E.L. James's "Fifty Shades of Grey'

I finally succumbed to the hype surrounding Fifty Shades of Grey, E. L. James's New York Times bestselling romance novel about a blushing virgin who's ravished by a wealthy, attractive and powerful sadomasochist who owns a helicopter. I bought a copy and read it from cover to cover this past weekend while devouring honey-soaked pastries from a Greek festival I attended on Saturday afternoon. The baklava, at least, was satisfying.

As a middle-aged woman with a daughter several years older than James's main characters, I had trouble getting worked up about this "romance." Many 20-somethings are surely attractive and fun, but when it comes to sexual fantasies, they're amateurs. I prefer conjuring up someone who has been around a while: a man with a few laugh lines and wrinkles and some kind of history and perspective, not to mention sexual experience.

So I was disappointed that James's characters are so fresh-from-the-cradle, and doubly disappointed by the central character, the aforementioned blushing virgin Anastasia. Between TV, movies, the Internet and one's well-informed friends, good luck guarding anyone's innocence much past the age of six.

Stone Age coupling

In a romance novel, however, we are supposed to suspend our disbelief. So I willingly acquiesced to this setup until James introduced the possibility of actually being suspended from the ceiling for the purposes of sadistic "pleasuring." Back in the Stone Age when I was a virgin or close to it, coupling to the roar of dinosaurs was excitement enough. Who can keep a straight face while reading about the whips, chains or other contraptions that James's Mr. Grey keeps in his secret room?

I will confess to being titillated by the idea of being dominated by a strong, powerful man, although I don't know why. It's not something I'd ever tolerate in real life. Maybe it's the idea of not being responsible— of handing one's power over to someone else. But what makes pain sexy?

To her credit, E. L. James is adept at writing sex scenes— no small talent, and I admire her for it. Millions of people love her trilogy, and one obvious reason is James's ability to describe sexual encounters so much better than the usual heaving bosoms and throbbing members that you generally find in romance novels. And I wish I had her marketing team. These people are geniuses.

Real suffering

But I do wish there were more characters in romance novels my age or older. And even if an author is capable of crafting an S & M relationship that's enthralling to mainstream readers, I already know (by virtue of having lived more than half a century) that suffering— well beyond anything a riding crop can provide— comes to us all if we live long enough.

All that said, no doubt that I'll buy Books II and III of the James trilogy, and so will most people who read the first one. I may have been dragged kicking and screaming into this story, but now I'm hooked. I want to know what happens next to this improbable couple.

But men and women whose hearts have been broken repeatedly through every sort of loss imaginable, with skin that's age-spotted, creased and wrinkled, who are willing to lie down with each other one more time, naked in body and soul— now, that is vulnerability. That is romance.

If you wrote a book about me, you could still call it Fifty Shades of Grey. But there wouldn't be a whip or chain in sight.