So! I've got GREAT news and I can't wait to share it!!! I've been offered a really cool opportunity that, God/Goddess/Allah/Buddha/FSM-willing will be the first official step on my path to Internationally
Renowned Blogger™-hood.
But...before I begin, a bit of background:
A number of years ago a Mormon housewife by the name of
Stephenie Meyer decided to publish what was essentially a written record of her
personal erotic fantasies (well, at least what passes for ‘erotic’ in the Land
of the Mormons) and thus was Twilight
born.
Most people know Twilight
as an engaging YA paranormal romance, wherein a young girl (Bella Swan) falls
in love with a ‘good’ vampire (Edward Cullen) and they have many and various
adventures on their path to eventual matrimony and parenthood.
In truth, it is a poorly written screed – about a somewhat
selfish and shallow girl and the ‘mysterious and enigmatic’ guy she falls for –
that details the many and various ways a man can stalk and abuse a woman while
convincing her that his actions indicate love.
Ick.
To give you some insight to my own character, while I found
the stalking and abuser behaviour awful and unacceptable, my biggest issue was
with the horrible writing and the poorly done editing. I only managed to get
through the first book and that was…painful.
Millions of people, however, did not agree with me, as the
book became an international bestseller and spawned several sequels, all of
which – with the original – have been turned into movies.
In addition to their invasion of Hollywood,
the books – or at least their characters – also found a home in the land of
fanfic.
Fanfic (as defined by the Urban Dictionary):
Fanfics
are fictional stories written about pre-existing books/films/animes/mangas/etc
by fans of this work. A Disclaimer
is included as standard, stating in some way or another that they do not own
the characters they are writing about.
Some authors (e.g. J.K. Rowling) have encouraged fanfics on the grounds that publishing is not attempted (this will always result in a law suit, something the authors of fanfics have generally accepted). However, other authors (e.g. Anne Rice) have requested that fanfics based around their stories (etc) are not posted on fanfiction sites. These such authors are more commonly known as Kill Joys (see bitching).
Some authors (e.g. J.K. Rowling) have encouraged fanfics on the grounds that publishing is not attempted (this will always result in a law suit, something the authors of fanfics have generally accepted). However, other authors (e.g. Anne Rice) have requested that fanfics based around their stories (etc) are not posted on fanfiction sites. These such authors are more commonly known as Kill Joys (see bitching).
A whole slew of Twilight fanfics came into being, most of
them content to stay on the pages of their fanfic sites. But then the
unthinkable happened: one got published.
As far as I know it was originally self-published, but soon
gained immense popularity and was picked up by a mainstream publishing house.
I’m speaking, of course, of Fifty Shades
of Grey.
In this story, Bella and Edward are re-imagined as Anastasia
Steele and Christian Grey, who are, respectively, a virginal, sexually naïve (almost
to the point of complete ignorance) recent college graduate, and a BDSM Dominant,
multi-millionaire business magnate. He falls for her and wants her to be his
sexual submissive. And, staying true to the nature of the ‘romance’ on which
the characters are based, he exhibits abusive controlling behavior, all in the
name of his love/need for her. (Full disclosure: I have only read the first
chapter of the first book, but I have read many in-depth, critical-yet-humorous
essays about the entire series).
Surprisingly, this book, too, became a huge success and it spawned sequels (and apparently movies are in the works as well).
Unsurprisingly, the book also inspired a number of critiques and parodies, and
that brings us back to the point of this post.
I was recently perusing Amazon.com – okay, that’s not true.
I never casually search Amazon. I go
there to ‘buy’ free books for my kindle, about which I am alerted by four daily
e-mails.
One of the e-mails I received featured a book titled – and I
poop you not – Fifty Shades of Jungle Fever. Now, my first thought was, “Has
Spike Lee lost his mind?” But I quickly
realized that he, in fact, had nothing to do with it. Rather, an…enterprising
author by the name of L.V. Lewis decided to write and publish her own version
of FSoG (I’m assuming it was self-published, as the ‘publisher’ is listed as
Jungle Fever Press, Georgia).
Of course, I had
to have it. I mean, I knew FSoG sucked, but a fanfic of a fanfic? How much
worse could things possibly get? I couldn’t wait
to read it!
Now, here’s where we get to the part about my GROWING
fame…=’)
Because I have an endless love of horribly executed fiction,
I routinely search the internet for critiques of, and essays on, awful
books/series, mostly for their comedic value. (here are some links to some of
my faves:
seriously, check them out. They’re awesome!!!)
The last link is the most relevant, as the author, Jennifer
Armintrout, and I have been chatting occasionally via twitter. She has done an
amazing chapter-by-chapter breakdown of the first book of FSoG (and I believe
is working on the other two) and contributed an essay to the book, “Fifty
Writers on ‘Fifty Shades of Grey’”. When I saw the ‘Jungle Fever’ version, I
had to send her a ‘tweet’ and let her know about it.
Her response? She asked if I would be willing to write a
guest post for her blog reviewing the
book.
Seriously.
A published author asked me
– a soon-to-be-burgeoning Internationally
Renowned Blogger™ – to write a guest post for her blog. I am SO jizzing excited right now!
So, uh yeah. I am in the process of writing the review and
then I will send it to her for…uh…review… and posting. Since she has been so
gracious in inviting me to write for her blog*, I will not be posting my review
here, but rather only on her site. I will post a link to it here when she puts
it up.
*by the way, while I’m sure this is just biz-as-usual for well-known
published author like her, it’s kind of a pretty big deal for me…and I’m super
excited about it!!!
=’)
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