Twilight (The Twilight Saga, Book 1)
by Stephenie Meyer
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Book Reviews of Twilight (The Twilight Saga, Book 1)
Book Review: Impact
Summary: 4 Stars
As a working professional mother I have little time for reading, so I am (and perhaps always have been) a literary snob. When I do find time, I stick to the classics, fiction and non-fiction, and, more recently, again due to time constraints, short fiction of highly regarded authors. E.g. my most recent read (before Twilight) was "The Great Game: The Struggle for Empire in Central Asia" and selected writings of Mark Twain (wonderful) and Dorothy Parker (nice but disappointing). With an English teacher and would-be writer as a mom, I had easy access to the best stuff quite early on. My favourites as a teen definitely included science fiction (Asimov, Huxley, Bradbury). Among other things, I also read everything by Hemingway (considered a "lightweight" by some?). Point being that prior to starting the Twilight series, the closest I ever came to reading popular best-seller was about 20 yrs ago (an Ayn Rand, to see what the fuss was about). However, be forewarned that, as you will see below, I address the question on a very personal note.
Why did I start Twilight? My 13 yr old daughter seems finally to have started to "graduate" from Manga (whew!) to the vampire romance genre. She now tells me bedtime stories about incredibly powerful but disturbingly anti-social female vampire girls, and, frankly, I was getting a little worried. I thought it was time I sampled the fare she was reading. I said to her, "Give me the best you've got, " and it only took her 30 seconds to find her copy of "Twilight" and hand it over. That said, she doesn't even come close to being among the more obsessed fans.
So, you can perhaps see why I am incredibly embarrassed to say that I was mesmerized. By the last page of Twilight, I had the uncanny feeling of having relived adolescence, moment by moment... the naivety, the foolishness, the illusions, the hormone rush. Meyer's rendition of first love, and of infatuation (even the kinds we sometimes experience beyond teen-hood), was nothing short of vivid. I think I may have held my breath throughout all of chapter 13 at the acuteness with which she rendered the powerful and foreboding emotions and physical interplay of first sexual encounters of youth. (I was intrigued to learn that this chapter came to her is a dream that inspired the book.)
Edward - the (dark) prince charming - is a strikingly accurate metaphor for nearly every girl's actual experience with the "first big crush", with his dark side accentuating the universal (and particularly adolescent) thrill of first sexual forays as an exercise in the forbidden. As girls, in real life we are usually utterly and naively convinced that whoever is the target of affection, and frequently undeservedly so, he is somehow perfect in every way, not to mention a strong and wise protector. Meanwhile, unless I'm mistaken, in real life, most adolescent boys in the equation are abused of the same notion, proudly and naively strutting hand in hand with the girl, posing as her knight in shining armour. Other aspects of adolescence that Meyer brings home with incredible immediacy (and which often form the crux of criticism) are the banality of the banter and the self absorption and lack of maturity or focus of the characters (had you chosen your future career path by the age of 16?). While this may contribute, in part, to a two dimensional characterization of Bella and Edward, I think another part of the problem is that the some readers, young and old, may be loathe to remember or admit that we really were (or are?) that way. Didn't we mistake sarcasm for wit, arrogance for intelligence, possessiveness and brooding for declarations of love? Didn't we play stupid verbal games and have petty arguments over nothing, rooted in inexperience and insecurity about our first close ties beyond the family circle? Weren't we shamelessly inflicting our moods and emotions on our beau, often for no other reason than to experiment with their effect on another human being?
Bella? To those who say Bella is boring, I fear that some folks probably do think that a bookworm who isn't on the "most popular" list, doesn't like parties or dressing up, blanches at the idea of going to a prom or early marriage and doesn't need a bevy of friends surrounding her is boring. I submit that vast majority of adolescents, and other humans, are more like her than not. Tell me, what were the redeeming graces of Holden Caulfield in "Catcher in the Rye". Classic or not, the book cast him as infuriatingly self-absorbed and mindlessly insensitive to those around him. Some readers have criticized Bella's character as flawed for so callously using Jacob. Perhaps, also, we're ashamed to admit that we all (male and female) likely had a Jacob in our lives at some point. That person we dated on the "rebound", because they were there, because they were such a kind and likable person, but who didn't inspire in us the passion we though love should be all about. There is scornful criticism that Bella is so shallow that she had nothing to live for, by the second instalment, once Edward leaves. Again, I wonder, have so few of us experienced something akin to the agony Bella went through at the jolt of our "first big break-up"? I know I did - it took me a year - the best way I can describe it is coping with a death - a death of my illusions, perhaps. Much later, I could see more clearly that, although he was incredibly handsome, muscular and brilliant (no, really!), he was actually over-domineering and there were misogynistic tinges to his sheer (and intoxicating) adoration of me. While away at grad school, I got a call from my mother when my sister got that fateful phone call from her first big love -- I was told she literally had to be scraped off the kitchen floor and carried to her bed. This isn't just a girl thing, mind you. I spoke not long ago with a friend about how her son, a good student, fell completely apart at such a time, to the point of failing out of high school. He's been trying to recoup ever since. Did Meyer really get that so wrong?
If we're lucky, we mature to realize that passion and love are not synonyms, that infatuation is suspect - a drug that seriously warps the senses. If we're lucky, we were able to emerge from our first big break-up as a stronger, perhaps wiser person. If we learn from our mistakes, we realize that the kind of person we fall in love with in high school is a far cry from the one we seek out when we're 25 years old, or 35 years old, that the ones we really ought to marry are the Jacobs or even the Mikes out there. But that's life, not fiction.
Moral message? Should Bella do so much sneaking around behind her father's back? Get real. Apparently, even a Mormon has to own up to the facts of life. Some readers are infuriated at the happy ending, that Bella doesn't pay for her self absorption and doesn't have to grow up. Instead, girl gets boy back and marries prince charming, and right out of high school, no less! Where's the college and career ambition? In this, too, I'm fairly forgiving, even though I explicitly raise my children to expect to go to college and beyond and, like Renée, hope they will marry late enough to know reasonably well what they're doing. Aren't fairy takes supposed to have happy endings? One reader argues that fairly tales are supposed to teach a moral lesson and that, even if viewed as such, this one doesn't. Well, find me one single fairy tail involving a Prince Charming that teaches girls to be strong, independent, and assume responsibility for themselves. No, the ones with Prince Charming in them are sheer fantasies about the impossible; commoners making good -rags to riches in a feudal era. I might add that the classics are also littered with women who ultimately fail, even on the somewhat rare occasions (think, Ana Karenina, or for that matter, even Kira in "We the Living") when they appear to be headstrong and intelligent. I'm intrigued to say, that my daughter's own made-up vampire stories feature extremely strong and stubborn girls who don't fall for the guy at all, but rather ignore or rebuff his adoring advances. That is bound to change. Perhaps, the one redeeming grace is that with so little emotional guidance out there, the story might help kids realize, when their turn comes for the inevitable heart wrenching experiences, that they aren't alone.
Writing? I won't begin to try to argue that Meyer is a literary heavyweight - but certainly a cut well above pulp fiction. A good writer is not supposed to "stoop" to clichés, right? Yet, it has struck me - although I could be giving Meyer too much credit -- how does one write for and about teenagers, in a setting of back-woods middle America, in an authentic and accessible voice without writing in the vernacular? Teenagers simply don't sound like Shakespeare, or Updike. Like the clothes they wear, they usually talk (and think?) in a way (maddeningly, to some) that reflects the latest in pop culture. Another feature of good writing is creating tension and suspense, and that the characters are well-developed so that the reader can be interested in them and want to know what happens to them and how they confront the inevitable challenges the story inflicts on them. On both of these scores, Meyer is very good. The only character I didn't get a feel for was Emmett, the brawny one (and discovered that a delightful passage revealing his playful side had hit the cutting room floor). I believe that an attachment to the characters is what drove me (even more incredulously) to the sequels. I also wonder whether I was driven by the prurient interest akin to following soap operas (another thing I've never done). Finally, one of my more personal prerequisites for decent fiction (and one that I always stressed when critiquing my mother's manuscripts for her) is that it allows the reader to see and feel the story. On this score, by using a seemingly simple blend of dialogue, body language, and sensory perceptions, I found Meyer to be right on the mark. For my part, I was living the story as I read.
I have, by the way, read Harry Potter and other prize winning youth literature to my kids, hoping to stoke their interest in books (and kept reading after putting the lights out). It did nothing for my son; Potter's a fantastic read, but we were perhaps a bit put off by the British vernacular and boarding school thing. For what it's worth, my daughter is now an avid reader, no thanks to Harry Potter. The turning point for her a few years ago was our discovery of the quite silly Melanie Martin series. She realized that books didn't have to be serious but could be humorous and fun. Sure, I'm a chagrined that my daughter hasn't graduated to more classic fare, but I'm confident that will come.
Is the series worth the time? I found the time, somehow, in the small margins of my otherwise very busy schedule, and I'm not sorry I did. Rather, I'm mostly mystified, and a little embarrassed at how it hit me like the proverbial truck (run over by Bella's pickup?). Am I simply more of a sucker for a good love story than I ever imagined? (I cry without fail at the end of Zeffirelli's Romeo and Juliet, but oddly, not when they die, but at the exact moment the Friar realizes what a mess he's made.) Would I have been a shameless addict to soap operas, were I not "over" educated? Like much of reading, in general, the Twilight experience is so very personal. Try it and see.
Book Review: "You're the only thing it would hurt me to lose"
Summary: 3 Stars
I started helping out in my church's youth group not too long ago, and the girls there raved about "Twilight". So I figured I might as well get an idea of what the heck they are talking about.
Isabella Swan, better known as Bella, is seventeen. Not long after her mom remarries a man who travels quite a bit, Bella decides to move from sunny Phoenix, Arizona to cloudy Forks, Washington to spend some time with her dad, Charlie. But not all is as it seems in Forks. There, she meets the Cullens, a strange, standoffish family. Through her interactions with Edward, she realizes that the family is something no one ever dreamed: vampire!
What I Liked:
Actually, I hadn't planned on starting "Twilight" so soon. I had figured I would buy it and put it on my stack to read at a later date. But curiosity led me to read the first page...then the second...before I knew it, I finished the chapter and had put away the previous book I had started (something I almost never do).
What was it about the first few pages that pulled me in? Well, I think if anything, it was how similar Bella was to me. Seventeen year old Bella lived in sunny Phoenix before moving to cloudy, rainy Forks. Her dad is rather withdrawn. She is plain (according to her description, not to Edward). She was unnoticed. And she had no notable romantic experience. All of these descriptions could be attributed to me!
Furthermore, Stephanie's writing style was very good on the eyes. Normally, a 500 page book is nearly impossible for me to haul through; this one, I breezed through (of course, it could be that a lot of the material is filler...). The writing is conversational, perfect for the first person view. Not to mention, that Meyer as Bella speaks as I feel a 17 year old would--not stupid, but definitely not a mature adult.
The romance in some aspects wasn't bad (the first 200 pages was great and the Edward-Bella relationship mirroring Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy from "Pride and Prejudice"), but what really perked my interest (again) was the action in the last 100 pages. Here, Bella is on the run from a vampire...will she live or will she die? (Given that there are three other books, you can probably figure she doesn't die, but still, it is intense!) The Cullens band together to protect her, she flees Forks...I mean, this kept me on the edge of my seat, wondering how the heck Meyer would wrap it up. And she does so very well in my opinion.
What I Did Not Like:
As suspected, this book had a few aspects that I found rather juvenile (of course, the book is in the young adult section for a reason) and/or irritating. In a vague order of most annoying at the top, here it goes:
1.Repetitive. Lord, have mercy, Meyer could have saved probably half the book if she didn't feel the need to detail every single movement, every single glare, eye shifting, seat shift, voice inflection change, and anything else under the sun. Seriously, I cannot tell you how many times that Edward or Bella will glare, growl, narrow their eyes, or say the same things (particularly Bella detailing how godlike Edward looks). I understand that description is important, but by the one billionth time, I think we get the picture.
2.Sparkly Vampires. I don't know a huge amount of vampires, haven't really been drawn into that sector of the reading section (until now), but I do know that sparkly vampires isn't a typical phenomenon. I can take the other deviations from what I've seen of TV (garlic, opposition to sun, crosses, gold bullets, etc.), but this one is just too challenging to believe in no matter how you cut it. Sparkly vampires? How do they sparkle if they are dead and have no sweat? Do they have light bulbs under the skin? Why? I mean, fiction doesn't always have to have an answer to the logical, but I cannot in my right mind suspend belief that any being would sparkle like a teen girl's MySpace avatar.
3.Edward. Our hero is most definitely a Mary Sue. The Adonis (one of Meyer's favorite terms to describe him) is not only gorgeous (duh), soft-hearted, strong, fast, quick-minded, smart, and heroic, but he is also humble to a fault, bowing to Bella's beauty (what the heck?--see Bella for elaboration). Any rage he feels is outrage over someone being mean to Bella, which is, like, completely and totally justified (uh-huh, sure), or being mean to Bella for taking her life in her hands and (gasp) harming him in the meantime (the "don't you know how much it would hurt me if something bad happened to you line", quite interesting as he barely knows her through much of the book). Anyone over the age of 30 (I am being overly generous) is going to groan at his language, at Bella's descriptions for him (and, let me tell you, if Meyer's cut back on her descriptions of the demi-god to one quarter, half her book would be gone), and his mercurial body language (grinning one minute, glaring the next, and then laughing the next is very extremely confusing to the reader). All in all, I had a hard time really liking Edward.
4.Bella. On one hand, I enjoyed her plainness. On the other, I found it incompatible with not one, not two, but three requests to go to a dance and everyone's immediate and permanent (I can understand a little bit since she is new to town) infatuation with her. How does Edward fall in love with a plain girl? What beauty (besides her scent) does he find in her? (Not that beauty is always external, but let's face it, Bella can be downright rude and anti-social so it wasn't that aspect that drew Edward to her.) Another particularly disturbing part comes after Bella learns how to become a vampire. She begs Edward to let her; he refuses. The fact that bothers me is how she is so ready to completely throw herself at Edward, turning her back on her parents and other friends (Jessica, Angela...I know she wasn't that close to them but still) all for the love of one man. Couple that with lines like "Would I ever get used to his perfection?" and "Well, it would be nice if I could find just one thing [Edward] didn't do better than everyone else on the planet" and fainting after Edward kisses her (cue eye roll), and Bella becomes an impossible character.
5.Filler. So I loved the first 200 or so pages, including the bickering between Edward and Bella (it was done remarkably well, minus the "Edward is perfect" factor) and the last 100 pages of the chase, but everything else is filler to make the book bigger. I really don't think it added much to the story and, in fact, can barely remember most of it.
Dialogue/Sexual Situations/Violence:
Tame. Oh, one or two da** and he** (other than circumspectly referring to sex).
The entire story is a romance (with vampires, of course), but the sexual situations are rather tame. Of course, you have disturbing images of Edward skulking in Bella's bedroom, how easy Bella is able to adjust to cuddling next to a cold-blooded (ha!) killer, and kissing (including heroine fainting), but nothing that is really inappropriate for the genre it was written for.
Edward and his friendly vampires subside on wild game. While these encounters are never shown, they are referenced. Bella is rather clumsy and gets into several scrapes...including ones that make her end up in the hospital. One of the Other Vampires catches Bella's scent and the hunt is on.
Overall:
I know this review will get flamed if I don't give it a stellar 5 star rating, and I know it will fair no better if I give it a 1 star rating. So I will be honest.
The tenderhearted, romantic teenager in me wants to give "Twilight" a stellar 4 - 5 stars (give or take how much eye rolling ensues). A girl moving away from familiarity and finding love in the hands of the unexpected touches at the core, at what I used to dream. Were I a teenager like Bella, I would probably enjoy the book much, much more.
But the adult in me can't overlook the road bumps. Mary Sues, filler, and the uncomfortable fact that Bella is willing in a heartbeat to give up her humanity for a man she's known all of maybe 6 months glare at me in the face. If I met a vampire, what would be my reaction? Immediate approval, acceptance, love, and desire to become like him? A willingness to give up my humanity, my family, my friends, my way of life just to be with one person? Or discretion, gradual openness, and careful thought? Holding said vampire at a distance, remembering those that I love, but trying my best to be open with the newcomer? I would like to think that it would be the latter, that I wouldn't plunge headlong into something I know so very little about.
All in all, I give "Twilight" a 3.5 stars rounded to 3 because of Amazon's rating system. A well-done story in many regards, but most definitely for the teenaged girl in all of us, who won't be thinking about the repercussions of a simple love story.
Brought to you by
*C.S. Light*
Book Review: Addictive Young Adult Fiction
Summary: 4 Stars
Let me start by explaining a bit about me and the way I look at books. I have a master's degree in literature. I read a lot of books, but I judge books according to what they purport to be. I love James Joyce's Ulysses, but I also love the Twilight series--for entirely different reasons.
I am more than a little perturbed by reviewers who, for lack of a better term, I'll call literature snobs. Who have developed some arrogant literary paradigm for what a book should be in their heads and so proceed to bash books that do not fit their paradigm. This bashing of course echoes that of any other snobbish group mocking people whom they see as their lessers whether it is the country-club member's view of the working man or the cheerleader's mocking of artistic girl (since we are talking YA fiction here). I don't know why such people bother to review popular fiction, except perhaps to help reaffirm their self-perpetuated feelings of superiority.
Such reviewers usually begin by falsely asserting that they wanted to like the book, or thought it really could have been good, but such assertions usually prove to be hugely insincere by the fact that they seem to have read the book looking for every flaw they could find. It is more likely that such reviewers set out to find fault with a popular book simply to maintain the idea that anything loved by the unrefined masses couldn't really be good. Their reviews usually resolve on some vague and undefined criticism of plot or characters: characters are shallow, or the plot drags. These criticisms, of course, are meaningless because the review doesn't give their criteria for what constitutes a shallow character or a dragging plot. If they did, most of us could recognize that the reviewer uses different criteria to judge a book than most of us.
As far as popular literature goes, check it out at the library and judge it according to your own criteria, but remember what the book is trying to be: popular. In the case of Twilight, it is trying to be a popular Young Adult Fantasy. In other words, it is meant to be escape fiction, entertainment, a fun ride, and not "high art" or "literature"--since some people have the arrogance to try and define such things. I highly recommend it as such for the following reasons:
For this genre, and I enjoy the genre--I even enjoy reading books that I couldn't rate higher than three stars, which would be generous, Twilight is fairly well-written, meaning true errors in grammar, syntax, punctuation, and style are few. There are some errors in all of these areas, but the story tends to allow me to overlook them even though I'm professionally trained to notice them all. If nothing else could be said of the writing, it at the very least isn't written in a vain attempt to make the characters sound like authentic teenagers of the day, allowing readers to supply the appropriate teenage slang and sounds of their own experience. The dialogue and language aren't great, but they don't distract from the entertainment quality of the story. Twilight is not a book about high school drama like a majority of YA fantasy. Forks High School is a minor scene where action takes place; there is no attempt to address themes of high school experience.
Another reason to recommend the book are the characters, whom I found very complex and interesting. To me a complex character is one who 1) is unique enough to be easily distinguishable from every other character in the book in sound and actions. A great many YA books have an ensemble group of teenagers who speak and act nearly the same (one character would probably respond to a situation with essentially the same words and actions as another). Meyer's characters manage to each be unique in mannerism and voice. 2) The characters are shown to have to deal with multiple aspects of life. Despite being labeled by many viewers as shallow, I found Bella to be one the most complex characters I've come across in YA fiction. She is a girl who has essentially been denied the life of a teenager because she has been responsible for her flighty mother (she cooks, keeps the financial books, buys the groceries, keeps the schedule, and makes the hard decisions about what would be best for her mother). The book begins with Bella making a selfless decision to banish herself to a place that she hates (Forks, Washington where her father lives) so her mother can be happy traveling with her new husband (I suppose some people might find a way to classify such altruism as shallow, submissive, weak, etc., but I find it a unique quality in a young person.) When Bella finds herself developing a crush on a handsome mysterious boy whom she discovers later is a vampire who chooses to deny his own nature and not feed on humans, she is really experiencing her first atypical typical teenage experience, which of course is going to be a mindless, over-emotional, hyperbolic obsessive devotion. The atypical nature of her relationship only fuels her obsession, but it also allows her to discover more reasons to love Edward beyond her teenage obsession. After days of conversation, interrogation, revelations of deepest feelings and secrets, Bella comes to love him for his goodness (hey, most people would probably agree that if you end up a vampire with a consuming need to drink human blood you would probably just go with it) as well as his mind, manners, concern for her happiness. I, for one, can perfectly understand why in just a few months Bella would want an enduring relationship with a guy who is attentive to her needs and wants (maybe in a hundred years we guys really could figure out that we're happier if we think of our partners well-being before our own, or maybe I'm just a hopeless romantic myself). Bella's complexity is established by the fact that everything that is "typically teenager" in the book is atypical for her. She is also incredibly stubborn (not really a quality of shallow people) in that she refuses to give in to the impossibility, danger, and foolishness of their relationship, of which she seems to be fully aware. She decided to love Edward and nothing will get in the way of that.
Edward also manages to go beyond the stereotypical personality detractors label him with. He's not perfect. His imperfection, in fact, is the primary cause of conflict in the book. If he had been perfect, he would never come back after he leaves on Bella's first day at school. Edward has had a hundred years of study both of knowledge and human nature, which he has unique access to because he can hear everyone's thoughts except Bella's, so it is only expected that he would have nearly perfected his talents. What he does he does as an expert with a hundred years of experience. This should be expected, so it really shouldn't lead so many to assert that he is too perfect. If anything, he is a classic tragic hero: a figure of great character and ability with one or some flaw that leads to disaster. Edward is far from perfect; when it comes to things that he hasn't been practicing for a hundred years, he's actually fairly bad. He struggles to interact with Bella because he can't hear her thoughts and so frequently misinterprets her words and actions. His main character flaw is hubris, not atypical for a man in his first serious relationship with someone he loves. He continually tries to make decisions for Bella, but can't even stick to his decisions because of his selfish need to stay with her and give her what she wants. I find Edward very complex and very interesting and find that I can identify with him (at least if I imagine I had been living as a vampire for a hundred years before I found someone I loved.)
Into this obsessive but far from typical romance (I wish the author had made fewer reference to Edward's appearance, but my wife asserts it is fairly authentic for an obsessive teenage girl to think frequently of the physical attributes of the object of her obsession) Meyer throws all the horror of the world of vampires.
I have found the entire series (the romance matures very satisfactorily over the course of the books) a great read, fun entertainment, and a cut above most YA fiction. I've read them obsessively several times, and I'll probably pick them up again when I can't find anything new that is as good.
Book Review: Jane Austin is rolling in her grave, while vomiting
Summary: 1 Stars
Great be the wonders of the written word. From the silky prose of the bard himself to the thunderclaps of imagination from Stephen King, there are innumerable novels to live out your every fantasy. However, I must warn you, the past, present, and future reader, that there is a dark underbelly to the pen-and-paper combination: Twilight.
"Pish-posh and nonsense," You may say, "He probably hasn't even read them. He's just a silly boy unhappy with the fact that he can't stand up to (Sharp intake of breath)
Now that I have recovered from my fit of laughter, let me assure you that I have read the books. All of them. And seen the movie. If you were to take all of the books you have read, and compared them to all of the books I have read, unless you were my father or two different people (Which we all know just isn't fair), My list would be longer.
And, being that you are not, as far as I know, an English major focusing on the dynamics of writing in particular, I am more knowledgeable. That's right. I just bragged. Deal with it.
Let's take an example from book one of The dark Twilight cult's bible, simply named Twilight:
"Aren't you hungry?" he asked, distracted.
"No." I didn't feel like mentioning that my stomach was already full - full of butterflies.
Thanks to the above passage, my stomach is now empty of bile. I wrote this kind of trash when I was twelve, and actually realized it was horrible. Meyer, cunning trollop that she is, obvious doesn't now that she just wrote "Are not you hungry?"
Which, If I wrote, I would follow with "No dear, I just finished that fabulous roast quail. Have you been hearing this news about a revolution in the English Colonies? Dear God, What ever could have caused that?"
The double wording, (full - full) the fact that if this person was distracted he probably wouldn't notice this, and the several lack of any detail all comes crushing down to the fact that It just sucks.
Next: The pinnacle of characterization know as BELLA SWAN!!!!!
1: Bella. Eerily similar to Bela Lugosi, the famous actor who appeared as Dracula in the original classic movies, as well as literally hundreds of other movies. Nice, Meyer. Creative much?
2: Swan. Ouch. She's ugly? No, actually beautiful! In fact, Bella has only one flaw: Clumsiness. Meyer, unfortunately, couldn't pick an actual flaw, such as depression, avarice, pride, or anything else. She had to pick clumsiness. Not the 'that girl is a walking disaster' clumsy, but 'sometimes she falls down' clumsy. It is seen as cute, and she is instantly doted on by hundreds of wailing boys. Oh, and Edward.
Also, I want to show you something: Meyer said that she neglected to put a in-depth description of Bella in the book because she wanted her readers to be able to put themselves in Bella's spot. (Dudes, shame on you) However, If you search on Wikipedia, you'll find this description of Bella:
"very fair-skinned, with long, straight, dark brown hair and chocolate brown eyes. Her face is heart-shaped--a wide forehead with a widow's peak, large, wide-spaced eyes, prominent cheekbones, and then a thin nose and a narrow jaw with a pointed chin. Her lips are a little out of proportion, a bit too full for her jaw line. Her eyebrows are darker than her hair and more straight than they are arched. She's five foot four inches tall, slender but not at all muscular, and weighs about 115 pounds. She has stubby fingernails because she has a nervous habit of biting them."
Now I dare you to look up a picture of Stephanie Meyer. I would post a picture here but the Amazon script doesn't allow it.
(I'll assume you have looked at a picture of Meyer)
Who are you trying to kid, Meyer? Did your editor* not realize that the girl that everybody falls in love with looks exactly like you?
(*Probably does not exist.)
Now we move on to the only reason anybody has more than a second glance at the book other than to burn it in the ultra-focused glare of a thirty foot magnifying glass: Edward.
I'm going to introduce a term to you: Purple Prose. It means, basically, that the words are so extravagant that they are taking away from the writing. So many descriptors are used in the passages of Edward (some of them seem callously ripped from a thesaurus) that it's obvious that Meyer was trying as hard as she can to get you to like Edward. (In fact, I'm pretty sure every time Meyer typed the word 'Adonis,' God leveled a south-American rain forest)
It is, however, difficult if not impossible to like Edward, based on his personality. More number oriented facts:
1: Edward would sneak into Bella's room and watch her sleep.
2: He first hates her because she smells so good, then loves her because she smells so good.
3: He throws stuff to prove a point, always seems to be moody or sad, and is very touchy.
4: Loves blood. (He's a vampire, I know, but it's overplayed and You Know It.)
So we have an emo goth bi-polar stalker who more or less wants to kill her. It's a good thing he's pretty.
Also, I may not be an expert on the female mind (Not having one, myself), but studies have shown that females are more attracted to power, position, and personality. Guys, on the other hand, are attracted to the body, and cooking skills.
Edward has no job, drifts from school to school, is stuck forever in the 17-year-old awkward tried-as-an-adult-or-child stage, has lived with his foster parents for a hundred years, and NEVER TALKS TO ANYONE...besides his equally two-dimensional and pathetic syblings.
Why hasn't he been staked yet?
Which brings me to another point: The vampirity of the vampires.
They are not vampires. They are simply creatures Meyer wants you to think are vampires. Why? I have no clue. Yet another list, albeit different:
Vampires vs. Twilight-pires
Vampires drink blood. Twilight-pires drink blood. Okay, so far so good.
Vampires have extra strength, speed, and senses. Twilight-pires do, also. Alright, nothing wrong there.
Vampires die in sunlight, at least become much weaker. Twilight-pires...Sparkle. What?
Vampires die from being stabbed by wood or having their head cut off. It is impossible to kill a Twilight-pire unless you are one, or a Twilight-wolf. Which is not a werewolf. Okay....
Vampires can shape-shift, and keep their basic form once bitten. Twilight-pires simply become mind-bendingly beautiful. Yay.
There are two similarities. Two. Only the most basic of points, as well.
So right now we have a perfect human that looks astoundingly like the author and a moody, thing-of-the-night that drinks blood. What's left?
The plot.
Ah, the plot. Certainly, the easiest place to find solace. Heh. No.
Plot point one: Bella moves to Forks, sees Edward, falls in love.
Plot point two: Edward falls in love with Bella, she finds out about his Twilight-pireism.
Plot point three: 300 pages of description of Edward.
Plot point four: Some guy tries to kill Bella. Entire world groans when he fails.
There you go, the plot in four sentences.
Oh yeah, one more thing. Meyer thought it up in a dream. Please tell me you know what this means.
The girl looks like Meyer. The boy is astoundingly beautiful. It was from a dream. You should feel dirty now.
That's right, poor reader. Twilight is a 400 page version of Stephenie Meyer's wet dream.
Good bye.
P.S. If you want a real vampire book, anything in the Dracula series by Fred Saberhagen is amazing, Bram Stoker's classic, or course, and the Anne Rice novels, though I haven't read them myself, have a huge following. "I am Legend" by Richard Matheson is incredible. It was a book far before a movie, so don't worry.
Book Review: I really wanted to enjoy this book...
Summary: 1 Stars
***Of course there are spoilers below, sorry!***
OK, so after hearing about this book for ages, after having dozens of friends recommend it to me and hearing them laud it as the "next Harry Potter", I decided to pick up Twilight. Some quick background info on me (not really important, but just so you see where I'm coming from): I'm female, in my early 20's, LOVE fantasy and YA, LOVED BTVS and ANGEL w/ a fiery passion. Anyways, so I, and many others who know me, figured I'd love this book to pieces. Just finished reading it, and frankly, I thought it was horrible. The issues I have w/ this book are plentiful, and, this late into the game, have likely been discussed in other reviews, so to be brief (ok, not that brief):
1) Bella is the worst protagonist ever. She is the typical "Mary Sue" character (a quick glance at 1 star reviews also mention this, so I won't go into definitions of what a Mary Sue is). She's a big city girl coming to live in a small town where everyone knows her name and wants to be her friend. Guys line up and actually fight for the "privilege" to take her to a dance, yet she dismisses these friendly advances as annoyances. Her only flaw is that she's hopelessly clumsy, but even this isn't really a flaw since it makes her endearing and provides ample opportunity for a dashing man to sweep her off her feet. Oh, and this happens often. My main beef w/ Bella is that, as a main character, she does absolutely nothing to resolve the main conflict. In my opinion, this is a big no-no, especially in YA literature. Protags should be the one to resolve the conflict and not rely on other characters so heavily to do so. Bella is the quintessential "damsel in distress" who seem to only exist to get into grave peril so her dashing man can rescue her. In a world of strong YA protags who make heavy, sometimes life altering decisions to resolve a conflict, this is such a cop-out. Bella is just a victim and I would have had more respect for her is she had found a way to outsmart the villain and save herself. Bella herself says it best, she is the perpetual Lois Lane, and there's a reason why Lois never starred in her own movie/show! (now, don't get me wrong, I'm not some zealous feminist that hates this archetype, I feel that characters like these can serve a purpose in a well written story, just not as a protag/MC)
2) Edward is unbelievably boring. For a mysterious "creature of the night", Edward is an incredibly dull "Gary Stu". He's perfect in every way: perfect looks; super powerful; perfect looks; super fast; perfect looks; can play the piano like freaking Mozart; perfect looks; sparkles like a giant diamond engagement ring in the sun; perfect looks; is, for some absurd, mostly chemical, reason, completely devoted to Bella; and oh, he has perfect looks. Meyer seems to think it is important to mention his beauty, his perfection, his angelic, Adonis-like, model looks on a VERY regular basis (I swear, it was mentioned almost every other paragraph in one chapter). He's so oh-my-gosh beautiful, Bella literally faints every time he even touches her (but that's ok, it gives him yet another excuse to sweep her off her feet!). We get very little about his past (should I hope to see more of this in the sequels?) even though we get an entire chapter, really, almost 1.5 chapters, on the origins of Carlisle, a vampire who plays a minor role in this story. His mood changes rapidly from anger to condescending, back to anger, to undying devotion, exasperation, then, again, back to anger w/ a bit of mockery. Other than his mostly chemical attraction (and really, it is mostly chemical. Bella seems to let off some sort of exotic smell that makes vamps go wild), little is known about him, about what drives him to do the things he does.
3) Sparkling vampires? Look, I know vampires have been done in all forms of media for decades and I appreciate some originality. But really, vampires that sparkle in the sunlight? Meyer gives us no reason why they should sparkle, doesn't explain how this works, really, just uses it has some vague excuse why the vamps can't go out in bright sunlight. So overall, besides the drinking human blood aspect, which can obviously be overcome, there is no disadvantage whatsoever to becoming a vampire. You remain young and oh-my-gosh beautiful for eternity, become super fast and strong, get cool powers like telepathy, clairvoyance, and, well, whatever it is Jasper has, drive around in luxury cars, and basically, other than a troublesome Native American tribe, can live the good life. I would have FAR more respect for this book if the vamps were hideous in daylight, or if they couldn't go out in daylight at all, but really, sparkly, glittery, diamond like vampires? It's like stuffing every teen girl/woman's fantasies (looks, wealth, diamonds, power, everlasting youth) into a dull boring package. Despite my complaints about the vampires, I do like the characters of Alice and Jasper, Jasper because he seems to actually struggle with his choice to abstain from human blood, and Alice because of her spunky attitude and her mysterious past that was partially reveled in the end (I'd love to read more about Alice)
4) The conflict doesn't kick in until the end. Yes, thanks to Alice, we get a lot of foreshadowing, but even this doesn't come until later. The main conflict w/ the other vamps could have been woven in much earlier into the story.
5) The overall writing is blah. First off, 1st person is very, very tough to pull off properly, and, in my opinion, this story would have been much better in a tight 3rd person POV. I think this story suffers from this point of view is because Bella is just plain boring who is ineffectual as a main character. I know she's supposed to be the normal, everyday girl thrown into a wild predicament, but her voice is just plain boring and at times, snobby and superficial. Another issue I have is the number of times Meyer uses a hyphen to break up a train of thought, which, in the beginning chapters, is very annoying. The characters are all mostly one dimensional, some border 2-D, none are fully fleshed out. Rosalie, one of the vamps, is just described as oh-my-gosh beautiful and jealous of Bella (*cough cough, Mary Sue alert, cough*), and little else is done with her, indeed, we only hear her speak a couple of measly lines in the whole book, which is sad because it would be nice to know exactly why she feels about Bella the way she does. All the human characters besides Bella are 1-D stock characters that the author (and Bella) could care less about.
In conclusion, not a great book in my opinion, though I was intrigued by the conflict of Bella wanting to become a vampire. It's such an immature request, but that's why I liked it, because it was a way to remind the readers that Bella, is in fact a child tossed into a relationship with a much older boyfriend, a child who doesn't quite understand what she has gotten herself into or the potential consequences. The only time I ever liked Edward in this whole book was when he refused her request, despite the benefits to their relationship. A truly selfless act that sadly doesn't excuse the 450+ pages of drivel that came before it.
I will read the next book, not only because I'm the type of person that must finish whatever series I begin, not only because I truly want to see what the hype about this series is, but mostly because I hope that the flaws in this first book are remedied later in the series, hope the characters gain more dimensions, hope to learn more about Alice and see Jasper wrestle more w/ abstinence. And while I know Twilight is Meyer's first novel, it just doesn't excuse the excessive faults I found w/ this book. The next "Harry Potter" this is not, and frankly, there are other, far better written YA books out there that deserve more fanfare than what Twilight is getting