Since 1993, the Literary Review has presented an annual Bad Sex in Fiction Award for the worst description of a sex scene in a novel – and this year that honour went to Rowan Somerville, who narrowly edged out Franzen and Campbell with the sexy, sexy line “like a lepidopterist mounting a tough-skinned insect with a too blunt pin he screwed himself into her.”

It gets better, though! Read:

“He unbuttoned the front of her shirt and pulled it to the side so that her breast was uncovered, her nipple poking out, upturned like the nose of the loveliest nocturnal animal, sniffing in the night.”

And if that doesn’t get you all in-a-lather, how about pairing oral sexiness with tiny birds?

“She loosed his trousers, pulled away his underwear and gripped him with fingers tender enough to hold a tiny bird.”

And to round off all that animal imagery,

“She stayed his hand and drew him, yanked him, into a smothering kiss. She released his hair from her fingers and twisted onto her belly like a fish flipping itself, her movement so brusque his chin bounced off her head.”

Which tells us that, when Rowan Somerville thinks about sexy animals, he mostly thinks about nocturnal mammals, butterflies,  fish, and tiny birds. Awww yeeah.

[via The Guardian]