Does sex sell?

If someone you only slightly know asks you to review the first few chapters of her book and you agree to do it, how honest should you be? Joanne has an apartment next door to my office. I recognize her from when I used to throw parties for Crain at her restaurant. We wave, say hello, but not until the other day, have we had more than a passing conversation. She called out to me and said that she had written a book and needed some feedback on it. I asked her if she needed it edited. "Oh no, I've already had someone do that." Being the dope that I am, I said sure. I had helped my friend Amy promote her book on Mackinac Island and it was a lot of fun.

OK, so she gives me the typed text in the alley behind the building and off I go with this new project. She had told me the premise of the book was today's views on marriage and what women will do to get the "white dress." The chapters were fairly well-written , although a lot of editing still needed to be done so I began by marking up the grammatical errors. Anyway, a few paragraphs into it, the sex started. Of the 100 or so pages she gave me, I think 90% of them had some graphic explanations of this or that. I don't mind a good love story that gets steamy, but there wasn't a story anywhere in this. It was loosely based on the people in a restaurant but she didn't really spend anytime building characters. Most of the time it was all about quickies in the back room.

I saw her yesterday across the fence and let her know that I had finished her pages and that I was ready to give them back to her. She asked what I thought. I babbled a bit about character development, told her I had made notes on the pages and rushed off to my car. What do I tell her? I don't want to crush her dream. She's obviously spent a lot of time on this. On the other hand, I don't have a lot of extra time to help her develop a stronger book. Or am I just an old prude? I just want to give her the notebook back and be done with the whole thing. Ugh!