"In the shower, Ed stood with his hands at the back of his head, like someone just arrested, while she abused him with a bar of soap."
This was just one of many fantastically painful sex scenes that earned David Guterson's novel, Ed King, a nomination for Literary Review's 19th annual, Bad Sex in Fiction award.
Being nominated for the worst sex scene in fiction is a mixed blessing as it means your work was at least noticed by mainstream critics. If the competition opened to romance writers, or bloggers, awarding the worst sex scene would be like trying to find the worst acting in porn.
This article appears in Nov 24-30, 2011.