By AMY O.
For some reason, I thought I would have some crazy spring break (#springbreaknoshirts) tale of sex on the beach or sex in a grimy club or something to that effect. Alas, here I am back on campus and, even though I made out with two frat bros, I don’t have any super scandalous tales to tell. Not that I’m complaining really — doing anything in a grimy club honestly sounds like it’s a recipe for disaster (and by disaster I mean getting an STD).
To be completely honest, the closest I came to coming (see what I did there?) was reading this really trashy book on the beach. Oh, and it didn’t stop there. I purchased the whole trilogy and read the entire 700-page ordeal during the course of the vacation. What’s worse is that I couldn’t put it down. Come on, the twisted love story between a woman who obsessively stalks men and a man who manipulates women into loving him before crushing their hearts sounded like a really good read.
In my defense, I only bought this piece of trash because it was on the New York Times’ bestseller list. Whoever the F decided it belonged there should probably have his or her eyes gouged out and privileges revoked because there is just no way a book in which every third word is either “clit” or “throbbing” should be a bestseller. I was expecting a thriller romance novel; instead, I pretty much just got porn.
As I continued to read the series, I realized in every steamy sex scene just how unrealistic the sex is. The woman, Alayna, looks at her man, Hudson, and immediately gets turned on and wet. In the course of my life I don’t think I have ever looked at a man and gotten wet without zero stimulation of any sort. And it gets worse.
In every sex scene, the sex is incredible for both parties! Alayna reaches orgasm multiple times and Hudson finishes every single time, saying her name over and over. I’m sorry. Though this has happened to me on a few occasions, it has never been a consistent occurrence — and I don’t think this is just me. Not only do I know many women who can’t finish at all from sex at all, but also I know very few people who have finished again and again and again. Maybe it’s just that Cornell men are inept, but …
The unrealistic expectations that books like these establish piss me off. Just recently, I took a guy home and he didn’t finish. Blame it on the alcohol or whatever you want, but he just didn’t finish. I didn’t finish. But guess what? Ultimately, it didn’t matter. It was drunken debauchery. It was whatever. I was just happy to roll over, be little spoon and pass out.
The problem here is that books like the Fixed trilogy set up completely absurd notions of what sex is supposed to be. See for us plebeians, sex is actually not mind-blowing every time! Sex is usually kind of awkward! Sometimes, neither party finishes! Having these crazy expectations of what sex shoulda-coulda-woulda been simply isn’t fair. It holds both parties to a ridiculously high standard that most people just cannot achieve.
I admit, reading the Fixed trilogy was fun. It was perfect for a beach vacation with my closest girlfriends who wouldn’t care that I was pretty much reading erotica on the beach. However, this book (and other books like it) have the potential to completely warp the expectations of sex for men and women alike. Forgive me for this angry rant but sex is great in all its forms. Sometimes it’s good, sometimes it’s eh, but each time it is what it is and shouldn’t try to be anything greater than that.