#enigmatic?

i'm tired of tear stained pillowcases and cheeks, and "talking to someone," and of realizing that hindsight isn't always 20/20, that the past is no clearer today than it was yesterday or when it was happening. i miss when i could and would write and i miss when i had new things to write about but most of all i miss writing with you, and how no one knew. i want another christmas and another fourth of july and another thanksgiving like those, i want more shared secrets and more late nights and another chance to be open.

So we meet the main 2 characters within 10 pages. Hello Anastasia Steele and Christian Grey (by the way, worst names ever). From the get-go, we can already picture pretty clearly what type of personalities they are. Kate, her best-friend, is also introduced and is described with some AWESOME prose.

But then Kate can talk anyone into anything. She'll make an exceptional journalist. She's articulate, strong, persuasive, argumentative, beautiful—and she's my dearest, dearest friend.

Has E.L ever heard of "showing, not telling"? I think not. Apparently we are just given a slew of adjectives and are supposed to apply them to Kate. Okay...

Ana drives to this interview down some highway I don't care about, "pedals to the metal" or whatever (who says that) and meets the "enigmatic" Christian Grey. We get a description of each and every female worker in Greys office (blonde and attractive no doubt) and Ana falls clumsily into Greys office. How very 'Bella' of her. What we learn of Grey is that he likes to control and possess things. More specifically:

“I want to deserve to possess them, but yes, bottom line, I do.” (Page 13)

As stated before this, Christian derives this sort of life philosophy from Carnegie's quote:

"The man who acquires the ability to take full possession of his own mind may take possession of anything else to which he is justly entitled." (Page 13)

This is the whole point then. He doesn't just want to possess Ana, he wants to DESERVE to possess her. He wants to make himself entitled to be her master. What does Christian do for Ana throughout the books to deserve this? He's either getting mad at her, trying to buy her things with his endless amount of money or 'fucking her hard'. How very romantic. This is not what makes a man worthy of a woman.

And if anyone knows anything about Carnegie (thank you Grade 12 European history), he was basically this rich dude who made his fortune off of steel and then became a philanthropist. What subtle comparisons you are making here, E.L.

Moving on.

They have a boring-ass interview and obviously he is attracted to her.

This is what ticks me most about these series. Ana is obviously attractive to men. Jose, Paul, Jack, probably Tyler and hell, maybe even Ms. Jones, apparently want her. Yet for 3 books she never seems to be able to fully grasp that Christian is attracted to her. Girl, you have a vagina, you are skinny and have nice skin. Just get it around your head. Either she is just a complete imbecile, a giant tease or has SERIOUS self-esteem issues and needs an assessment with Dr. Flynn or the likes. And then maybe even a second opinion. Ha.