Bad Sex Awards

[ankhorite]

Who could resist a headline like that? Here is the summary of the 2008 Literary Review Bad Sex in Fiction awards. Excerpts:

Paulo Coehlo, in Brida, describes sex as "the moment when Eve was reabsorbed into Adam's body and the two halves became Creation." Ann Allestree's Triptych of a Young Wolf comes complete with wolf and "hybrid" sex. And sex and soup? "He was bringing her to a pitch of ecstasy when she heard Madame Veuve, on the landing, put down the supper tray. Whiffs of onion soup strayed over them as he engulfed her. 'Don't stop,' she clamoured; she was nearly there, it was in the bag."

Hey, I know plenty of people, even on my flist, who would get into the hybrid bit in a major way. And Madame Veuve? Isn't that like saying Mrs. Widow? Oh no! Per these graphic excerpts, the soup scene is part of the wolfy book.

Regardless, here is the whole story for this year, and here is a summary of related tales from prior years. Some of the links lead to excerpts.

My favorite bad novel sex was a pre-publication excerpt from the politician Newt Gingrich, who wrote a passage in his WW II book 1945 about how some woman "straddled" his hero in a "kittenish" way and "growled" about how she was going to make him do bad, bad things. PBS says it was toned down to a pouting sex kitten. Salon calls what finally got published "that unforgettable line (think Jacqueline Susann meets Bulwer-Lytton)" and quotes thus: "Suddenly the pouting sex kitten gave way to Diana the Huntress." Oh, Newt. You wish.