The Literary Review has been conducting the Bad Sex in Fiction Award since 1993. They put the spotlight on bestselling and indie authors who often write cringe-worthy bits about their characters doing it.
This year’s nominees include Before, During, After by Richard Bausch, Book of Numbers by Joshua Cohen, Against Nature by Tomas Espedal, Fates and Furies by Lauren Groff, The Making of Zombie Wars by Aleksandar Hemon, Fear of Dying by Erica Jong, List of the Lost by Morrissey, and The Martini Shot by George Pelecanos. According to the Review, “The purpose of the prize is to draw attention to poorly written, perfunctory or redundant passages of sexual description in modern fiction, and to discourage them.”
Instead of just writing about the specific passages there is a new video by the folks at Maxim that actually read them all aloud in a video. It is quite excellent and worth checking out.
Michael Kozlowski is the editor-in-chief at Good e-Reader and has written about audiobooks and e-readers for the past fifteen years. Newspapers and websites such as the CBC, CNET, Engadget, Huffington Post and the New York Times have picked up his articles. He Lives in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
