Bad Sex in Fiction Award

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Bad Sex in Fiction Award

1Nickelini
Nov. 30, 2010, 11:41 am

"Irish author Rowan Somerville has won the 2010 Bad Sex in Fiction Award, Britain's ''most dreaded literary prize'', for a scene in which a nipple is likened to the upturned ''nose of the loveliest nocturnal animal, sniffing in the night''. "

Somerville beat out Christos Tsiolkas for the Slap and my hometown favourite, Annabel Lyons for the Golden Mean, among others. Full story here:

http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/books/bad-sex-winner-by-a-nose-20101130-18f9...

2lilithcat
Nov. 30, 2010, 1:01 pm

This reminds me of a book I read several years ago, Bound in Blood: the erotic journey of a vampire. I looked for my old review; here's part of what I wrote:

"Despite the subtitle, the sex is not particularly erotic.

"It's anatomical: "He rasps his tongue from Claude's earlobe . . . over his supra clavicular nerves, around his deltoids to his intercostobrachial nerve."

"It's geological and geographic: "Looking over the topography of this human island, Jean-Luc searched out the broad mesas of his chest, followed the valley between to the foothills of Etienne's abdominals. Down he traveled, through sparse into thickening forest, and out onto a short, naked peninsula."

"Ooooooh, that's sooooo hot, I don't think."

3Booksloth
Nov. 30, 2010, 2:14 pm

The only one of these I've read was The Slap and that would have been a worthy winner so my congratulations to Somerville for being able to top that one. Judging by the nose-like nipple, he's a master! It does make you wonder whether some of these authors have ever seen a real nipple or had real sex.

4Nickelini
Nov. 30, 2010, 2:24 pm

I agree that the Slap was a fine contender for the prize. But I haven't read the other ones either. As I told people about the many sex scenes in The Slap--I think the author learned everything he knows about heterosexual acts from watching porn movies.

5ajsomerset
Nov. 30, 2010, 2:32 pm

That award is a mean-spirited exercise in prudery, which succeeds chiefly by lifting passages out of context and forgetting that the experience and language of fiction belongs to the narrator and characters, and not to the author.

Laura Miller's column on this was quite good.

http://www.salon.com/life/sex/index.html?story=/books/laura_miller/2010/11/30/ba...

6Nickelini
Nov. 30, 2010, 2:47 pm

Although I know it's in the news every year, I've never paid enough attention to notice whether it's mean spirited or not. I always thought it was more along the lines of an attempt at humour. I certainly didn't pick up on the prudery (good word, that). But then I'm one of those readers who is bored with almost all sex in fiction, so I look at the whole thing as a couple of minutes of amusement and nothing more.

7Booksloth
Nov. 30, 2010, 3:09 pm

No, I don't think it has anything to do with prudery either. Sex is great, bad sex is awful - that applies to fictional sex as well as the real kind - and disliking the bad kind has more to do with discernment than with prudery.

8ajsomerset
Nov. 30, 2010, 3:19 pm

The stated purpose of the award is to discourage writing about sex.

9lilithcat
Nov. 30, 2010, 3:33 pm

> 8

No, it's not. The stated purpose of the award is to discourage "the crude, tasteless, often perfunctory use of redundant passages of sexual description in the modern novel". Not "writing about sex", per se.

10Booksloth
Bearbeitet: Nov. 30, 2010, 3:38 pm

#8 Is it? That sounds a bit of a daft idea. I would have hoped the purpose would be to let people know when they write badly about it. I tend to think that sex is a bit like comedy (in writing, at least, though there have been times . . . ) in that everyone thinks they can write it and very few people actually can. Some truly terrible sex scenes have been written by some great writers (D H Lawrence, I'm looking at you) and it's not as if the average reader doesn't know what sex is like, so they don't always have to be told. Sex is just one of those things that can all too easily look ridiculous to an observer, no matter how great it feels to the ones taking part and so, unless a writer has something new and exciting to say about it, most descriptions are superfluous.

ETA - What lilithcat states is the actual purpose sounds much more sensible.

11ajsomerset
Bearbeitet: Nov. 30, 2010, 3:48 pm

9: I can read, thanks.

The stated purpose of the award, removing the adjectives, is to discourage passages of sexual description. That Auberon Waugh considered those passages crude, tasteless, perfunctory and redundant is evidence of his prudish intent.

10: The fact of the matter is, this award lifts sentences out of context. The metaphors it mocks are part of the overall language of a novel, and they may be more concerned with characters and their perceptions, their way of seeing the world, than with mere description. The people who run this award as an annual publicity stunt do showcase some bad writing, but they also hold up for ridicule excellent work by excellent writers.

12lilithcat
Nov. 30, 2010, 3:53 pm

> 11

You cannot simply remove the adjectives, and say, "no, they meant all writing about sex". Adjectives limit. The stated purpose is to discourage certain types of writing about sex, the types described by the chosen adjectives.

13Booksloth
Nov. 30, 2010, 3:56 pm

It lifts sentences out of context? Isn't that a bit like removing the very adjectives that tell you what a sentence is all about? Can't have that, then.

14susanbooks
Nov. 30, 2010, 4:10 pm

I remember a few years ago John Irving was nominated (and maybe won) for describing a woman's legs as forming "the M of receptivity." I love the complete & utter badness of that.

Whatever the prize's ethos, it makes us aware that even the most gifted writers (and filmmakers) can fail horribly when it comes to sex scenes. I think this award encourages readers & writers to expect more, to not be satisfied with the cliched or just plain old wrong.

15ajsomerset
Nov. 30, 2010, 4:17 pm

12: And the adjectives in use are entirely subjective.

How much do you know about Auberon Waugh? About his views on this subject? Do you know what he meant by "tasteless?" Waugh was the epitome of the upper class twit, and his views on literature (as on all things) were markedly conservative. This is the spirit in which the award carries on.

According to one report of this year's award ceremony, Waugh's son said that the award is not for writing about sex badly, but for writing about sex at all.

Somerville's novel, it seems, is bad all over. Why, when so many novels are overwritten & overblown, are we so fascinated by this bad sex award?

16lilithcat
Nov. 30, 2010, 4:42 pm

12: And the adjectives in use are entirely subjective.

Well, duh. So are these: "overwritten & overblown". Adjectives describing writing are almost entirely subjective. But the point is that, subjective or not, they are limiting. You are free to give an award using the same criteria, and perhaps you would choose a different "winner". But you will still have limited what books are in the running.

> 15

Why, when so many novels are overwritten & overblown, are we so fascinated by this bad sex award?

I don't think we are "fascinated" by it so much as we are amused by it.

Why the Bulwer-Lytton award? Why the Razzies? Why the All-England Summarize Proust contest?

Why not?

17Citizenjoyce
Nov. 30, 2010, 4:43 pm

We're fascinated about the bad sex award because we like to engage in, think about and talk about sex. I also think that sex scenes are frequently boring filler to what might otherwise be a good or bad book. I love the idea of a nipple's being compared to upturned ''nose of the loveliest nocturnal animal, sniffing in the night If you can't see how hilarious that is, maybe a bit of your own prudery is poking through or sniffing in the night.

18ajsomerset
Nov. 30, 2010, 4:54 pm

16: Of course they're limiting. But because they're subjective, their meaning, i.e. the way in which they are limiting, is flexible. The subject is the intent of the award's founders and organizers. What matters is what they mean by "crude" and "tasteless," not your own idea of what is crude.

Understanding the intent of the founders and organizers of this prize requires more than simply reading that sentence. You have to know something about Auberon Waugh. He felt that frank descriptions of sex, badly written or otherwise, were tasteless.

13: No, it's more like taking a sentence laden with adjectives and attempting to interpret its meaning without reference to its original context, i.e. the views of the person who wrote it.

19susanbooks
Dez. 5, 2010, 10:41 am

I don't think the intent of the award's founder matters as much as that of the current organizers/judges. And, prudes or not, the nosey nocturnal nipple deserves mockery.

20ajsomerset
Dez. 5, 2010, 10:45 am

The current organizers have said that sex in fiction "never works," which speaks eloquently to their intent.

21Booksloth
Dez. 5, 2010, 12:37 pm

#19 Hear hear. If you write for public consumption you must expect to have your work publically criticised, whether that be by your friends, literary critics or judging panels for humorous awards. If nobody ever made fun of that 'nosey nocturnal nipple' the author would go on supposing it was an effective metaphore, which it isn't. You can't support freedom of speech for writers unless you also support it for their critics. And perhaps the most important word in all that is 'humorous' - whatever the intent of their originator, these awards are taken by the public to be light-hearted - getting all bent out of shape about them is a bit like getting upset about jokes about the chicken crossing the road because you're scared the chicken might get run over.

22ajsomerset
Dez. 5, 2010, 12:49 pm

21: No writer worth a damn would ever change what they're doing based on public criticism. The first thing any writer learns is that, to borrow from Full Metal Jacket, opinions are like assholes in that everyone has one. If you take all those conflicting opinions seriously, you'll go insane.

I have to laugh at the attempt to make this into a freedom of speech issue. If writing is open to criticism, surely awards are, too. And both the motivation and the method are in question here.

The problem with what this award does is that it rips the context away. You won't find a single serious critic who thinks that presenting a passage out of context is a valid approach to the job of reviewing. You can make any book sound awful by doing that.

There's no reason to assume that this is a descriptive metaphor. It's possible that the passage is intended humorously. It's possible that it's intended for characterization. You won't know unless you read the book and see it in context.

23Booksloth
Dez. 6, 2010, 6:01 am

No writer ever will be worth a damn if he/she doesn't learn from his/her mistakes either. If authors don't want to acknowledge that they sometimes get it wrong that's their problem, of course.

Yes, of course the awards are open to criticism, nobody said they weren't, I'm just a little confused at why you seem to be so very upset and defensive about them. The awards gain more publicity for these books than most of them would ever otherwise have got and sales rocket after any book has been mentioned in any awards, whether positive or negative.

You can't expect that nobody will ever talk about a book they haven't read - you do know how many books are published every day? - and I haven't heard that the judging panel claims to be making 'serious criticisms', they are doing exactly what the awards claim they are doing: picking a single overblown passage to poke some fairly innocent fun at. People are always extracting passages out of context from books, it's part of what you have to learn to live with when you write.

24susanbooks
Bearbeitet: Dez. 6, 2010, 10:11 am

Well said, Booksloth! I don't think I ever thought of or read of (until now) the prize as a serious literary judgement. The Updike (or Irving -- I forget) selection -- the woman's legs in the M of receptivity -- is hilarious, perhaps intentionally so on the part of the author. I don't recall the prize award statement going on to say that John Updike/Irving is therefore a hack.

Sex is hard to write about without falling into porn on one hand or harlequin romance-speak on the other. I think the award points that out in a fun, witty way. Perhaps that's not what the founder & judges intend(ed), but it seems to me to be the effect.

ETA: The idea that writers, unlike everyone else, artists or not, don't learn from & react to criticism is just silly. Pick up any biography of a writer, a collection of their letters & that idea is easily refuted.

25ajsomerset
Dez. 6, 2010, 10:43 am

23: I'm neither upset nor defensive. I'm simply pointing out why this award should, in my view, be ignored.

As for "innocent fun," the award's organizers are on the record all over the place with their serious intent.

24: Everyone has an opinion about how you should have written your novel. You learn quickly to ignore everyone, except the few people you trust. I know many writers; I don't know a single one who feels differently about this.

26bergs47
Bearbeitet: Apr. 16, 2012, 10:02 am

27comedy.stu
Apr. 16, 2012, 9:37 am

Dieser Benutzer wurde wegen Spammens entfernt.

28bergs47
Nov. 27, 2012, 3:56 am

The shortlist for the Literary Review’s 20th annual Bad Sex Awards were announced 21 November, and the nominees are:

The Yips by Nicola Barker
The Adventuress by Nicholas Coleridge
Infrared by Nancy Huston
Rare Earth by Paul Mason
Noughties by Ben Masters
The Quiddity of Will Self by Sam Mills
The Divine Comedy by Craig Raine
Back to Blood by Tom Wolfe

The winner of what has been dubbed ‘Britain’s most dreaded literary prize’ will be announced on Tuesday 4 December 2012.

29bergs47
Dez. 5, 2012, 6:21 am

Nancy Huston won the Bad Sex in Fiction Award, the U.K.’s “most dreaded literary prize,” for a steamy description of a threesome involving a photographer, her camera and her lover. The passage, from Huston’s novel Infrared, last night defeated torrid scenes by writers including 2004 winner Tom Wolfe and Paul Mason, the economics editor of BBC TV’s current- affairs show, Newsnight. (quoted from Bloomberg)

30bergs47
Nov. 27, 2013, 10:25 am

Bad Sex Awards 2013: The shortlist in full

House of Earth by Woody Guthrie
Motherland by William Nicholson
The City of Devi by Manil Suri
Secrecy by Rupert Thomson
The World Was All Before Them by Matthew Reynolds
My Education by Susan Choi
The Last Banquet by Jonathan Grimwood
The Victoria System by Eric Reinhardt

The winner of the tongue-in-cheek award will be announced by the Literary Review on Tuesday, December 3.

31bergs47
Dez. 4, 2013, 4:29 am

Manil Suri has won the 21st Literary Review Bad Sex in Fiction Award, for The City of Devi.

32Citizenjoyce
Dez. 5, 2013, 3:19 pm

I read a little description of it which had to do with supernovas and streaking super heroes, but I haven't read any of the actual book. Do you have a quote?

33bergs47
Dez. 6, 2013, 6:18 am

34Citizenjoyce
Bearbeitet: Dez. 6, 2013, 5:04 pm

Thanks for sharing. I have to think the supernovas and flying superhero sex would be fun. For bad sex I'd have to go with The World Was All Before Them by Matthew Reynolds. Masters and Johnson sex emphasizing vas deferens and neuromuscular euphoria isn't all that euphoric. And for really disgusting sex, I'd have to give it to The Last Banquet by Jonathan Grimwood. Chocolate? Not any kind of chocolate I've eaten, I would think.

35Booksloth
Dez. 7, 2013, 6:03 am

It's almost too easy, isn't it? Let's face it, we all have our own idea/experience of really great sex and that's why it's always most effective when the bedroom door stays closed. I notice there is no 'great sex in fiction' award and that's probably because such a thing doesn't exist. Much better left to the imagination.

36bergs47
Bearbeitet: Nov. 21, 2014, 4:33 am

Richard Flanagan's Booker-winning novel The Narrow Road to the Deep North, cited by judges of that prize as an "outstanding work of literature", has landed another, rather more dubious accolade: a spot on the shortlist for the Literary Review Bad Sex in Fiction award, for a passage in which the act of love is interrupted by a dog killing a fairy penguin. (from the Guardian)

This year's winner will be announced on 3 December.

The shortlist in full:

The Snow Queen by Michael Cunningham

The Narrow Road to the Deep North by Richard Flanagan

The Hormone Factory by Saskia Goldschmidt

Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage by Haruki Murakami

The Age of Magic by Ben Okri

The Affairs of Others by Amy Grace Loyd

Desert God by Wilbur Smith

Things to Make and Break by May-Lan Tan

The Lemon Grove by Helen Walsh

The Legacy of Elizabeth Pringle by Kirsty Wark

37bergs47
Dez. 4, 2014, 2:43 am

Booker winner (Ben Okri) beats distinguished peers to clinch Literary Review award on strength of passage from The Age of Magic

38bergs47
Bearbeitet: Nov. 26, 2015, 3:31 am

The short list for 2015 was announced on November 17

List of the Lost by Morrissey
The Making of Zombie Wars by Aleksandar Hemon
Before, During, After by Richard Bausch
Book of Numbers by Joshua Cohen
Fear of Dying by Erica Jong
Fates and Furies by Lauren Groff
The Martini Shot by George Pelecanos
Against Nature by Tomas Espedal

The Literary Review will announce the winner on December 1, at a party at the carefully chosen venue, London’s In and Out Club.

39Citizenjoyce
Bearbeitet: Nov. 26, 2015, 2:44 pm

Hmm, I read Fates and Furies and found it average. I guess I didn't find the sex scenes bad enough to stand out.

40bergs47
Dez. 9, 2015, 7:12 am

Morrissey has won the 23rd annual Literary Review Bad Sex in Fiction Award for his first novel, List of the Lost. The former lyricist and lead singer of The Smiths

41bergs47
Nov. 23, 2016, 4:57 am


Bad Sex 2016 Sort list for 2016

A Doubter’s Almanac by Ethan Canin

The Tobacconist by Robert Seethaler

Men Like Air by Tom Connolly

The Butcher’s Hook by Janet Ellis

Leave Me by Gayle Forman

The Day Before Happiness by Erri De Luca

The winner of this year’s award will be announced on Wednesday 30 November.

42bergs47
Jan. 17, 2017, 8:26 am

Erri De Luca has won the 24th annual Literary Review Bad Sex in Fiction Award for The Day Before Happiness

44bergs47
Dez. 1, 2017, 9:07 am

Christopher Bollen has won the 25th annual Literary Review Bad Sex in Fiction Award for The Destroyers

45Citizenjoyce
Dez. 1, 2017, 1:45 pm

>44 bergs47: No quote?

46bergs47
Dez. 1, 2017, 4:28 pm

as in the actual passage > 45?

47Citizenjoyce
Dez. 1, 2017, 11:29 pm

>46 bergs47: if you have it or a reference to it.

48Citizenjoyce
Dez. 4, 2017, 2:08 pm

>44 bergs47: Well, that was OK but I would have gone with Laurent Binet ‘Let’s construct an assemblage’. That was hilarious. Thanks for the post.

50bergs47
Dez. 26, 2018, 5:22 am

James Frey has won the 26th annual Literary Review Bad Sex in Fiction Award for Katerina

51susanbooks
Dez. 26, 2018, 7:54 am

Thanks for posting. I love this award

52Citizenjoyce
Dez. 26, 2018, 4:06 pm

I guess it’s fitting that James Frey would win the bad in any kind of literature award, but I would have had to vote for the peppermill sex offered by the two majors. Now, that was unique.

53gilroy
Dez. 26, 2018, 6:25 pm

The description in the two majors book made me squirm. That didn't sound good or pleasant or ... Yeah, No.

54Citizenjoyce
Dez. 27, 2018, 12:42 am

But if you're going for bad sex, I think this is about as far as you could go

55susanbooks
Dez. 27, 2018, 12:52 pm

The Murakami was appropriately nominated.

57justifiedsinner
Dez. 3, 2019, 2:20 pm

Not just bad sex but really bad writing.

58Citizenjoyce
Bearbeitet: Dez. 3, 2019, 5:06 pm

>56 bergs47: funny, I just read City of Girls and liked it, but I wondered when I read that passage if it would be included in this award. In her defense, she has to make sex seem more important than anything to the girl, and she does it with this passage.

59justifiedsinner
Dez. 4, 2019, 8:52 am

>58 Citizenjoyce: Phoebe Waller-Bridge managed that without ridiculous prose.

60JESHTISANJAY
Dez. 4, 2019, 11:53 am

Dieser Benutzer wurde wegen Spammens entfernt.

61Citizenjoyce
Dez. 4, 2019, 5:44 pm

>59 justifiedsinner: Well, who of us could stand being compared to Phoebe Waller-Bridge? They're writing about completely different types of characters.

62LolaWalser
Dez. 4, 2019, 7:42 pm

>59 justifiedsinner:

Oh, I'm curious, I've only seen two seasons of Killing Eve and the first one of Fleabag. Where did Waller-Bridge write a female character who cares most about sex?

63Citizenjoyce
Dez. 4, 2019, 8:17 pm

>62 LolaWalser: I think her Fleabag character. At least that's her back story.

64LolaWalser
Dez. 4, 2019, 9:03 pm

>63 Citizenjoyce:

Hmmm---well, I don't know what happens in Season 2, so... I guess I'd postpone final judgement.

But as far as what we see in Season 1 is concerned, if it's about her having slept with her friend's boyfriend, I see how that would be interpreted as putting sex above friendship, but to me that's a one-time incident, not a value-defining trait. Male characters sleep around and cheat all the time but no one judges sex is the most important thing to them--in fact, such behaviour is often taken as proof of how unimportant they find sex.

I think--but again, I may have to revise later--that Fleabag is supremely uninterested in sex for sex's sake--so the very opposite of someone to whom it's the most important thing in life. She's no Casanova, but a desperado (much before the incident) who uses sex for (temporary, fatally) self-validation, for getting at something that keeps escaping her.

It's like the difference between people scaling mountains because they love mountains and those who do it to prove something to themselves (or think they are mountain goats).

65Citizenjoyce
Dez. 4, 2019, 9:28 pm

>64 LolaWalser: Very well put. In City of Girls the sex act itself is taken into the center of Vivian's life, not to prove anything to anyone but for its unsurpassed ability to take her out of herself.

66LolaWalser
Dez. 4, 2019, 9:36 pm

>65 Citizenjoyce:

Sounds interesting--especially if she found the way to make the "taking out" last longer than seconds. :)

67Citizenjoyce
Dez. 4, 2019, 10:55 pm

>66 LolaWalser: Sometimes quantity has to suffice.

68justifiedsinner
Dez. 5, 2019, 10:02 am

>64 LolaWalser: Well, Waller-Bridge describes Fleabag as a "young, sex-obsessed, angry, dry-witted woman". The obsession is probably more prominent in her one-woman show which premiered at the Edinburgh Fringe and which led to the TV show. There's more going on in the TV show although the main plot points are still there. The text of the show, along with interviews and production history is published by Nick Hern Books.

69LolaWalser
Dez. 5, 2019, 3:14 pm

>68 justifiedsinner:

Yeah, maybe there's more in the context, but I don't get from that that sex is "the most important" thing in her life, though. I suppose it may depend on how one conceptualises the meaning of "the most important" or "being all about x", so, perhaps it's all semantics... but it seems to me there's a bigger difference in how we see this character than that.

As I parse the situation she's "sex-obsessed" (I would note this is a common throwaway phrase such as is often used to describe one's partiality to something--be it football, shoes, French cinema etc.) because she's "angry", and she's angry because she is suffering from guilt and other older wounds. I'm obsessed with fascist politics and positively hopping mad about them all the time, but I'd be flabbergasted if someone then concluded Trump and other fascists are "the most imortant thing" in my life. No. The most important thing in my life are my family, my young niece and nephew, the benighted lost priest-infested little country I came from, its almost vanished flora and fauna and ruined environment, its idiot people--they are why I'm obsessed with and made sick by politics.

Apologies for going for the personal example but it seems like the best way to explain the difference that may exist between being obsessed with something, and valuing something as "the most important". Fleabag is shown going after sex non-stop but she doesn't value it. It's not sex she places on top of her hierarchy of goods--certainly not after the traumatic event, and--I would argue--not even before it. Why do you think she did what she did?

Oh--assuming you're up for nattering about this... :)

I suppose the second season deals with these themes so there's no point to guessing how it's resolved. But I'll be astonished if it turns out there's a lesson that "mindless sex is bad for you, young people" or some such.

70Citizenjoyce
Dez. 5, 2019, 4:50 pm

>69 LolaWalser: As I recall, she does come to an epiphany about her sexual activity, but I can't remember which season. Sex absolutely is not centermost to her being as it is to Vivian's. I do see it sometimes as an expression of her anger.

71LolaWalser
Dez. 5, 2019, 5:20 pm

>70 Citizenjoyce:

I really ought to see the whole thing first... I have to say I liked Killing Eve better, although neither is really my cup of tea (much as I admire PWB's mega-talent). I absolutely love how it's all carried by women (Killing Eve), and how different the characters are, but I think I'm a leeetle out-cartoonish-violence-d--feels like a non-stop ride since Pulp Fiction. Even watching it all as a satire and grand guignol.

Have you seen Happy Valley though? It's amazing. Difficult (there is rape and other violence) but really good.

Ooops apologies for driving the thread off topic...

72Citizenjoyce
Dez. 6, 2019, 12:03 am

I do love Killing Eve. I'm so glad Sandra Oh got out of the hospital soap opera. Sadly, I guess I'm inured to some violence. Not rape and not violence against women, but that's not much of what's going on with Eve.
I haven't heard of Happy Valley. Is it streaming somewhere? Yikes, we did derail the topic for a bit.

73LolaWalser
Dez. 6, 2019, 2:38 pm

>72 Citizenjoyce:

Well, until someone comes in with a broom to shoo us away... :)

Omg, you're in for a treat with Happy Valley if you can find it! I borrowed it from the library, two seasons (so far? I think I saw some talk about making a third but not sure.) Sorry, I don't do streaming so no idea but it's a few years old now so maybe... not? Or yes? Don't know how that works... Anyway, it's one of the same writers who did Scott & Bailey, plus that fabulous ball of magnificence that is Sarah Lancashire. She's a 40+ cop in a small town, divocrced, raising a grandson who is the result of her daughter's rape. The daughter killed herself after his birth. We don't see those events, that happened 7-8 years before.

Then the rapist is released and learns about the child.

It sounds grim as all get-out and yes it is heart-wrenching but the characters are fantastic, and there is so much warmth and (I say this reluctantly, make-believe involving make-believe) reality or, uh, a sense of the real.

74Citizenjoyce
Bearbeitet: Dez. 6, 2019, 2:50 pm

>73 LolaWalser: wow
ETA just found both seasons at my local library. Thanks.

75LolaWalser
Dez. 6, 2019, 3:16 pm

>74 Citizenjoyce:

That's great!--I'd love to hear what you thought.

76Citizenjoyce
Dez. 7, 2019, 4:12 am

I've seen the first two episodes. Somehow, in spite of your description, I thought it would be a comedy. This might be too much for me.

77LolaWalser
Dez. 7, 2019, 12:54 pm

Definitely not a comedy. But the characters have a sense of humour, those one cares for anyway.

78Citizenjoyce
Dez. 7, 2019, 4:09 pm

I love the characters. I love the complexities involving decision making, it just the crime at the heart of the show that has me cringing. The only other time I’d seen James Norton was in Grantchester where, of course, I couldn’t get over how gorgeous he was. He is terrifying. I’ve seen 3 episodes now, I’ll probably watch at least the rest of the first season, but, wow, his character has me really spooked. While everything about Sarah Lancashire makes me want to know more and more. You’re right. It’s very good but much more effectively violent than Killing Eve or even Pulp Fiction. And to fit with the topic of the group, the sex is believable and not bad at all.

79LolaWalser
Dez. 8, 2019, 2:38 pm

And to fit with the topic of the group, the sex is believable and not bad at all.

Nicely done! :)

I wasn't familiar with Norton and I'm afraid this role forever branded him to my eyes, but yes what a fantastic job he did.

It's a heavy, heavy theme and I totally get that some may not bear with it--I'm surprised I did. But if you can steel yourself--and as you say, if you get invested in Sarah's character--then you really should see at least to the end of Season 1, as there's a huge, cathartic payoff. Not just for her (and I don't mean just the one particular sequence), but, IMO, for the viewer(s) in general, it's just... dare I say, after all the dark, uplifting. In relation to human spirit, to women's spirit and resilience, the real strength.

80Citizenjoyce
Dez. 8, 2019, 3:25 pm

I have 1 more episode to view in the first season. Whew, I'm glad I got through the horrible parts - so far. Funny, on Grantchester Norton plays a priest or minister who solves crimes with his detective buddy and has a forbidden love of a rich woman. I'm not a big mystery person and no longer a fan of forbidden love so didn't watch many episodes, but you would never think the same man could play someone who is so effortlessly good and also the monster of Happy Valley. I love the characters of Sarah and her sister. Great complex parts for women

81LolaWalser
Dez. 8, 2019, 3:29 pm

I love the characters of Sarah and her sister. Great complex parts for women

Yes, THIS! Women written like people, not The Sex Object, The Mother, The Caregiver etc.

I think the sister is actually one of the writers--and (co)creators (?) on both this and Scott & Bailey.

82Citizenjoyce
Dez. 9, 2019, 1:51 pm

Really one of the most satisfying endings of a season ever. Wow.

83LolaWalser
Dez. 9, 2019, 2:45 pm

👍😁👏

84bergs47
Dez. 29, 2020, 8:40 am

The ‘Bad Sex In Fiction’ Award Is Canceled, Because Everything Is Already Awful

The Literary Review magazine has announced the cancellation of this year’s “Bad Sex in Fiction” award, because 2020 has already offered more than its fair share of horrors.

The editors who run the contest stated:

“The judges felt that the public had been subjected to too many bad things this year to justify exposing it to bad sex as well. They warned, however, that the cancellation of the 2020 awards should not be taken as a license to write bad sex.”

85Nickelini
Dez. 29, 2020, 11:00 am

>84 bergs47:
Niiiice!!

86Citizenjoyce
Dez. 29, 2020, 4:08 pm

>84 bergs47: But no. Bad sex is so entertaining.