "Hey what?" Well that's why it's a different day so it's a brand new day here we are nothing's getting in my Okay but like a lot but like a lot got but a lot it's been like two weeks in the way but that's all right we're back and that's what's important so we just finished up our quotes as you guys you were listening you know um so we're going to be talking about some positive and negative contributions to the canon mhm yep so literally all that I put in this section was that at this point I would say that it has contributed both positively and negatively to the canon um I think that you know this book is a lot more benign than I thought it would be truly yeah um you know it has some problematic elements but like really if you go into it thinking that it's going to be a quote unquote dark romance or even just a contemporary romance with some dark elements like uh there's very few things that are actually related to the spice specifically that would be triggering or controversial I feel like at this point in time reading it in 2025 um that's why I think like it at this point I would say that it's probably a pretty neutral contribution to the canon in that way but also positive in the way that it it made this type of romance a lot more mainstream yeah i'd be curious to find out from you know our authors out there who write dark romance how many were like inspired you know to start writing or felt like the space was more accepting of it you know somebody kind of at one point whether it have been this book or some other book that didn't do it somebody needed to come on the scene to kind of normalize the dark romance genre even if even though like we said I mean by today's standards you know 101 15 years later it's not that dark but it had something had you know it's like what we talked about in you know our dark romance enters the chat like introductory episode you know women have been paving the way i say women because it's been predominantly women have been paving the way in this genre for literally hundreds of years if not longer than that and so I think we have to look at it in that way like is this perfect no not by any stretch of the imagination is this perfect um is this winning the Nobel Prize no um however I I mean it reached a huge audience as we know and you know I think that we do have to give the credit where credit is due somewhere because it opened a lot of doors I think exactly exactly yeah and I don't think honestly at this stage in the game and we'll talk about it a little bit more like moving on to our like little critique section we're going to do here in a second I don't think that it's like overly problematic i think it's just kind of like okay but that might also be our 2025 eyes looking at it you know what I mean like maybe it seemed more problematic back then yeah yeah i mean I just you know we've talked about at this point now that you guys know it's been two weeks later i don't know when was it this episode was it the you know the kickoff episode where we talk about dark romance as a whole um but you know it was heavily parodyied made fun of but at the same time it was I think it was very liberating you know we have here as a question problematic or liberating i think it it must have been from what I see like I said I s saw a lot of ladies walking around with that book you know had to have been liberating for a lot of people and maybe they just weren't they didn't want to talk about it though you know I think that's what it could be is maybe more of this like societal it's like both right it's like a societal permission to to read something like this right like it's acceptable be on one level because maybe you know that a lot of your girlfriends are reading it your co-workers are reading it your acquaintances are reading it so that kind of like normalizes it right but I think mainstream it was still a little bit like on the hush hush for a lot of people um so I think it's kind of both it's like yeah I do think that it was probably liberating to a lot of people i don't know that many would have probably gone around exclaiming like we are that we were reading it back then but hey maybe because of the fact that there's books like this now we're able to talk about it on a podcast like think about it like that now we have books like Lights Out you know that the sprayed edges talk about the handle scene you know they allude to that and that's just at Barnes & Noble so by introducing something like this it opens the door to be able to have more creative freedom and push the envelope even further yeah so it's like agree or disagree with the content like you know I think that's like any book very subjective but I think you know maybe if we look at it more from that like objective like copies sold aspect you know how many people it reached aspect I think in that way it could be very liberating to just open a lot of doors in the genre in general well and I got to say what's so interesting as people who only kind of saw a little bit of the fandom regarding Fifty Shades at the time but not reading or looking into it i thought this book was about something totally different you know like Yeah me too not totally different but like this none of this stuff that we've read was I didn't think was going to happen at all you know i thought honestly I thought this was a like boss and employee situation so I wasn't looking forward to that cuz I don't personally like that dynamic and you know kind of that taking advantage and like literally the way they made it seem like this book was literally all sex you know so I was like this is a lot of pages for that and it wasn't like there's a big story line and obviously it goes in a direction I didn't think was going to go at all so and we'll talk about that in future episodes but yeah I mean honestly after reading after reading this I would just categorize it more like a traditional contemporary billionaire romance like yes that's what it is exactly i just thought Yeah I thought it was going to be so much darker and the only dark thing about this we've talked about in this episode is you know the unhealthy and it bad relationship that he was with with the pedto so which that's the only thing was bad yeah that's just that's dark and that needs to be dealt with coming off of that I mean do we have any like specific red flags about the characters because I feel like that was one of the things that I was really concerned going into this book is that um I was thinking oh the dark part about this is that Christian's going to be a bad guy like he's just going to be a really bad guy and I think we're used to morally gray men obviously in most of the books that we read at this point in time so that's nothing new but I kind of got the sense that this was going to be more it was going to lean more towards like the thriller kind of bad guy where it's like he's actually a bad guy yeah at least you know for this book that was the feeling that I had too so I was writing down all these red flags like saying thinking that these are all like I'm you know trying to outsmart the book trying to figure out like these all the signs were there lady but it's like I literally stopped writing them down cuz like oh no he's just a normal dude who likes some kinky stuff you know so I don't need to write these down anymore i did like he smiles but the smile doesn't touch his eyes boom sociopath i did i wrote down shows up at her place of work and buys what could be murder items you know cuz he buys like rope and stuff and she isn't like thinking these are red flags but I'm like although this was this did creep me out but whatever um you know he runs his finger down her pigtails and says "You look so young with me." I did not like that i hated that that was gross i didn't like that either sorry I said gross if you're into that and it's two consenting adults it's not gross okay it's not for me it's not for me yeah well I don't like it when it alludes to being like underage so that's where I draw the line it seemed like That's what I draw the line totally so cuz she already is young she's like 22 right 23 so uh it's like how much younger can you look then so that's what grossed me out so those little things yeah those kind of things are problematic but as far as like just being Yeah more of a dark romance it's like okay I stopped writing stuff down i think that was like halfway through the book cuz I'm like "Oh he's just a dude he's just a billionaire." Yeah well well this is what I put though and okay now that I've finished the series it's We'll talk more about it moving forward but I was on to something for sure um so I put red flags i put his mood swings and his temper that are caused probably from unresolved trauma and emotional immaturity yeah so red flags more so like well you'd really have to like weigh weigh the pros and cons like well he acts like an angry teenager but he's a billionaire so you win some you lose some you know what I mean um and then I put Anna's frontal lobe is obviously not fully developed i also put that um as a red red flag they're just it's a young relationship though i think that's the thing is that both of them you know he's older i think like 6 years older or something like that but they're both in their 20s like they're figuring it out um so while those are red flags it's also like okay well it's like red flags from any of the relationships any of us have been in our early 20s you know yeah exactly exactly um okay so do you have any critiques either from yourself or from you know that you looked up or whatever about specifically this book book one Fifty Shades of Gray like any major critiques yeah i mean I just I didn't like the relationship that Gray insists on having with the the lady um Miss Robinson yeah yeah um that's my biggest critique we've gone on on I think in this episode about it is like you don't you don't need to have a trauma story to enjoy different types of things in the bedroom so that's my but you know it is a choice so hey yeah and at this point we don't really know where that's going either you know what I mean like what's going to happen with that um okay so I personally I looked up because I feel like we've talked a lot about what we our issues with it um I looked up what the critiques were about this book from like just I don't know mass media just the ones that are floating around out there i read I don't know probably like at least fiveish artic like random articles online about people not just like personal blogs but like actual articles um that were criticizing it for normalizing domestic violence um and so you know take this all with a grain of salt i'm not saying that I necessarily I don't agree or disagree with anything that I'm saying i'm just presenting you guys with the information cuz I was curious like what you know why this got so much hate from like an opposition and criticism negative criticism yeah so the two things were that it normalizes u domestic violence because it's not actually characteristic of a BDSM relationship so it's actually physical and emotional abuse so that's the argument i mean reading the book one just speaking on that one huh cuz I would have thought that too not ever reading the book that is what I thought it was going to be about and it wasn't at all like hello they have a contract that he's willing to negotiate on what like it's not the same i think that there are definitely some people you know as I was reading these things that read it and this is truly how they felt i feel like a lot of people just kind of jumped on the bandwagon without properly doing their research i.e reading the book and gaining their own like insight into what it was really about i mean really when you lay it out just uh black and white right it's a contract which means that anything that she engages in is very black and white consensual there's really no better way to make sure that someone's consenting to something than have them look over a contract line by line discuss it and then decide if she wants to sign it or not it's Yeah that to me is very straightforward and in that way I don't really know she wasn't I don't feel like she was coerced yeah agreed um you know because you could argue okay well she was coerced into signing it i don't I don't think so because she doesn't even sign it like they negotiate it and figure something out that works for both of them so anyway whatever we're going off on a tangent but the argument is that uh this relationship that they're in is manipulative controlling possessive he's jealous he has angry outbursts he's demanding he punishes her with sex uses sex to control her he needs her to obey him he dominates all of her time tries to control how she meets with her friends wants her to not work uses punishment through sex which turns him on and manipulates situations to keep her quote unquote safe with safe without her knowing that he's doing it so these are all the things where it's like I feel like on a surface level it can look it it's like I feel like I'm defending it it looks bad it looks bad no but I mean but it's not it's because you have you read it and you find out it's not any of that i don't know yeah it's I feel like it's two young people fumbling through a emotionally heightened early relationship trying to figure it out and this just so happens to be a sex thing that one of the people is into that's literally it so I don't think he's intentionally I mean yeah he is some of these things right he is controlling possessive and jealous like he does have angry outbursts like but I don't necessarily know that we can equate that to him he's not doing most of it intentionally i know that doesn't always matter but I don't really think that he's also a bad guy you know what I mean but I wouldn't necessarily say that he's not those things but he's also very upfront about being those things yeah so it I guess it puts you in a gray area but as far as this book goes we're not really seeing we're seeing like a little bit of towing that boundary finding out where she works and showing up like those red flags but we're not seeing any DV situations at this point and anything crazy so I would agree with that i don't Yeah I I would say that at this point in time everything that he's doing I mean maybe that's the thing too is like uh yeah okay he might be controlling because he's like "Hey you have really weird eating habits maybe try eating breakfast sometimes please." Like that's what he's doing to be controlling like making sure that she's eating making sure that she's safe from you know her creepy boss like whatever you know I feel like the things that he's doing to be quote unquote controlling are actually helping her because she is young and very naive and would probably just float around willy-nilly i don't know he's like "Hey don't get wasted and black out." Yeah or or like if you do make sure you're in like a safe environment or at least have a ride home like I don't know so yeah yeah i'm not seeing it yet but we'll see we got two more books so so at this point in time would you say that you are team Christian or team Anna or both um team Anna even though I don't love her as a person I got to choose one so yeah what about you i said team both because I feel like they're kind of on the same level to me it's like he is like mature on paper and like emotionally immature to like all the ends of the earth yeah and I feel like she is a fairly like naive person but she's actually like mature in a lot of different ways um more than him like I think her emotional intelligence is better than his but still not great because she's still like so young um so I feel like right now I'm kind of just like eh they're just working it out i'm on both of their side it's fine you know we'll just see where this goes fair yeah okay so do you have any bonus questions for me today or should we go into fun facts no that's it that's all I got apparently okay so hey yeah okay i've got So fun facts for these movies were so funny and there were so or these movies and books were so funny and there were so many of them that I actually wrote down three cuz I was like I just want to share these of three yeah so first one and again take these with a grain of salt they literally literally just came off Google okay although I will say my sources for these facts are Vogue Australia and Cosmopolitan magazine so they should do factchecking okay okay so first fun fact about 50 Shades of Gray we'll just say the franchise uh hardware stores reported abnormally high sales in ropes love it around the time of the release of the first film hardware stores reported the highest by a long shot number of sales in ropes just the highest sales in I'm like doesn't I don't know i just when I think of like going to a hardware store and getting a rope I think of that like really like plasticky ones yeah like isn't there better options i don't know but that's kind of doesn't specify what kind of rope but that is the kind that come to mind too that's like kind of stiff yeah yeah doesn't seem very comfortable um okay this one cracked me up jamie Dornan who's the guy who plays you know Christian in the movies visited a sex dungeon for research and observed a dominant who was having some fun with a submissive that's in quotes he told British GQ that it was very playful and jovial and not at all dark and serious so that's good but it did make me wonder what is a sex dungeon and how how did you just go visit but okay yeah yeah hey Hollywood baby what does it mean what does it mean yeah we don't want to know um also this one is more for me because I am continuously cracking up about the use of oh my all the time in this series you know she just says it all the time oh my well she says it 178 times in the book series specifically oh my oh golly oh that's times yeah mhm i thought that it was a lot and it is in fact I wonder how many times long fingers is said someone needs to count those if I could go back and start this from the beginning which I will never do but if I if I did do that I would count long fingers i think there's just like a you could just do it on like a dock or something there's a word count yeah you put it in i don't know if that'll work like on Kindle or something but I know authors can do it for their manuscripts they just like type in worth yeah yeah yeah yeah that way you don't have to manually go in and tally someone find out long fingers please fifty Shades of Gray cuz gosh it was so many times i bet it's a long list so it's like long fingers oh my and beguiling oh and um Oh what does she call him mercurial mercurial that's the other one that she says all the time yeah so there we go it's her thesaurus of the day dictionary of the day word of the day there we go word of the day it's like it's just normal talking and then she'll throw in this word and it's just like h can you not Yeah we don't need we don't need to know we don't you you don't need to say oh my Oh I also wanted to mention because I kind of jumped back and forth between um the audiobooks and the Kindle mhm every once in a while I would be looking at the Kindle which I do this sometimes and listening to the audio in my ears at the same time mhm and the audiobook narrator who I do like would add oh my where they were not in the text oh my oh my so I was going to say on purpose all the time so there is 178 oh my already in there and then the audiobook narrator added more why i don't know a fan a big fan of Oh my eyes wow well that's unusual but All right there we are well I think that's all that we have for you guys today about Fifty Shades of Gray in this wonderful May yep it's not going to be May guys it is May and we're here bringing you the gray okay all right so we just we just may say we just find out roll in the hay i just may oh thank you guys so much for joining us for our first official Fifty Shades of Gray episode being all about the first book thank you thank you thank you so much i just lost my week we'll be all week we can't keep it past five we will be here all week filming all the other episodes for you which will be dropping every Friday through May in case you didn't catch that yet so there you go make sure to like follow and subscribe anywhere you like listen to your favorite podcast including YouTube and you can also check us out on Instagram Tik Tok at Bessies in the Books Podcast we're there we're everywhere what's up and you guys what's up we'll see you before next Friday we'll see you next Tuesday see you next Tuesday bye bye[Music]