Author could be guilty of bad sex

Published on 21/11/2012 01:39

AUTHOR Tom Wolfe is in competition with Newsnight economics editor Paul Mason for one of the literary world’s least sought-after prizes – the Bad Sex Award.

Also in the running for the annual prize, presented by Literary Review, is a novel by Nicholas Coleridge, the boss of glossy magazine publisher Conde Nast, .

The accolade is awarded to the “most egregious passage of sexual description in a novel” and is in its 20th year.

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, and Back to Blood by Tom Wolfe.

The award is designed to discourage and “draw attention to the crude, badly written, often perfunctory” passages of sexual description in novels.

The judges said they gave lengthy consideration to the first adult novel written by Harry Potter author JK Rowling, The Casual Vacancy. However they decided “the book’s sins were venal compared with the competition”.

In a year in which the country’s obsession with “mummy porn”, red rooms of pain and Christian Grey has reached fever pitch, Literary Review is proud to continue its gentle chastisement of the worst excesses of the literary novel.

The Fifty Shades Of Grey series was ineligible as the prize is not open to erotic literature.

The winner will be announced at a ceremony in London on 4 December.