I always feel weird writing these posts in the school library.
Chapter Seven
Christian and Ana have discovered that Jack Hyde, Ana’s old boss who was fired after attempting to rape Ana, was the arsonist in Christian’s office. Pretend to be surprised.
“Yes, I remember. Do you have an address for Mr. Hyde?” Christian says sharply.
“Yes, sir, I do. […] I’m also going to scan the city CCTV and see if I can track his movements.”
Okay, I’m calling “English author fails at writing a story taking place in America” bullshit again. England has CCTV in virtually all public locations, and this is a pretty well-known fact, but I don’t think it really works the same way in Seattle. Nice try, E L James.
“Well, Mrs. Grey, it seems that you are not only decorative, but useful, too.” Christian’s eyes light up with wicked amusement. I know he’s teasing.
hahaha objectification of women haha classic
“So what would you like to eat, Sir?” I ask sweetly.
He narrows his eyes. “Are you being cute, Mrs. Grey? […] I can still put you over my knee,” he murmurs seductively.
“I know.” I grin. Placing my hands on the arms of his office chair, I lean down and kiss him. “That’s one of the things I love about you. But stow your twitching palm—you’re hungry.”
Okay, wait, did Ana literally just say that one of the things she loves about Christian is that he beats her when she misbehaves? That’s… that’s actually what just happened, isn’t it?
I poke him with my elbow.
“Mrs. Grey, you wound me.” He clutches his side as if in pain.
“Wimp,” I mutter disapprovingly.
“Wimp?” he utters in disbelief. He slaps my behind, making me yelp. “Hurry up with my food, wench. And later I’ll show you how wimpy I can be.”
uhhhhhhhhhhh
Anyway, now that we’ve got Stockholm Syndrome and antiquated gender roles out of the way, it’s time for some continuity errors!
“We do that all the time. When was the last time you made out in front of the TV?” I ask, shy and teasing at the same time. […]“I’ve never done that,” he says quietly. […] “Have you?”
I flush. “Of course.” Well kind of . . .
Okay, um, here’s a quote from the third chapter of the first book.
And for the first time in twenty-one years, I want to be kissed. I want to feel his mouth on mine.
Basically it’s been strongly implied this whole time that Christian is the only person Ana has ever kissed.
(Update: If you take a look at the comments, you’ll see that I was corrected on this. In chapter eight of the first book, we do have this exchange:
“Have you ever been kissed, apart from by me?”
“Of course I have.” I try my best to look affronted. Okay… maybe twice.
I figured there was a better quote to confirm this matter but I just could not find it when I was writing this post. So thanks to morningrain48 for their help, and just ignore how stupid I sound in the next sentence of this post.)
But why bother sticking to the continuity when we can develop Christian’s character? And when I say “develop Christian’s character”, I mean “have him continue to be a jealous control freak following an outdated double standard view of gender roles and never stop being an abusive dickbucket”.
I gaze down at my knotted fingers. He gently covers my hands with one of his. When I glance up at him, he’s smiling at me.
“I want to know. So I can beat whoever it was to a pulp.”
And
“How old were you?”
“Fifteen.”
“And what’s he doing now?”
“I don’t know.”
“What base did he get to?”
“Christian!” I scold—and suddenly he grabs my knees, then my ankles, and tips me up so I fall back on to the couch. He slides smoothly on top of me, trapping me beneath him, one leg between mine. It’s so sudden that I cry out in surprise. He grabs my hands and raises them above my head.
“So, this Bradley—did he get to first base?”
Aaaaaaaaaaaand
“What about Joe Schmo number two? Did he make it past second base?” […]
“No,” I whisper, trapped in his carnal gaze. Christian smiles wickedly.
“Good.” His hand cups my sex. “No underwear, Mrs. Grey. I approve.”
In other words, E L James wrote four pages of “hooray for double standards!” Well, I mean, this time specifically. By now she’s probably written a few hundred. And thought she was being really progressive the whole time.
Ana goes back to work the next day and the most pressing issue she faces coming back to her job after her three week honeymoon is why she hasn’t changed her name to Anastasia Grey yet.
“No! Christian, of course not.” I scowl at him. “This is about me—not you.” Jeez, he’s exasperating sometimes. Silly overbearing megalomaniac.
“How is this not about me?” He cocks his head to one side, genuinely perplexed, some of his detachment slipping as he stares at me with wide eyes, and I realize that he’s hurt. Holy fuck. I’ve hurt his feelings. Oh no . . .
This actually reads like Stockholm Syndrome. First, she thinks of him as an “overbearing megalomaniac”. Next, he acts like an overbearing megalomaniac (“How is this not about me?”). Finally, Ana now feels bad for him even though he acted badly exactly how she thought he would? This is stupid. And sure, you could argue against my reading of this scene with something like “Look, Matthew, Christian is an emotionally broken person and doesn’t understand how to love”, and there would be some credibility to that, but we are on the one-thousand and eleventh page of this novel trilogy and I am sick of reading the same shit.
“Why is it so important to you?” […] But even as I ask the question, deep down I know the answer before he says it.
“I want everyone to know that you’re mine.”
You know what’s a good argument against eReaders? You can’t throw the book across the room when it pisses you off.
The conversation continues and Christian wants to give Ana, who graduated college about a month or two ago, the publishing firm, because the novel just isn’t unrealistic enough yet. Christian’s reasoning is solid.
“You’re also the most well-read person I know,” he counters earnestly. “You love a good book. You couldn’t leave your job while we were on our honeymoon. You read how many manuscripts? Four?”
“Five,” I whisper.
Dude, you should hire Ana’s subconscious. She read three volumes of Charles Dickens in like a week.
The argument about Ana changing her name continues. Christian wants to bang in her office. She says she’ll change her name instead. This makes even less sense than the rest of the story.