Have you had that moment when you were reading an inappropriate book at an 
inappropriate time and place? Do you think anything that you deign to read is inappropriate?
How about that time on the tube while you were reading Fifty Shades of Grey and having an erotic interlude in your head and the person behind you or beside you peeped into your book. Maybe they couldn’t help it because it was too crowded. Then, your eyes meet and you both know that he knows what you were reading. The space in the train just got smaller because there’s an elephant in the room and you start counting stops.
A while ago an Indian journalist friend of mine posed a question on social media, ‘would you openly read Fifty Shades of Grey on public transport in India? Or, would you conceal its cover, so that no one knew what you were reading.
I think I would openly read it but, I would conceal it if it had a racy cover. Imagine a train full of people surreptitiously glancing at your reading material. Are they forming opinions about you? Would you mind? I might be too busy reading to bother but, I did have a habit of covering my racy romantic reads in old newspapers once upon a time.
The Book Drifter 
Stopping by from the A to Z Challenge.
When I think about it – maybe when I was in my teens – I may have been reading a slightly racy Sidney Sheldon or something similar (it’s irritating that I can’t recall the book names right now) and had an uncle / aunt walk into the lounge. As far as 50 Shades goes – I wouldn’t spend my money on that book. I just don’t see the big deal about it.
Personally I’m not fussed whether a book has a racy cover or not and whether or not anyone sees me reading it (or even formed an opinion about it). The beauty about being on a train full of people is that everyone is doing their own thing and even if they do happen to look over and see the racy cover; they’d probably be wishing they could be reading the same book LOL
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This reminded me of the time when I went to say “Hi” to a 12-year-old in a bookshop where I had just finished interviewing his father, an author. The 12-year-old was reading something and I, for the sake of conversation, asked in as friendly a tone as possible what was the book. He blushed and tried to pass it off, but by that time I had noticed that it was the (in)famous Fifty Shades… Both to suppress my laughter and to spare the young man further blushes (and to stop myself from blurting out “Should you be reading that?”) I waved him a smiling goodbye and left rather hurriedly, but probably not in as much haste as he was to see me gone!
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