Bad Sex In Fiction, 2008

The results are in: John Updike has been titled the Laureate of bad sex writing, and author Rachel Johnson picked up the grand prize for having composed the absolute worst description of a sexual encounter during the past year at the Bad Sex In Fiction awards, courtesy the UK's The Literary Review. The award, of course, is all in good fun — anything can sound lame if taken out of context — and this years' winner, Shire Hell, quite clearly identifies itself as satire, so the amount of earnest effort put in doesn't seem to count for or against you. Johnson at least has the ability to fall back on the assertion that she was trying to write amusing sex. I don't know what excuse Updike has.