Twilight (The Twilight Saga, Book 1)
by Stephenie Meyer
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Book Reviews of Twilight (The Twilight Saga, Book 1)
Book Review: It's not very often you're a first hand witness to disaster
Summary: 1 Stars
But Twilight managed to completely involve me in its train wreck of a story.
I picked up the books after they were recommended to me and I saw all the fans of the series. At first I thought that the first one was kinda cute, as long as you don't put a lot of importance on plot, narration and basic grammar. There is a love story, it has some pretty witty lines, and the first pages where Bella is trying to figure out who this strange boy is are almost intriguing. Unfortunately, it just goes downhill from there.
The books take place in the head of one Bella Swan (yes, from the moment I saw her name was Beautiful Swan, I realized that this book could be truly gag-worthy) who has recently moved to the small town of Forks in order to give her flighty mother more freedom and take care of her can't-cook-for-himself father. Upon arrival, she's humiliated to find herself popular and liked. Then one boy catches her interest. She later learns that he is a vampire, and she falls madly in love with him.
Never mind the fact there's like 8 disturbing points right there, it gets worse. Edward is closed off, broody, demanding, and he shows some pretty strong leanings towards stalking early on in the book. For some reason, this is viewed as part of the romance. Call me old fashioned, but if some guy I barely met admitted he'd been sneaking into my room to watch me sleep for the last few months, I might find that unsettling. Apparently to our beautiful swan, though, it is just a way for a strange guy to show you he likes you.
Edward is drawn to Bella because the author insists that she's so different than the rest of the girls in town. In fact, Meyers beats this statement into our heads again and again, though her character does absolutely nothing to back up said statement. The story is told in first person, and aside from a perpetual whining habit and an attraction to a potential serial killer, Bella's not all that special. Edward is also intrigued because he is a mind reader, and for some reason, cannot seem to penetrate Bella's thoughts. (Trust me Eddie, I've been looking at her thoughts for the past hundred pages - I think part of your attraction is the fact that you don't have to listen to this drivel.)
As the romance blossoms, the characters (BELLA) only become more intolerable. She's so obsessed with Edward I had to skip pages because I was getting sick of the guy. She's horribly condescending towards the normal guys who show attraction to her, even getting angry at them for asking her to the prom. I can see her point, they don't watch her while she sleeps, tell her what to do, smile at her one moment and tell her to take a hike the next. I mean, they actually welcomed her to a new school and were nice to her - the rotten bastards.
The book then plagues us with events like Bella having trouble breathing when Edward smiles, Bella's heart stammering when Edward looks at her with his "dazzling" gaze, and the final nail in the coffin - she actually faints at one point when he kisses her. GET IT TOGETHER WOMAN!!
Edward claims to feel the same way, though he doesn't breathe so at least he can stay conscious. At one point, he explains to her that he's never felt any kind of physical desire towards anyone. Since he was supposedly a normal seventeen year old boy when he was changed, I can only assume he must have been in a COMA before that.
Finally after a lot of pages where nothing but Bella's innate stupidity have come across, we are introduced to the bad guy. Then the bad guy leaves, then shows up for a few pages in Arizona.
That is all there really is to say about the bad guy.
This book got away with being a silly little light-read romance for a while, but about halfway through it started to take itself way to seriously, and before I knew it I was laughing at things I'm pretty sure weren't intended to be funny and skipping over a lot of the rest. There's a whole chapter dedicated to Edward's "father's" past. I find that a little strange - shouldn't we get such a detailed chapter on, I dunno, Edward's past? All we get told about him is he was sick and the vamp doc bit him. This is apparently because vampires remember so little about their lives as humans. However, Dr. Vamp is able to give a full account of his life, including directly quoting the conversations (by the way, Stephanie Meyer - no one talks like that). Therefore, I have to attribute Edward's lack of memory to lazy writing.
What really got me more than anything, though, is the total lack of work put into this supposed love story. As far as I can tell, Edward glares at her one day, talks to her later, and then starts ignoring her completely. In this time she wonders about him, she stares at him, she obsesses over him. Then suddenly he wants to be friends, and they're declaring undying love. Can we see a little build up to this maybe? Hey Edward, what's you real last name? What did you want to be when you grew up before the whole dying thing kicked in? Anything?
And yes, I realize some of these details come out in later books, but it would have been nice to see before they were ready to die for each other.
This can be a light, easy read for someone who doesn't want to think to hard about what they're looking at, but if you're looking for good reading, look elsewhere.
Book Review: One of the Worst supernatural romances ever written
Summary: 1 Stars
I can't even express into words how strong my distaste for the entire Twilight Saga truly is. In my personal opinion Twilight is prefabricated, poorly written, shallow, demographic-forcing tripe. When I was a fourteen-year-old girl I was very obsessed with the vampire anti-hero Lestat from Anne Rice's The Vampire Chronicles. And though Lestat had many relationship issues he was still a better defined and more well conceived character than that of Edward Cullen.
Edward and Bella are poorly thought out, two dimensional shells. This was a deliberate effort by the author so that every young reader could imagine themselves as the main characters but in the process she made them so superficial that the characters lacked any quality of definition. They did not feel like real people.
Not only is Twilight poorly written but it also hinders upon actual mythology. The notion of vampires glittering in the sun is laughable at best. It brings to mind the recollection of such toys as the My Little Pony dolls. The logic behind vampires sparkling in the sunlight is non-existent. A vampire burning in the sun has been a staple of Gothic fiction for many years. There are real diseases and disorders in the world that make sunlight harmful to certain individuals. Scientifically it's more plausible to be harmed by sunlight than to 'naturally' sparkle in it.
Another flaw in the mythos of Twilight is the definition of werewolf. I cannot tell you how many times I have come across Twilight fans who insist the characters who can turn into wolves are not werewolves. They say that these characters are shape-shifters. A shape shifter by traditional definition can take on multiple forms, not just one. Many Twilight fans also argue that within the mythos of the books a true werewolf only changes on the full moon and that's why Jacob and company are not actually werewolves. The parapsychology student in me winces at this. In many traditional werewolf folklore out of Germany and France there are werewolves that most certainly can change at will, are aware in their wolf form, and are not bound by the phase of the moon. The very word werewolf means man-wolf. It does not mean part man and part wolf. It comes from the notion of a man INTO a wolf. Most classic werewolf stories (before The Wolf-Man movie) had the werewolf changing from a person into an actual wolf.
The very first werewolf legend can be traced back to the Greek myth of King Lycaon. According to legend King Lycaon served human flesh at a feast for Zeus (the king of the Gods). Zeus was so offended that he punished Lycaon by turning him into a wolf. Only his eyes remained human. This myth is where the terms Lycanthrope, Lycanthropy and the more modern Lycan come from. I guess it's safe to say Stephenie Meyer does not do her research in regard to the occult before writing these stories.
Not only is Twilight poorly written and intellectually insulting to occultists (amateur and professional alike) but it also promotes very unhealthy relationships. Edward Cullen is abusive, stalkerish and obsessive. Edward has also had moments of physically harming Bella. Bella is equally so but that does not make it okay, nor does it make the relationship healthy. At one point Edward disables Bella's mode of transportation and has her kidnapped as a means to 'protect' her. If he was not a vampire this would be viewed as highly abusive of the character. There is a fine line between being chivalrous and sexist. Edward Cullen crossed that line miles ago. This sets a very unhealthy ideal of what defines romantic relationship for the young readers of Twilight. I am not saying not to read Twilight nor am I saying to burn the books. I am simply saying that it needs to be looked at in context for what it truly is and that there are far higher quality reads out there. If you want a chivalrous character who is NOT sexist, seek The Dresden Files novels by Jim Butcher. The hero, a wizard named Harry Dresden, is very chivalrous without being sexist.
Bella is what modern writers call A Mary Sue. In fiction writing and role playing games Mary Sue characters are strongly frowned upon. A Mary Sue is a character of shallow quality who is nearly flawless. The character is so perfect that even her so-called flaws are endearing.
I have run online text based role playing games since 1999 and I can tell you there are plot points in Twilight I would not have allowed in my game. A major one would be when Bella and Edward finally had their daughter toward the end of the book series the child aged extremely fast and by age seven or so she was involved with her mother's werewolf ex-boyfriend. To me this is disgusting. I would never have allowed this in my online role playing game. She might have developed with supernatural speed but she still has only had only seven-years-life experience and I feel that is certainly not enough time to be in a romantic relationship with a grown man. That was disturbing to me. Supernatural speed aging does not give her enough life experience for that sort of relationship. That was simply not right.
In short Twilight is not what I would consider a good read even for those who truly love supernatural romances. Seek out the likes of The Ghost and Mrs. Muir. Twilight is not worth the time. There are higher quality works of fiction out there.
Book Review: Something that could have been better had it been better worked on
Summary: 2 Stars
How to give a good critique of Twilight without offending any of its fans? Well, the first thing to do would be to present its best points.
First of all, the story's setting, Forks Washington State, is a great choice. As they read the book, Forks' forests, town and atmosphere become romantic, mysterious and wild to the readers. It sets the tone of the story and incite the reader to visit Forks and the whole Washington State and British Columbia's forests for I heard, from a friend of mine who lives around Vancouver, that this atmosphere is also present in British Columbia.
Now, the second best point would be the book cover. With its attractive composition and warm colours, putting tens of copies of the book around a bookstore and a library really attracts the customers to buy the book and read it. Gail Doobinin did an excellent job not only on that cover but on all the other ones of this series.
Now for the disappointing remarks.
The story, set over five hundred pages, would have been much better if it had been written with better characters, set at a better rhythm, and been better edited.
Now this is a love story, and to make it excellent, you have to make the characters believable and likable to the reader. However, Bella is annoying. She whines that she is bored and alone in Forks, yet she wanted to live there.Everyone around her at school, including her new friends, which seem sympathetic, seem boring to her, even more the minute she spots the Cullens in the cafeteria, most of all Edward. The minute she sees Edward, Bella falls in love with him and the only thing she can see in him is how perfect he is. His body, his words and his acts are all perfect to her, even when the guy is a disagreeable character who manipulates Bella and says some horrible things to her. Personally, I don't understand what one could find so impressive in Edward, apart from his physique. It would have been better if Bella's love for Edward had progressed and evolved along the story. In the end, I read and watched love stories and movies (for you see I am not someone jaded) which were more believable than Edward and Bella's love story.
Now the story's rhythm is uneven and very uncomfortable. We have, for almost the whole half of the book, a whole part of Bella's school life, her classes, her horrible gym lessons, her homeworks and all the gossips she has with her friends, her cooking life along with how she discovers that Edward is a vampire. It is all right when Stephenie Meyer writes these elements once or twice in her book when they are essential to the plot. Why, those elements give to the book a neo-realistic touch, like the Italian movies. But it is a problem when she lets them appear more than they should be. Thanks to those overlong details of Bella's ordinary life while I was more interested about Bella's research on Edward, I shut the book and went to do other things. This was one of the reasons the book took me more than three weeks to finish it. It would have been better to the story if Stephenie Meyer didn't overstate Bella's ordinary life and only stated it when she wanted to give essential plots to the story.
Finally, I think the book's story would have been better read if Stephenie Meyer had edited not only those passages, but also removed at least a hundred pages to her book. And the best way to do it would have been not only to trim down all about Bella's life which doesn't even help to the plot, but also Bella's comments on everyone she meets and who dares to glance at 'her' Edward, and events that already happened in the book and which we already learned before, like Bella's reason to leave Phoenix for Forks which we learned in the first chapters and are then repeated again and again over the story. With a better editing, the book would have been easier and less tiring to read.
In conclusion, I am not saying that Twilight isn't a book to be read. Instead, it can be a convenient story to read when you have nothing to do during your bus ride, or when you are at the beach or when you relax in your bath. But I do think that there are better books and stories than this one. Those of you who can overcome the bad points I stated and can read the whole series, good for you. However, you can count me out of the rest of this series.
Here is a suggestion of love stories I loved:
Far from the Madding Crowd by Thomas Hardy
Lady Chatterley by D.H Lawrence
Women In Love by D. H Lawrence
Salome by Oscar Wilde
A Room with A View by E.M Foster
The Piano Teacher by Elfriede Jelinek (movie adaptation by Michael Haneke too)
Breaking the Waves by Lars Von Trier (Extremely romantic love-story, very melodramatic and emotional too)
Dancer in the Dark by Lars Von Trier (Not only that, it is sets in the Washington State too. Though they are not shot there, some of his movies' stories are set in this State.)
The Piano by Jane Campion (Absolutely marvelous. Really deserved its Golden Palm and best actress for Holly Hunter)
Heaven's Gate by Michael Cimino (good romance under a dramatic historical incident in Wyoming, in 1890)
Any movie by Ken Russell (Women In Love, Music Lovers, Crimes of Passion, and his documentaries for the BBC).
Book Review: from missprint.wordpress.com
Summary: 3 Stars
Between the movie and the release of the final book, everyone seems to have heard about and read Twilight (2005) by now. The book came to my attention a couple years ago when I started hearing it mentioned a lot in the library although I initially confused the title with another YA book about a transgender teen (Luna by Julie Anne Peters).
Since then I met numerous librarians who vehemently dislike the series, teens who are obsessed with all of the books, and others who don't want to like the books but can't stop reading them. Given the negatives I heard, I had been prepared to not read the books. But then the movie came out and it got even more popular and it seemed like I had to read it just to see what all the controversy was about.
So. Stephenie Meyer's novel Twilight has added its own spin to the age-old vampire story. Sort of like a vampire book for people who don't read fantasy since most of the old vampire facts are simply dismissed as myths rather than being explained in some new way. We'll let that pass.
Bella Swan begins her self-imposed exile in Forks, Washington hoping for little more than a quick stay in her own personal purgatory. Coming from Phoenix, Forks feels like another world: dark, green, and everything Bella hates.
Her opinion of the town begins to change when Bella notices the enigmatic and beautiful Edward Cullen along with his equally lovely siblings. The closer Bella gets to Edward, despite his rebuffs, the more obvious it becomes that Edward is not human. Unbelievably, he is a vampire. And Bella is in love with him. And, even more shocking, he loves her.
I won't get into spoilers, but the rest of the plot revolves around Bella and Edward trying to answer the question, "Now what?" given, shall we say, their divergent outlooks on life.
Despite the overblown hype and negatives I heard, I did want to like Twilight. However, the more I read, the less likely that outcome seemed for a number of reasons.
First of all, I wasn't thrilled with the writing. The style here reminded me a lot of Eragon by Christopher Paolini. But Paolini was fifteen when he wrote Eragon while Meyer is a grown woman. I feel like that suggests that Twilight might not be the best written novel out there, not a damning fact in itself although compared to other novels this one did seem weak.
I also felt like the writing would have been stronger simply if there were less of it. The novel runs nearly 500 pages in paperback. I read it in four days, so it does go fast. Still, I feel like the writing could have been pruned a hundred pages and not suffer, which usually suggests to me that it should have been. That assertion is further supported by the repetition of the prose. Words and phrases came up with such frequency that I started to experience deja vu.
I'm also still not sure how I feel about Bella or Edward. I really liked Alice and Jasper, Edward's siblings, but they didn't get enough screen time to redeem the story. In the beginning, Bella struck me as kind of whiny. I've always thought of the Pacific Northwest as picturesque and neat, so it bugged me when Bella kept complaining about too much greenery.
After meeting Edward, Bella began whining in a different way. Every chapter is filled with Bella's angst that she could never be beautiful enough to be worthy of Edward. That would be fine if eventually Bella realized otherwise, but even in the face of Edward's undying (get it?) adoration Bella still refuses to accept that he loves her just for herself. Now, to be fair, I have my own bouts of feeling not pretty and most people do. There are, in fact, a lot of books for teens where the humor or plot stems from a girl having low self-esteem and using self-deprecation. The difference, and it's a big one, is that in most of those other books the girl ends the novel with a stronger and more positive sense of self. Bella ends Twilight with Edward which, while awesome for her, is not the same thing as a sense of self worth.
That brings me to Bella's other fatal flaw. Meyer repeated, constantly, that no matter what Edward did Bella could not conjure the appropriate response of fear. While weird, it was acceptable given the sweeping-yet-impossible love story that Meyer sought to create here. Then we learn that Edward likes to watch Bella sleep and, instead of freaking out even a little tiny bit, Bella is flattered. Because why would beautiful Edward deign to watch boring, not pretty Bella sleep? I can almost appreciate the pseudo-flattery of such a gesture. But Bella's reaction to it felt so unrealistic with her total lack of concern about such behavior.
The last thing that really ruined this series for me was Bella's use of "anyways" in conversation. We already have a word in the English language that can serve as a segue or extender in conversation. That word is anyway. Without the S.
I realize all of that sounds pretty negative. I didn't hate the book though, it was okay. I have read worse, but I've also read a lot better. Some parts were genuinely romantic and funny, but they were too few and far between to warrant my commitment to three more books of the same.
Book Review: Worrisome that so many think favorably of Bella and these books....
Summary: 1 Stars
That this book and series is being read by young woman and a majority of them see Bella as a strong, healthy, young woman with desirable traits and characteristics is worrisome to me. I dislike the lead female character Bella in this series, and I'm only up to the third book now and it doesn't seem to get any better. In fact it seems to get worse. Putting that aside for the moment I will say that the author Meyer can certainly tell a good tale, but the writing needs a severe editor, and it suffers from "MaryJane fan fiction" problems. The biggest problem however is Meyer's version of a heroine, which is more than disturbing to say the least.
Bella's character spends most of her time being cared for like a child, she is infantised, constantly needing to be looked after. She is always falling down, being picked up and carried around, and put to bed and even sung lullabies. It's disconcerting that this behavior is considered and accepted as normal by the characters in the book and fans of the book, and more frightening that it's accepted as the behavior of "being in love".
When anyone breaks into your room, watches while you sleep, invades your home and privacy, picks you up or blocks your way, makes unilateral decisions for you or "for your own good", even uses their strength against you---that's not "love" that's a psychotic stalker and an abusive relationship. And the fact that such behavior is being accepted as normal and the epitome of "real" "true" "love" is beyond disturbing. Perhaps even more insidious is the other through-line in books one and two, that Bella and the other human woman-the werewolf's wife, need to be wary of setting the males tempers off, thereby making the women responsible for the males temper. That's an abusive relationship based on control and domination. It's not romantic and it certainly isn't "Love".
Bella is supposed to be smart-but we never see her excel in her own interests, hobbies or even academia. She has no interests other than obsessive self-destructive behavior to gain the attention of the male she so-called "loves". Bella always needs to be rescued by the stronger, wiser, male. Even her human friendship was unequal. The soon-to-be-werewolf, knows all about cars and motorcycles and Bella just sits there watching him while he actively does....she just sits and watches. Too bad only in passing are Bella's own supposed capabilities mentioned, I never get to see them in action in any real sense. But that's the author's fault, as Meyer purposely put Bella in a situation where she is inferior to even someone "younger" than herself. There's even a whole conversation that his skills make him actually older than Bella. And of course Bella needs the human/werewolf to build her a motorcycle, to guide her through the woods etc.
Bella never seems to use the smarts we're told she has. Walking alone in an unfamiliar place---she "somehow" winds up in the worst part of town...twice!! The first she's almost raped, and the second she lucked out that those men weren't rapists. She walks in the woods, knowing she'll get lost and all too often seems to become weak to the point of being immobile. It's really rather tiresome to read. Bella didn't even have the smarts to put together, using the clues given by the other Vampire with the visions she had seen, that her mother was not with the bad vampire. Nope, she doesn't even ponder why the vampire is watching videos, she doesn't think about anything...once again she's weak to the point of immobility. Until she runs away without a real plan or thought except to let the vampire kill her in hope that he then won't kill her mom. And of course it's really just a set up for her vampire to come and save her... again.
It's not only her vampire boyfriend who protects her though. Her human male friend also protects and guides her-it seems nothing Bella decides to do she can actually accomplish on her own without the assistance of the more-capable male, or if she goes off on her own, then needing to be rescued by said males. The only thing that seems to motivate Bella-that in the book I hear her talking about being good at, is cooking. She has to get home to get Charlie's dinner on. She's a good cook apparently, but she doesn't cook for herself or for the enjoyment of the doing of cooking. It's just something she does... or rather what human women are supposed to do as the werewolf's wife's main job seems to be cooking for all the boys and being motherly. Which is fine in the context of a well-rounded person but women in this series are hardly seen as well-rounded full fledged human beings with talents and interests outside of caring for their superior males. They're inferior to their males and behave as such. And while some defend it as a "choice" I see it as a sad commentary on the author's part of what young women have to accept to be "loved" and "accepted" by those they find attractive. Also, the superficiality of that attractiveness and "love" is nothing but vapid shallowness, altogether another major problem with Bella in the book. And after all that, there is still no character growth and development from book one to book two at all.