Picking Apart the Finalists from the Bad Sex in Fiction Awards
20:01 |
Few things bring me as much joy as bad erotica. Bad erotica is what I turn to when my I need to experience a swift but intense burst of happiness, the literary equivalent of scarfing down an entire pack of Jaffa Cakes for a sugar rush. No matter the depths of my sorrow, bad erotica can bring laughter back into my life. I once spent the best part of two weeks reading a spectacularly horrendous erotic fanfiction to my then-housemate, providing commentary on the most notable passages. It was a wonderful period of my life, one that I look back on with a nostalgic fondness that a normal person would reserve for weddings, graduations, or the births of new relatives.
This love of bad erotica combined with my job in publishing makes me, as far as I'm concerned, more than adequately qualified to judge the Bad Sex in Fiction Awards. These are real awards, for those who aren't familiar with them. They exist to mock bad erotic scenes in fiction, rather like I do, except the awards are run by Literary Review so people see them as valid and newsworthy rather than the bizarre hobby of a bored twenty-something who has too much time on their hands. This year's finalists have recently been announced, and The Independent has published a full list of the extracts that are up for the prize. Here is each one, accompanied by my thoughts.
'A Doubter’s Almanac', Ethan Canin
The act itself was fervent. Like a brisk tennis game
'Fervent' is a word that one would be happy to hear in the context of lovemaking. 'Brisk' not so much.
or a summer track meet, something performed in daylight between competitors.
Other activities performed in daylight between competitors include Formula 1 racing, boules tournaments, games of Monopoly, and every episode of The Great British Bake-Off.
The cheap mattress bounced.
She liked to do it more than once, and he was usually able to comply. Bourbon was his gasoline. Between sessions, he poured it at the counter while she lay panting on the sheets. Sweat burnished her body.
burnished
VERB [WITH OBJECT]
usually as adjective 'burnished'
Polish (something, especially metal) by rubbing: 'highly burnished armour'
That's some powerful sweat. I am also now imagining that our bourbon-loving hero is romancing a cyberman. I hope you are too.
The lean neck. The surprisingly full breasts.
That's a backhanded compliment if I ever I saw one. Quick piece of advice for any of my socially challenged readers: no one ever wants to be told a part of them is 'surprisingly' anything.
---
'The Tobacconist', Robert Seethaler
He closed his eyes and heard himself make a gurgling sound.
And as his trousers slipped down his legs all the burdens of his life to date seemed to fall away from him; he tipped back his head and faced up into the darkness beneath the ceiling, and for one blessed moment he felt as if he could understand the things of this world in all their immeasurable beauty. How strange they are, he thought, life and all of these things. Then he felt Anezka slide down before him to the floor, felt her hands grab his naked buttocks and draw him to her. “Come, sonny boy!” he heard her whisper, and with a smile he let go.
I didn't think this one was especially noteworthy until I got to the end. I think we can all agree that the term 'sonny boy' should never be used in any situation, least of all a sexual one.
---
'Men Like Air', Tom Connolly
The walkway to the terminal was all carpet, no oxygen. Dilly bundled Finn into the first restroom on offer, locked the cubicle door and pulled at his leather belt.
Well, this level of selectivity can only bode well.
“You’re beautiful,” she told him, going down on to her haunches and unzipping him.
I am aware that the word 'haunches' is anatomically correct, and therefore this is more a matter of personal taste rather than of poor writing, but to me there is something profoundly unromantic about any word that can also be applied to a cut of meat.
He watched her passport rise gradually out of the back pocket of her jeans in time with the rhythmic bobbing of her buttocks as she sucked him.
"Yeah, baby, rhythmically bob those buttocks for me."
He arched over her back and took hold of the passport before it landed on the pimpled floor. Despite the immediate circumstances, human nature obliged him to take a look at her passport photo.
Is it human nature to be overwhelmed by the urge to look at a passport photo in the midst of fellatio? Male readers, please advise in the comments.
---
'The Butcher’s Hook', Janet Ellis
When his hand goes to my breasts, my feet are envious.
Erm…
I slide my hands down his back, all along his spine, rutted with bone like mud ridges in a dry field
Which of these options is the least appealing? Is it a) an abnormally protruding spine, b) mud, or c) all of the above?
to the audacious swell below.
audacious
ADJECTIVE
1 Showing a willingness to take surprisingly bold risks, 'a series of audacious takeovers'
2 Showing an impudent lack of respect, 'he made an audacious remark'
Can someone please explain to me how an erection, which I am assuming is what a 'swell' refers to, can be either bold or disrespectful? Because I am at a loss.
His finger is inside me, his thumb circling, and I spill like grain from a bucket.
I'm going to say what we're all thinking: if you refer to spilling when discussing anything related to the nether regions it sounds like you're talking about urine.
He is panting, still running his race. I laugh at the incongruous size of him, sticking to his stomach and escaping from the springing hair below.
I wish authors who decide to write sex scenes into their books would not shy away from referring directly to genitals. If you aren't comfortable with the words necessary to describe human sex just don't write about sex. When I am running my own publishing company any author who describes a man's penis as his 'size', 'thickness', or 'length' will immediately have their contract terminated and their books taken out of print. 'Length' particularly bothers me as it brings to mind a person who is only wide on every other part of their body. Effectively a horizontal line with a penis.
“‘Anne,’ he says, stopping and looking down at me. I am pinned like wet washing with his peg.
I will be the first to admit that I hate doing my laundry, so much so that I think I own over forty pairs of underwear just so I can go as long as possible without washing my clothes. I'm still confident that it is not just me who won't find this comparison sexy. This will bring a smile to the face of anyone familiar with the Urban Dictionary definition of 'pegging', though.
‘Till now, I thought the sweetest sound I could ever hear was cows chewing grass.
This is worrying for so many reasons and I am not going to insult your intelligence by explaining them to you.
But this is better.’ He sways and we listen to the soft suck at the exact place we meet.
Jesus Christ, this is even worse than the gurgling.
Then I move and put all thoughts of livestock out of his head.
I hate it when I have to work to get my partner's attention because they keep getting distracted by livestock.
---
'Leave Me', Gayle Forman
Once they were in that room, Jason had slammed the door and devoured her with his mouth, his hands, which were everywhere. As if he were ravenous.
I suspect (and hope) this was intentionally sinister, and it becomes even more so when you imagine Jason as Jason Voorhees from the Friday the 13th series. Which is what I'm going to do for the rest of this extract.
And she remembered standing in front of him, her dress a puddle on the floor, and how she’d started to shake, her knees knocking together, like she was a virgin, like this was the first time.
Isn't that what happens when you have rickets? Is rickets virginal? No one mentioned this in my sex education classes.
Because had she allowed herself to hope, this was what she would’ve hoped for. And now here it was. And that was terrifying.
Of course it is. Have you seen that hockey mask?
---
'The Day Before Happiness', Erri De Luca
She pushed on my hips, an order that thrust me in.
SIR, YES, SIR.
I entered her. Not only my prick, but the whole of me entered her, into her guts, into her darkness, eyes wide open, seeing nothing. My whole body had gone inside her.
This sounds highly inadvisable.
I went in with her thrusts and stayed still. While I got used to the quiet and the pulsing of my blood in my ears and nose, she pushed me out a little, then in again. She did it again and again, holding me with force and moving me to the rhythm of the surf. She wiggled her breasts beneath my hands and intensified the pushing.
I've been sitting at my desk for a good five minutes now trying to work out if I can get my breasts to wiggle. This admittedly limited research has strongly indicated that wiggling of the breasts is not possible in a medically typical human body. I can manage an oscillation at best, really.
I went in up to my groin and came out almost entirely. My body was her gearstick.
I should preface this statement with the admission that I have never had a driving lesson and recently had to have it pointed out to me that what I thought was the clutch was actually the handbrake. However, I am fairly confident that to use the gear stick one puts one's hand on the top of the stick and moves it back and forth. This is the image that I have of this interaction: grabbing a person by the head and titling their entire body, which is completely rigid. Can humans successfully have intercourse like this? I'm no expert but I don't feel that they can.
Additionally, the word 'groin' makes me slightly nauseated.
And the winner is…
The Butcher's Hook. It had to be. None of the others ever really had a chance. The heavy-handed and honestly quite disturbing farming references would have been enough to win the title alone, but she secured her place with 'audacious swell'. 'Audacious swell' is the 'bulbous salutation' of 2016. Janet Ellis, I salute you.
Image credit: Pekka Nikrus
Image credit: Pekka Nikrus
0 comments