When the Twilight franchise inspired E.L. James to put pen to paper to create Fifty Shades Of Grey, it set in motion a global phenomenon that would make her a millionaire several times over, make a pin-up of Jamie Dornan, and make the sight of commuters reading erotic fiction on the Tube about as surprising as delays on the District Line.
Now, a year after Dornan and Dakota Johnson hung up their handcuffs following a final outing as Christian and Anastasia Grey in the last of three movie adaptations, James is back. Her first post-Grey bonkbuster, The Mister, features an aristocratic British playboy instead of a billionaire businessman with a penchant for gauche students and BDSM, and it’s already rocketed to the top of book charts – despite having failed to arouse excitement among critics, who have pronounced it variously “dull”, “ghastly”, and “excruciating”.
Such reviews are unlikely to have anyone rushing to their local Waterstones, but Dr Merve Emre, an author, critic, and associate professor of English at the University of Oxford, points out that erotica as a genre has much to offer readers beyond James’s red room of pain. Here, she shares eight risqué recommendations with Vogue…
