Fifty Shames of Earl Grey by Fanny Merkin, Andrew Shaffer
My rating: 3/5 cats
i don’t know if it is just because i read A Coupla Shades of Taupe: A Parody first and may have reached my supersaturation point with fifty shades of grey parodies, but this one was not as amusing to me as the other.
there is something almost too easy about it, the way it is really easy to write bad theatre d’absurd, you know. for example:
An attractive blonde behind the receptionist’s desk smiles at me as I walk in. I assume she’s the receptionist, because I can’t think of any reason she would be sitting behind the receptionist’s desk. Unless maybe she’s filling in for the real receptionist, who could be on her lunch break. But then I remember: it’s almost two, and I doubt anyone takes their lunch breaks that late. So this must be the actual receptionist.
that, to me, is just placeholder humor. it isn’t funny necessarily, but it is absurd enough that it can fool you into thinking it is funny. but it’s not. and it is too “easy.” and there is a lot of that type of writing in the book.
but there are “actual” funny things, too.
This is amazing. I’m in a helicopter with Earl Grey, the most handsomest man on the planet. And now he’s the most handsomest man in the air! I peer into the distance, and can see the Space Needle in faraway Seattle jutting above the skyline. We’re up so high, and the sun is so bright –
“Earl!” I shout.
“What!” he shouts back, over the roar of the helicopter’s massive blades.
“Watch out for the sun!”
“What!”
“I said, WATCH OUT FOR THE SUN!”
He shoots me a puzzled look.
“What? I’m not wearing sunscreen,” I say.
He shakes his head.
“Nevermind,” I mutter. He probably knows how close to the sun we can fly without getting burned. I hope.
and:
“You’re a mystery to me, baby,” he says, biting the tip off the banana. I blush.
“Oh, stop.”
“No, it’s true,” he says. “I have no idea what’s going on inside that pretty little head of yours…”
“To be honest, I have no idea either,” I say, looking down at the table to avoid his powerful gaze. “Most times, my mind is just an ongoing, present-tense first-person monologue. It’s like I’m writing a novel, constantly, but only in my brain. A really bad novel.”
and
It’s ten in the morning and Earl Grey is long gone from the bed. He hasn’t completely abandoned me, because I’m still wearing Earl’s shirt from last night; it’s like I’ve skinned him and am wearing his flesh. Only it’s less creepy by like a million times.
and i think that is part of why i liked taupe better than earl grey. taupe truly embraced the sickness. it was gross and dark and gross some more. this one was a tamer comparison that incorporated more of the twilight source material, but i just never really got into it. a lot of my reservations had to do with the inconsistencies in the character of anna. she is horny and in charge of her sexuality one minute, idiotically innocent the next; it just doesn’t wash. i know it is foolish of my to require character-consistency from a parody of a book that was pretty crappy to begin with, but i do. i require it.
i didn’t laugh out loud once while reading this, although i smirked a few times. this is smirky humor. if that is your thing, read this one. if you like sickfuck humor, read taupe.
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