So, it only took 300 odd pages for Smeyer to get some meat on the "So then Jacob said, and then Edward was all, I was like 'Hey guys don't fight over me!'" bones of Eclipse. Better late than never? She appears to have overcompensated in the end though--there are so many instances during these last few chapters that the only thing keeping me from throwing the book straight across the room was that it wasn't mine, and the person I borrowed it from actually cares about it. And trust me when I tell you this: as far as my track record goes, the only time I've ever had the desire to actually chuck a book (and in this past instance I actually did--it was only a library book) it was because of something grossly wrong.
(Oh, Tamora Pierce. I dislike you greatly.)
For example:
Bella convinces Edward to sit out from the Cullen/Indian vs. Victoria/Baby Vampires fight and stay with her in the safe place they're secreting her away to, because she doesn't want him to get hurt. Edward agrees because they're all confident that with the werewolves on their side it won't even be a contest. So they're camping out in the woods together, with a werewolf guard just in case. Who just so happens to be Jacob. And it just so happens that it snows while they're on the mountain (because mountains don't care if it's June). And it just so happens that Bella is already half vampiric in that she apparently generates less body heat than a chipmunk, and is in danger of freezing to death even though she's inside a tent away from the elements, wearing several layers, a sweater, a coat, and is snuggled in a sleeping bag made for camping in the mountains in cold weather. And it just so happens that the only solution is not for Jacob to speedily run about five miles to civilization to get her more clothes, or a snuggie, or perhaps that space-heater Edward suggested (he's sensible, for once), but for Jacob to snuggle into the (one person) sleeping bag with her to save her life with his amazing 108 degree body heat.
Shirtless of course, because though the werewolves are in the habit of carrying around a pair of jeans to change into when they turn back into people, carrying around a whole t-shirt as well would just be a burden.
Isn't that an extraordinary set of coincidental circumstances? You couldn't have happened upon more angst, conflict, and tortured romance if someone had planned it!
And it doesn't stop there. Jacob leaves in the morning after a seven page conversation between Edward and Jacob that basically reiterates everything we already know about how they feel about Bella, each other, and the love "triangle" (more like love less-than sign) they're in. Edward and Bella have a romantic little talk. Jacob, who's an eavesdropping fiend, overhears that Bedward are engaged, and he's so pained by it that he lets out an agonized howl. Because knowing that the girl you love wants to be with someone else forever and eternity and knowing that the girl you love is getting married to someone else are two entirely different things, and just register on completely different emotional levels, you know?
Anyway, Bella is so tortured by Jacob's pain she decides to stop being selfish and talks to him alone to tell him to stay away from her so he can stop torturing himself. Jacob responds just as maturely as expected: he tells Bella he'll just go make sure he dies in the afternoon's battle. She's shocked and horrified he would do such a thing. The exchange goes something like this:
BELLA: Jacob, I've decided that it's selfish to keep hurting you like this, so I'm going to stay away from you from now on.
JACOB: Fine then I'll just kill myself! Nyah!-dramatic music plays-
BELLA: -falls on knees- [that's actually in there]NOOOO! I changed my mind stay here with me and don't fight at all!
JACOB: No!
BELLA: Yes!
JACOB: No!
BELLA: Please?
JACOB: There's only one thing in the whole world that will make me not kill myself.
BELLA: Ooooh, okay. Hey Jacob, gimme a kiss!
(Ever notice how preoccupied people in Twilight are with being physical? The only human experience Bella wants is sex; the only thing that Jacob says is worth living for is a kiss from Bella...yeah, it doesn't really surprise me either.)
So he does. And it's super creepy; all gaspy and gropey, and that's as far as I'll go into detail. Suffice it to say it was quite passionate.
And then Bella, who's a genius, comes to the sudden revelation that Jacob was right all along--she does love him, as he so shamelessly and pathetically insisted! She loved both Edward and Jacob all along! She just loves Edward better!
Oh my goodness, it's like wading through pudding the plot is so thick. What a complicated, intricate, masterful web of intrigue.
Anyway, that particular revelation serves very little purpose other to reiterate that Bella (and Smeyer, I suppose) still can't really tell the difference between lust and true love.
The werewolf pack as grown substantially, and there's now a girl in the pack. And it's just. So. Very. Awkward. I'm not sure if I mentioned this, but when the Pack is in werewolf form, they're minds are completely open to each other. They can hear all each others thoughts, feel all each others feelings, and all that--like the Twilight version of the Borg. Can you imagine how mortifying that is when you add a girl to that? There are things that guys just aren't supposed to know--not your father, not your brother, not your...pack-mate. Not to mention the whole business of when one changes back into a human. And to add to the situation, the girl, Leah, is a giant shrew. She's just a horrible person. So, there's literally nothing good about having her in the Pack.
The climax to Eclipse was much less intense that I originally expected upon hearing it would be a fight between good vampires, werewolves, and evil vampires. In the end it was Edward vs. Victoria and Seth the Baby Werewolf vs. Riley the Baby Vampire, with Bella crouching fearfully in the back.Victoria and Edward are fighting so fast Bella can't see them, Riley and Seth are hitting each other around a bit....Bella contemplates cutting herself to distract the evil bloodthirsty vampires; Seth and Edward dismember Riley in about five seconds, and then Edward dismembers Victoria. And they burn them. Climax over. Victoria pretty much stayed the same one-dimensional character for the entirety of her Twilight existence. So sad.
So after that things wind down...Jacob got hurt, but not anywhere near fatally so. That didn't stop Bella from fainting about it, but still. A couple of the Volturi show up a little later, all, "We're evil, we don't have to come help you if we don't want to" and kill the only surviving baby vampire.
One of the things I was told about Eclipse was that Smeyer's "people" wanted her to have Bedward sleep together and she said "No way!" like a good little Mormon, and that's one good aspect of the book. I cannot agree with this assessment. The only real reason they actually haven't done the nasty yet is merely convenience in one form or another. The aforementioned first time they almost do, the only reason they don't is because Edward sees this as an opportunity to secure Bella's yes; the second time they almost do--that being in a little mountain clearing, where Edward decides Bella's doing to many things to make other people happy and he wants to spontaneously make her happy by sacrificing his virtue--the only reason they don't is because Bella is all "No, I'm trying to do all these things in a responsible organized manner, and that includes doing the nasty." Briefly, during the first exchange, it's mentioned that one of Edward's reasons is that he's clinging to his upbringing, but it's much less, "Bella, I believe it's wrong to have sex before marriage" and more "I know it's old-fashioned, but I have this quaint desire to keep your virtue intact." It's treated flippantly by both of them, like a joke. There are no moral issues brought to bear through any of the decision making--Smeyer never raises the question of "right or wrong," merely "here or there."
The Final Review:
Eclipse was a slow read. Most of the actual substance of the plot could probably be told in a book half the size of what it is now, and I think it would still be somewhat difficult to get through due to a complete lack of suspense. There was no point where I was asking myself "What happens next?" because if it was a mystery (which it usually wasn't) I didn't care. For the most part, the book is more a string of event than an actual cohesive plot. And the bits of it that are a natural cohesive plot are nothing extraordinary.
The drama and intrigue within the plot are melodramatic and immature. Any and all interactions between Edward and Bella, and Jacob and Bella, remind me of my few attempts at writing romance during highschool--if you ask the very few people who were actually exposed to said writings, you'll understand that's a very bad thing. I had the excuse of being inexperienced, hormonal, and fifteen. I have yet to hear Smeyer's excuse. She shows very little understanding of the way human emotions, motivations, and psyche really work; which means the romance is painful and melodramatic, the villains are flat and lack suspense, and every other relationship Bella has in her life is unrelatable and abnormal.
On a slightly more positive note, Smeyer has finally shown some improvement in her writing, in the technical aspect. I won't spoil the moment by focusing on the artistic aspects--suffice it to say she still has a way to go in that area, and is dismally flawed for a Literature Major. However, her sentence structure and variation is much more interesting--not to mention grammatically correct--and she's stopped being so obviously enamored with the Word of the Week. She's finally got her p's and q's moderately in order.
Breaking Dawn I approach with trepidation. On, ho!
1.27.2010
The Twilight Experiment--Eclipse, Chapters 11 (or something)-20
For a series that is based entirely upon the romance between two individuals, that is ultimately about not friendship or goodness or the eternal struggle of good versus evil in any way way but instead is merely about not being able to live without a boyfriend, that is so inextricably centered around the relationship between a boy and a girl, the Twilight Saga has the least romantic proposal scene I've ever heard, seen, or read.
Now, we all knew it was coming. After all, Edward did stipulate that he wouldn't turn Bella into a vampire unless she married him first; and Bella really wants specifically Edward to turn her, so I knew it was inevitable that she marry him eventually (furthermore what self-respecting romance doesn't end with a wedding?). But I wasn't really expecting the actual pin-down, concrete, "Yes, Edward, I'll marry you" proposal to be quite so anticlimactic.
Here is how it happens:
Edward and Bella get a little alone time together before the big upcoming battle between the Cullen/werewolf team (they're working together now because they finally decided to use their brains) and the Victoria/Mr. Shirt Stealing Vampire/all the little baby vampires Vicky made to be her army....team. This is really a gratuitous plan on Victoria's part, using an entire army of newly created vampires solely for the purpose of killing Bella; but then who can understand her motives? Certainly not me, the reader, because oh yes, Smeyer hasn't featured Victoria in any real way for more than about a paragraph altogether of page-time, making it completely impossible to get any sense of depth into her character at all. The Leprechaun from Leprechaun has more depth as a villain.
But I digress. Back to business: Bella, Edward, empty house, alone time, all night. Which isn't as worrisome as it seems if you consider that's almost exactly the way they spend pretty much every night of their relationship. So innocent I of course was lulled into a false sense of security by the fact that though Edward hangs out in her room every single night, for all his strange, creepy, horribly inappropriate traits he has kept them from going off the deep end, if you understand my meaning.
Oh, foolish I!
Little was I to know that Bella has decided the one human experience she actually wants to experience as a human is not spending time with her family, seeing her friends married, taking care of her children, graduating, going to college, or anything like that. The one thing, in the entire wide wonderful world of human experiences that she wants to have a shot at before she's undead is sex.
Our protagonist, ladies and gentlemen.
A mortifying and traumatizing four pages (that's eight sides of pure text, dear reader) pass of Bella trying to convince Edward to sleep with her; immediately followed by three more pages of arguing about Edward's reasons for not doing it and Bella's reasons for wanting it; and finally, it settles with Edward saying that she has to marry him first and then they'll, ahem, consummate it while she's still human. And this is the thing that finally pushes Bella to agree to marry him.
There. Engaged.
Que romántica.
Jacob Black is no longer my favorite character. I should have known, given it's Stephanie Meyer, that he would eventually take a turn for the worst--but even in my most pessimistic of moods I'm not sure I would have predicted that he would have fallen out of my good graces so very thoroughly in one swift action. Confess your love for Bella, Jacob--that's not a surprise, you already stated that a while ago. Express your resolve to fight for her affection as hard as you can--well, that's sad and a little bit pathetic, but I suppose a man's got to do what a man's got to do. However, forcing yourself upon a girl who clearly wants nothing of your advances is not only ungentlemanly and uncouth, but literally illegal. Bella could have you charged and put in handcuffs. And the fact that you're a werewolf and can kiss her as long as you want as hard as you want makes it worse, not better.
For the first time in the entire Saga, I was legitimately happy with Bella: as soon as she can get the big nitwit's paws (look I made a funny) off of her, she punches him right in the face. Of course, since Jacob is a werewolf she just ends up breaking her hand, but it's the first time she's ever reacted to something in a way that makes sense. It would have been even better if she had called Edward and had him pick her up, but she has Jacob drive her home in angry silence instead. Oh well, nothing's totally perfect (no matter what Smeyer would have you believe. Don't listen to her, she lies!).
And what is Charlie's reaction upon hearing that his only daughter was just moderately violated? He laughs. And tells Jacob, "Good for you." Actual quote there. I'm sorry Charlie, you want your daughter to become a harlot?
To thicken my animosity towards Jacob--in a very short period of time!--he turns into a manipulative little brat. He comes to Bella's, Edward, and Alice's giant graduation party, and Bella is still mad at him (good for her!). He uses her guilt over the werewolf/vampire animosity and her in-betweeny position therein, and gets all pouty and says when she tries to leave his insufferable presence (this is a near-verbatim quote), "I guess you're just going off to your real friends." And of course Bella falls for it completely and rushes to reassure him that they're still besties and fine I suppose we can hang out. Bella's Shining Moment ended.
In sum, Mr. Black is a rogue and a fiend.
Jasper is my new favorite friend, because he hardly says anything at all. The longest even ever spoken is when he told his entire life story. Which was....pretty long, but also, granted, kind of awesome and he basically used all the dialog-time he'd saved up over the last two-and-half books by only giving everyone about two words to rub together per fifty pages.
On a slightly more encouraging note, an actual plot has finally emerged! That being the aforementioned vampire army crawling around Seattle and killing pretty much the whole population of the city. So the vampires and the werewolves are all ready to go to war, and they have a plan and everything's dandy and moving forward.
Potential down-side: Smeyers moving quickly into the climax--and there's still about 300 pages left in the book. I can't fathom how this story can possibly be stretched out that far after the battle is finally over.
I just wish Edward would bite Bella and they would move to Antarctica and I could stop reading about their boring life.
The end.
Now, we all knew it was coming. After all, Edward did stipulate that he wouldn't turn Bella into a vampire unless she married him first; and Bella really wants specifically Edward to turn her, so I knew it was inevitable that she marry him eventually (furthermore what self-respecting romance doesn't end with a wedding?). But I wasn't really expecting the actual pin-down, concrete, "Yes, Edward, I'll marry you" proposal to be quite so anticlimactic.
Here is how it happens:
Edward and Bella get a little alone time together before the big upcoming battle between the Cullen/werewolf team (they're working together now because they finally decided to use their brains) and the Victoria/Mr. Shirt Stealing Vampire/all the little baby vampires Vicky made to be her army....team. This is really a gratuitous plan on Victoria's part, using an entire army of newly created vampires solely for the purpose of killing Bella; but then who can understand her motives? Certainly not me, the reader, because oh yes, Smeyer hasn't featured Victoria in any real way for more than about a paragraph altogether of page-time, making it completely impossible to get any sense of depth into her character at all. The Leprechaun from Leprechaun has more depth as a villain.
But I digress. Back to business: Bella, Edward, empty house, alone time, all night. Which isn't as worrisome as it seems if you consider that's almost exactly the way they spend pretty much every night of their relationship. So innocent I of course was lulled into a false sense of security by the fact that though Edward hangs out in her room every single night, for all his strange, creepy, horribly inappropriate traits he has kept them from going off the deep end, if you understand my meaning.
Oh, foolish I!
Little was I to know that Bella has decided the one human experience she actually wants to experience as a human is not spending time with her family, seeing her friends married, taking care of her children, graduating, going to college, or anything like that. The one thing, in the entire wide wonderful world of human experiences that she wants to have a shot at before she's undead is sex.
Our protagonist, ladies and gentlemen.
A mortifying and traumatizing four pages (that's eight sides of pure text, dear reader) pass of Bella trying to convince Edward to sleep with her; immediately followed by three more pages of arguing about Edward's reasons for not doing it and Bella's reasons for wanting it; and finally, it settles with Edward saying that she has to marry him first and then they'll, ahem, consummate it while she's still human. And this is the thing that finally pushes Bella to agree to marry him.
There. Engaged.
Que romántica.
Jacob Black is no longer my favorite character. I should have known, given it's Stephanie Meyer, that he would eventually take a turn for the worst--but even in my most pessimistic of moods I'm not sure I would have predicted that he would have fallen out of my good graces so very thoroughly in one swift action. Confess your love for Bella, Jacob--that's not a surprise, you already stated that a while ago. Express your resolve to fight for her affection as hard as you can--well, that's sad and a little bit pathetic, but I suppose a man's got to do what a man's got to do. However, forcing yourself upon a girl who clearly wants nothing of your advances is not only ungentlemanly and uncouth, but literally illegal. Bella could have you charged and put in handcuffs. And the fact that you're a werewolf and can kiss her as long as you want as hard as you want makes it worse, not better.
For the first time in the entire Saga, I was legitimately happy with Bella: as soon as she can get the big nitwit's paws (look I made a funny) off of her, she punches him right in the face. Of course, since Jacob is a werewolf she just ends up breaking her hand, but it's the first time she's ever reacted to something in a way that makes sense. It would have been even better if she had called Edward and had him pick her up, but she has Jacob drive her home in angry silence instead. Oh well, nothing's totally perfect (no matter what Smeyer would have you believe. Don't listen to her, she lies!).
And what is Charlie's reaction upon hearing that his only daughter was just moderately violated? He laughs. And tells Jacob, "Good for you." Actual quote there. I'm sorry Charlie, you want your daughter to become a harlot?
To thicken my animosity towards Jacob--in a very short period of time!--he turns into a manipulative little brat. He comes to Bella's, Edward, and Alice's giant graduation party, and Bella is still mad at him (good for her!). He uses her guilt over the werewolf/vampire animosity and her in-betweeny position therein, and gets all pouty and says when she tries to leave his insufferable presence (this is a near-verbatim quote), "I guess you're just going off to your real friends." And of course Bella falls for it completely and rushes to reassure him that they're still besties and fine I suppose we can hang out. Bella's Shining Moment ended.
In sum, Mr. Black is a rogue and a fiend.
Jasper is my new favorite friend, because he hardly says anything at all. The longest even ever spoken is when he told his entire life story. Which was....pretty long, but also, granted, kind of awesome and he basically used all the dialog-time he'd saved up over the last two-and-half books by only giving everyone about two words to rub together per fifty pages.
On a slightly more encouraging note, an actual plot has finally emerged! That being the aforementioned vampire army crawling around Seattle and killing pretty much the whole population of the city. So the vampires and the werewolves are all ready to go to war, and they have a plan and everything's dandy and moving forward.
Potential down-side: Smeyers moving quickly into the climax--and there's still about 300 pages left in the book. I can't fathom how this story can possibly be stretched out that far after the battle is finally over.
I just wish Edward would bite Bella and they would move to Antarctica and I could stop reading about their boring life.
The end.
1.25.2010
The Twilight Experiment--Eclipse, Chapters 5-I don't even remember. 10 or Something
This dreary day seems like a good time to update. Rather quickly.
Nothing much to report. Some strange vampire was in Bella's room, but I'm not concerned about it (yet, I suppose) because they did nothing more than display a slightly stalkerish tendency in stealing her pillow and a shirt. And since Edward is a stalker, I'd be silly to be afraid of Mr. New Vampire for being kind of a stalker, too. It just wouldn't be logical.
So basically we have yet another faceless threat (?) that's impossible to be frightened of.
Also Jacob and Edward aren't trying to kill each other anymore; I suppose there's something about mutually freaking out over an incident that they know nothing about and may or may not be threatening to the girl they love that just helps boys bond. Which is to say, they're both now on "Keep Bella in at least one of our sites at all times" mode. Honestly. It's like she can't pee without being in peril.
Also, werewolves are officially just weird. There's this whole thing about how they "imprint" on people, which is basically some mysterious connection that it's possible for them to instantly form with a member of the opposite sex upon seeing them. After which time they're hopelessly devoted to the person. But here's the thing: if, in your lifetime (assuming you're a werewolf), you do catch sight of the person you're supposed to imprint on, you will do so immediately--no matter how old the person is. One of Jacob's friends just imprinted on a two-year-old.
Oh, Smeyer.
Nothing much to report. Some strange vampire was in Bella's room, but I'm not concerned about it (yet, I suppose) because they did nothing more than display a slightly stalkerish tendency in stealing her pillow and a shirt. And since Edward is a stalker, I'd be silly to be afraid of Mr. New Vampire for being kind of a stalker, too. It just wouldn't be logical.
So basically we have yet another faceless threat (?) that's impossible to be frightened of.
Also Jacob and Edward aren't trying to kill each other anymore; I suppose there's something about mutually freaking out over an incident that they know nothing about and may or may not be threatening to the girl they love that just helps boys bond. Which is to say, they're both now on "Keep Bella in at least one of our sites at all times" mode. Honestly. It's like she can't pee without being in peril.
Also, werewolves are officially just weird. There's this whole thing about how they "imprint" on people, which is basically some mysterious connection that it's possible for them to instantly form with a member of the opposite sex upon seeing them. After which time they're hopelessly devoted to the person. But here's the thing: if, in your lifetime (assuming you're a werewolf), you do catch sight of the person you're supposed to imprint on, you will do so immediately--no matter how old the person is. One of Jacob's friends just imprinted on a two-year-old.
Oh, Smeyer.
1.20.2010
The Twilight Experiment--Eclipse, Chapters 1-4
Edward took apart Bella's car engine to keep her from visiting Jacob.
That in itself is creepy and wrong and a strong characteristic of an abusive, controlling boyfriend (Edward actually displays a lot of those characteristics). Bella is appropriately infuriated.
But that doesn't stop her from letting him stay in her room all night. She's so obsessed with him that she can't stand to be away from him even when she's furious with him.
All told, Bella and Edward spend about four hours, maybe, out of the twenty-four that are in the day, apart. And that includes nights. If I were Charlie I'd be upset too. If I were Charlie, I wouldn't have ungrounded her like he does; I'd have sent her to a convent in the sunny, sunny Sahara Desert.
Victoria, that female vampire who was introduces briefly in the first book and popped up again in the second book but not in person to hunt the crap out of Bella, is now back. To hunt the crap out of Bella. I get the feeling she'd be way more terrifying as a villain if we actually saw anything of her and/or if she actually did something other than run around and make vampires and werewolves chase her. She's like the Twilight Saga's Bakura, only with even less screen-time (and if you got that reference, please don't expose my secret shame). She seems to be emerging as the Saga's overall villain, but utterly fails because Smeyer doesn't actually have her, only mentions of her--basically people in Bella's life saying, "Yeah, Victoria's back bent on revenge against you for that whole thing with James, but we've got it covered."
Four expansive chapters--Smeyer writes long chapters--into Eclipse and nothing has happened. Victoria showed up, but Bella was in Florida with Edward. There was an altercation between the Cullens and the werewolves over hunting said Victoria and territories and such, but we learn of that after the fact. Thus far there is no actual action in the narrative.
Therefor I have nothing else to report on. Sorry, dear reader. The post reflects the subject.
Til next time.
That in itself is creepy and wrong and a strong characteristic of an abusive, controlling boyfriend (Edward actually displays a lot of those characteristics). Bella is appropriately infuriated.
But that doesn't stop her from letting him stay in her room all night. She's so obsessed with him that she can't stand to be away from him even when she's furious with him.
All told, Bella and Edward spend about four hours, maybe, out of the twenty-four that are in the day, apart. And that includes nights. If I were Charlie I'd be upset too. If I were Charlie, I wouldn't have ungrounded her like he does; I'd have sent her to a convent in the sunny, sunny Sahara Desert.
Victoria, that female vampire who was introduces briefly in the first book and popped up again in the second book but not in person to hunt the crap out of Bella, is now back. To hunt the crap out of Bella. I get the feeling she'd be way more terrifying as a villain if we actually saw anything of her and/or if she actually did something other than run around and make vampires and werewolves chase her. She's like the Twilight Saga's Bakura, only with even less screen-time (and if you got that reference, please don't expose my secret shame). She seems to be emerging as the Saga's overall villain, but utterly fails because Smeyer doesn't actually have her, only mentions of her--basically people in Bella's life saying, "Yeah, Victoria's back bent on revenge against you for that whole thing with James, but we've got it covered."
Four expansive chapters--Smeyer writes long chapters--into Eclipse and nothing has happened. Victoria showed up, but Bella was in Florida with Edward. There was an altercation between the Cullens and the werewolves over hunting said Victoria and territories and such, but we learn of that after the fact. Thus far there is no actual action in the narrative.
Therefor I have nothing else to report on. Sorry, dear reader. The post reflects the subject.
Til next time.
1.17.2010
The Twilight Experiment--New Moon, Chapters 5-Epilogue and Final Review
I apologize for the delay on this one, but you see the trouble is that New Moon is boring.
Almost in it's entirety it's a manic narrative of Bella frantically trying to piece her life together after she's fallen apart because the Cullens, namely Edward, left her. It's...pathetic. In the purest sense of the word.
Furthermore, Bella Swan you are a stupid girl! She actually believes that Edward just dropped her because he got bored or something--how can you claim to love someone so much and yet think so little of them? This goes beyond mere self-deprecation; she's just uncharitable. The entire situation is just absurd.
Adding to the absurdity: Jacob Black came back into the picture, which pleased me because he continued to be a source of slight happiness in my mind whilst I was surrounded by the dreary landscape that is Bella's brain; Jacob is really the only character that I actually like, and he continued to be really nice and sweet and happy and just an all-around cheerful, easygoing guy. So naturally, Smeyer had to go and taint my enjoyment by making Bella's brain work even less illogically than usual. Jacob, nice kid that he is, actually managed to pull Bella out of her Edwardless stupor and start living as normal a life as you can have when you're Bella Swan. Therefor she decides that though she is not in love with him in anyway, she and Jacob will be boyfriend and girlfriend in everything but name because it is a comfort to her. Jacob, as he expresses midway through their friendship, really likes Bella and is willing to wait for her as long as she needs. Which is a bit sad, but what can you do. Bella basically tells him, "Sorry, Jake not a snowball's chance in Hell--friends still?" in words; in actions, however, she clearly expresses that "friends with benefits" is a-okay in her book--holding hands, snuggling, spending all day together, the whole shebang. She throws a drawn out fit when he disappears off the face of the earth for a while (Jacob had to take a little time out whilst he turned into a werewolf, you see). Basically, she doesn't want him as a brother-figure, or a boyfriend, she just wants to claim him because he makes her forget about how much she misses Edward. She just treats him abominably.
And as if my brain wasn't frazzled enough trying to work out these gaping chasms in anything resembling reason, Bella continues to hear Edward's voice. Constantly, not even when she's in danger necessarily, just advising her on what she should be doing; "Don't provoke the werewolf, Bella. Lie to the vampire, Bella. Eat your broccoli, Bella." (Okay, that last one didn't happen. But you get the point) She becomes some strange, irrational thrill-junkie in an effort to continue to hear Edward's voice. It's just weird. I can't even begin to think how I would explain it rationally. Smeyer explains it irrationally by having Bella epiphanize in the end that subconsciously she knew all along that Edward really loved her and therefor his voice in her head was her subconscious mind telling her that he really loved her. And that's the best explanation you'll get, dear reader. My apologies.
New Moon is 563 pages long, and aside from what I've mentioned in this and the earlier post, only one other thing of actual interest happens in New Moon. Bella, in another thrill-junkie moment, decides it would be just smashing to go cliff-diving during an impending storm and nearly drowns. Jacob saves her, but Alice Cullen (who can see the future) unfortunately only has a vision of Bella jumping, not being saved, and concludes that she was going to commit suicide; she rushes back to Forks to save Bella (unnecessary), and through a series of miscommunications better suited for a comedy or a Disney Channel original movie, Edward gets wind of part of the incident and thinks Bella is dead. Alice has another vision (because they've been so useful so far) that tells her Edward, in despair, has gone to Italy to try to get the vampire Mafia (basically), the Volturi, to either kill him on request or piss them off enough to kill him. Bella and Alice rush to Italy to stop him, with nary an explanation to Charlie. Edward's plan to piss the Volturi off (because they're not nearly apathetic enough to actually be okay with just killing him for the heck of it) is to expose vampirism to the city they rule over by walking out into the square in the bright, noonday son--because when I see a man sparkling like a child's Valentine's Day art project in the middle of a sunny, crowded street I immediately think "Vampire!"
Of course, Bella stops him before he can do it, but not before the Volturi notice the kerfuffle (that's an honest, real word, I swear). Alice, Edward, and Bella are led by two Volturi henchmen to the Volturi headquarters where we meet even more vampires who are cooler than Edward, and learn very little other than Smeyer can be like everyone else with her vampires (there's a three-man council of ruling, ancient vampires, and a bunch of underlings holding court, and the entire thing smacks of Underworld and Interview with a Vampire) and that Bella is immune to the unique, special powers that vampires have. Which confused me to some degree, because in the climax of the first book Jasper was integral to keeping Bella calm with his emotion-manipulating powers. Plot hole? I think maybe.
That whole snafu takes two chapters. I think you understand now, dear reader, how little substance New Moon actually holds. Like I said, boring. Most of the rest of the book is Bella being miserable thinking about the Cullens, Bella and Jacob being not-dating, and primarily lots and lots of waiting--Bella waiting to come out of her stupor, waiting for Jacob to be her friend again, waiting for Jacob to come back from hunting the evil vampire that's poked her head up in the Cullen's absence, waiting to get to Italy, waiting to get back home, waiting, waiting, waiting. The book drags something awful.
In the end, our intrepid heroes are left here: the Cullens are back, all is right with Bella's world--except Edward still won't turn her into a vampire, and now the Volturi are threatening her with death if she's not a vampire soon because she knows too much. There is an undetermined, half-decision made that she'll either get turned by Carlisle (Edward's sire and foster-father) after she graduates and moves out so her parents don't wonder why their daughter is suddenly inhumanly gorgeous (because of course the one thing they won't wonder about is why their daughter disappeared off the face of the planet after she left for college--THIS IS A SOLUTION.), or Edward will turn her after they're married. They came to no real conclusion--perhaps they will wait to see which comes first? Jacob and Bella can't be friends now that she's chilling with the undead again, because apparently vampires and werewolves are doomed to be enemies for all time. As to why this is, I have no idea; Smeyer offers no explanation, not even your standard, unsatisfactory, "Vampires are the natural predators of werewolves/vice versa" or anything to that degree. Jacob is sucked into the pack mentality on that point, and hates all vampires, and Edward of course does not like Jacob because he is Bella's friend who is a boy-type person. So now her boyfriend and her best friend are at odds, as well as their respective family units. I almost feel sorry for Bella. Almost.
One thing that is making me legitimately angry as I read both Twilight and New Moon is the complete perversion of the child-parent relationships in the Swan family. Bella treats her parents as if they are either her own children--e.g., worrying about their safety, being overly concerned with "taking care of" both Charlie and Renee, her mother--or simply a nuisance (particularly Charlie, particularly when he actually tries to act like her father in governing her life). Bella flat out refuses to listen to her father if he tells her something she doesn't want to do, sometimes directly to his face, as was the case when he told her he didn't want her seeing Edward anymore after he hurt her so bad. Obedience and honoring her parents are not ideas anywhere present in her mind. The relationship between Bella and her parents is a complete role reversal--except, on a normal daily basis she's completely content to ignore Charlie entirely so she probably would make a horrible parent anyway. It's just wrong.
The Final Review:
New Moon gets about 2 stars out of 5. The plotline is just a mess, much resembling Bella's state of being for most of the book; which perhaps was Smeyer's intent, but in certainly didn't make for a fun read. There is no ascertainable purpose behind most of what happens. It's more than a stream-of-consciousness string of events than a well-constructed, cohesive storyline. Smeyer persists in describing Edward and his handsomeness more than any other character; even Jacob, who's shirtless 75% of the time, didn't get as much page-time as far as descriptive adjectives go as Master Cullen (despite the fact that he's only in about eight of the twenty-five long chapters). The writing has not improved in the least. The vocabulary continues to be as ADD as Twilight--Smeyer insists on sprinkling her narratives with her Word of the Day, making the paragraphs she places them in sound more like a ninth-grade vocabulary worksheet than a thought-out piece of narrative. Though there is much potential that I can see in many of the creative paths Smeyer chooses, she always fails to deliver that potential. Melodrama abounds, reason and realism are absent.
I cannot in good conscience recommend this book, either. My hope for Eclipse is that Smeyer makes more of an effort in her authorial duties, or her editor makes more of an effort in his/her editorial duties.
(I hope this post is coherent--as you might have noticed, I'm writing it late at night, when by rights I should be in bed. I really need to purge New Moon from my system before I settled down for the night. That being said, my deepest apologies for any moments of "Heavens to Betsy, is that even English?!" you might experience, dear reader.)
1.15.2010
The Twilight Experiment--New Moon, Chapters 1-4
New Moon is not off to the most stellar start.
It starts off with Bella angsting about her birthday, because it's one year closer to being old and Edward still won't turn her into a vampire. Life is hard, isn't it? They're both totally unreasonable and selfish about that whole vampire thing--Bella is willing to completely abandon everyone else in her life who cares about her for Edward, because apparently his is the only affection that actually matters; and Edward doesn't want her to be doomed to a soulless life, but still selfishly claims her as his own in every other way and won't give her a chance to move on even though they have no future together if he sticks with his no-biting rule. It's all just dumb.
But I digress. The Cullens throw a birthday party for Bella at their house; everyone is there, even spiteful Rosalie, the real token catty blond who's had maybe one line in the entirety of the series thus far. Bella gets a paper cut while opening a present, which wells with a generous drop of blood that sends Jasper (my favorite--the Absent Cullen, I like to call him) into a frenzy, as he's been on the "No Human" diet for less time than any of them and has trouble on the best of days. Edward protects Bella by slamming her into a glass vase and getting her cut up more. So everything's a bloody mess and the party is ruined. But hey, stuff happens when you hang out with vampires, you know?
Apparently Edward doesn't. Smeyer spends almost an entire agonizing chapter simply spelling out "Edward is distant and Bella is worried." I don't know if there's a right way of dragging out a situation like that into an entire chapter--probably there is--but Smeyer definitely didn't find it. I found myself literally groaning as I got to the next paragraph and read: "School followed the silent, frustrating, terrifying pattern of the last two days." The last two days that she detailed copiously...Anyway, we're finally granted some relief when Edward takes her for a short walk at the end of the chapter, says he's tired of pretending to be human for her (yeah Edward, we're all buying that reason), and that she'll never see him again.
Bella falls into a despairing stupor, and is found that way around midnight-to-early-morning by a search party her dad organized. Good gravy.
The whole situation is entirely ridiculous. I suppose I should feel some sort "Aw, Edward!" that he's nobly sacrificing his own feelings to protect Bella--but I can't over the feeling of "It's a little late for that, now isn't it Edward?" If he was going to do that, he should have left her alone in the first book, before she fell hopelessly in love with him. And Bella literally cannot function without Edward--he breaks it off in September, the entire family disappears, and then there's a huge time skip to January and she's still a lifeless zombie. There's another agonizing half-chapter detailing just how miserable she is without Edward. And Smeyer does not write short chapters. It's upsetting. The beginning of chapter four consists almost entirely of "We were working on Animal Farm, an easy subject matter. I didn't mind communism; it was a welcome change from the exhausting romances that made up most of the curriculum." and "In the last several months, I'd spent ten times the amount of time on Calculus than I'd ever spent on math before." Basically, "As with every single other day these past four months, life was dreary today."
She's not friends with Jessica anymore because she just ignores everybody, and the only person who talks to her is Mike the Retriever because I guess he's just a way nicer friend than she deserves. She is devoid of life without Edward. It's truly pathetic.
And to round off the whole experience thus far, chapter four ends with an interesting climax wherein Bella approaches four men outside a bar while on an outing with Jessica at night because she thinks they might be the same guys who wanted to violate her the last time she was in town, the first time Edward saved her. Luckily for all involved it wasn't the same guys--and strangely for all involved, what stops her is she hallucinates hearing Edward's voice telling her to keep safe.
On a slightly more ridiculous note, Bella's clumsiness seems to have gone to such an extreme that she can come back from a party with a great honkin' bandage on her arm and her dad won't worry about it. Interesting.
Oh Smeyer.
It starts off with Bella angsting about her birthday, because it's one year closer to being old and Edward still won't turn her into a vampire. Life is hard, isn't it? They're both totally unreasonable and selfish about that whole vampire thing--Bella is willing to completely abandon everyone else in her life who cares about her for Edward, because apparently his is the only affection that actually matters; and Edward doesn't want her to be doomed to a soulless life, but still selfishly claims her as his own in every other way and won't give her a chance to move on even though they have no future together if he sticks with his no-biting rule. It's all just dumb.
But I digress. The Cullens throw a birthday party for Bella at their house; everyone is there, even spiteful Rosalie, the real token catty blond who's had maybe one line in the entirety of the series thus far. Bella gets a paper cut while opening a present, which wells with a generous drop of blood that sends Jasper (my favorite--the Absent Cullen, I like to call him) into a frenzy, as he's been on the "No Human" diet for less time than any of them and has trouble on the best of days. Edward protects Bella by slamming her into a glass vase and getting her cut up more. So everything's a bloody mess and the party is ruined. But hey, stuff happens when you hang out with vampires, you know?
Apparently Edward doesn't. Smeyer spends almost an entire agonizing chapter simply spelling out "Edward is distant and Bella is worried." I don't know if there's a right way of dragging out a situation like that into an entire chapter--probably there is--but Smeyer definitely didn't find it. I found myself literally groaning as I got to the next paragraph and read: "School followed the silent, frustrating, terrifying pattern of the last two days." The last two days that she detailed copiously...Anyway, we're finally granted some relief when Edward takes her for a short walk at the end of the chapter, says he's tired of pretending to be human for her (yeah Edward, we're all buying that reason), and that she'll never see him again.
Bella falls into a despairing stupor, and is found that way around midnight-to-early-morning by a search party her dad organized. Good gravy.
The whole situation is entirely ridiculous. I suppose I should feel some sort "Aw, Edward!" that he's nobly sacrificing his own feelings to protect Bella--but I can't over the feeling of "It's a little late for that, now isn't it Edward?" If he was going to do that, he should have left her alone in the first book, before she fell hopelessly in love with him. And Bella literally cannot function without Edward--he breaks it off in September, the entire family disappears, and then there's a huge time skip to January and she's still a lifeless zombie. There's another agonizing half-chapter detailing just how miserable she is without Edward. And Smeyer does not write short chapters. It's upsetting. The beginning of chapter four consists almost entirely of "We were working on Animal Farm, an easy subject matter. I didn't mind communism; it was a welcome change from the exhausting romances that made up most of the curriculum." and "In the last several months, I'd spent ten times the amount of time on Calculus than I'd ever spent on math before." Basically, "As with every single other day these past four months, life was dreary today."
She's not friends with Jessica anymore because she just ignores everybody, and the only person who talks to her is Mike the Retriever because I guess he's just a way nicer friend than she deserves. She is devoid of life without Edward. It's truly pathetic.
And to round off the whole experience thus far, chapter four ends with an interesting climax wherein Bella approaches four men outside a bar while on an outing with Jessica at night because she thinks they might be the same guys who wanted to violate her the last time she was in town, the first time Edward saved her. Luckily for all involved it wasn't the same guys--and strangely for all involved, what stops her is she hallucinates hearing Edward's voice telling her to keep safe.
On a slightly more ridiculous note, Bella's clumsiness seems to have gone to such an extreme that she can come back from a party with a great honkin' bandage on her arm and her dad won't worry about it. Interesting.
Oh Smeyer.
1.14.2010
The Twilight Experiment--Twilight, Chapters 11-Epilogue and The Final Review
I knew it was coming. Of everything I knew about Twilight, this was the one thing that irked me the most. It had never really gone away, always lurking in the back of my mind. And yet, it was still anticlimactic.
Vampires sparkle in the sunlight. Sparkle. That's the word Smeyer uses; not even "gleam," or "emit an otherworldly glow." They sparkle. And it's supposed to be something beautiful and alluring and inhuman, and it's just....silly. It's the same as Bella being so completely clumsy--it's meant to be quirky I suppose, and original, but instead I can't help but think, "Okay now, this is just unrealistic that she fears walking up a trail because of her clumsiness--I think there might be something wrong neurologically with her." And you end up feeling concerned for the inner workings of her brain instead of relating to it. It's the kind of thing that would work much better in a romantic comedy, but she chooses to utilize it in the most awkward of times, where humor wouldn't exactly be appropriate.
So Edward is now completely on my "Leery List"--we find out in chapter 14 that since Edward doesn't sleep, being a vampire and technically dead I suppose (Smeyer never actually explains the reasoning behind why he doesn't sleep, he just doesn't), he entertains himself by coming to watch Bella sleep. Every. Single. Night.
Creepy.
And his whole authoritative, my-way-or-no-way thing is still going quite strong. If Bella doesn't want to do something he wants her to do, like go to prom, or ride his back up a mountainside, he either bodily forces her to do it anyway or seduces her until she gives in--because conversely, Bella is literally unable to say no to him because of his handsomeness. She never once, in the entirety of the book, actually in the end sticks to her decision of "No" after she tells him so. Now, I firmly believe that the man should be the leader of a relationship--but there's a huge difference between leader and dictator, and between communication and manipulation.
The whole relationship is just completely unhealthy. Edward tortures himself because he's afraid he's going to eat Bella, but he won't leave her alone because he's completely blurred the line between "want" and "need." And the entire relationship is based solely upon lust--they barely know each other, and primarily what they do that really gets them excited is cuddle. Extensively. It's just...uncomfortable. So, Edward is territorial, overprotective, and something of a despot, and Bella is besotted, reckless, and a bit loose. Bad kids.
Furthermore, Edward refuses to make her a vampire. He expresses that he doesn't want to end her life or put her through the pain of the transformation. He also doesn't trust himself to be with her for more than the periods of time they spend together (slightly less than a married couple). Which means that they can't get married, and they can't be together after Bella's about....twenty-five (because Edward still looks seventeen and that would be really creepy). So they know that if they continue the way that they are, they have no real future together. They acknowledge that...and then that's it. Bella's actually the reasonable one in this argument (relatively), because she wants him to make her a vampire so they can have a future together (nevermind that she's willing to throw her entire life away--turn her back on her family and her friends--to be with Master Edward). But still they're content to just live in the state of limbo in their relationship, knowing that as long as Edward doesn't give in they have no real future with each other, but loving (and lusting) each other too much to just do the healthy thing and move on.
Everything about it is just unhealthy, not to mention melodramatic. There's nothing realistic about their romance or their relationship--they have no basis for loving each other, they barely know each other before they claim to. Bella is seventeen, how does she even know what love is? It's just this floaty, abstract idea to them: they're hopelessly attracted to each other, and can't keep their hands off each other despite the dangers on both sides, so it must be love.
But enough about them.
The other Cullens are actually pretty cool--Smeyer gave each one of them separate histories that are intriguing. And even though every time Alice moves more than three inches Smeyer describes it as "dancing," calling to mind some hilarious visuals on my part, other than that Smeyer spends very little time describing how attractive the other Cullens are aside from their initial introduction (side note: Smeyer never ever stop reiterating how gorgeous every single aspect of Edward Cullen is).
The vampires for the most part are pretty cool--the problem I have is this: the Twilight Saga is supposed to be a breakthrough original piece of work in the vampire novel genre. As far as representing vampires go, Smeyer does a pretty poor job. The cool aspects of her vampires--their immortality and all the fascination that comes with endless lives (histories, etc.), their super-senses, and their inhuman beauty (which make no mistake can be cool when you don't beat it to death, reanimate it like the Electric Man, and then beat it some more, Smeyer)--are all things about them that aren't exclusive to vampires. Basically every humanoid fantasy creature out there shares those characteristics--take elves for example. All other aspects Smeyer tries to put her own twist on are either unoriginal--such as vampires having venom in their bite that will turn people if they don't die (hearkens to the more Scifi version of vampires where's it's more like a disease or a parasite)--or just silly--like them sparkling instead of combusting in the sunlight. She even managed to sort of screw up the most basic thing about vampires: their blood sucking. Her vampires don't have fangs. They just sort of eat people. They're glorified cannibals, hairless werewolves.
My problem is, they aren't really vampires. And that makes me sad.
The climax of the book is completely random, seeing as how it's unrelated to what the book is previously about--Edward and Bella ttly in wuv--in every way. A random group of other vampires shows up, and one of them decides that Bella "Tripping Toes" Swan would be the ultimate hunt because it would make Edward so darn upset. So the Cullens take her away and try to protect her but of course she gets lured into a trap, and Edward saves her after she almost dies. Woohoo!
The Final Review:
So, this is the part where I feel I can be completely free with my comments, and unleash the reserved judgement.
Plotwise, Twilight has some intriguing and original aspects; unfortunately, those aspects take the sideline to the main plot, which is nothing we haven't seen before. Buffy the Vampire Slayer covered that whole tortured vampire love pretty thoroughly, and other than the fact that Edward's a vampire it's a pretty standard steamy romance. It lacks any realism or nuance that would make on the caliber as romances like the classics. Some of the sideline parts are really interesting, like the different pasts of the Cullens and what the heck is going on with poor Jacob Black's family, but about 2% of the entire book is devoted to that. Overall, the plot lacks any true creativity or originality to set it apart from your run-of-the-mill grocery store steamy romance novel.
As for the writing: at her high points, Smeyer is an average writer. At her lower points, which are more frequent than her high points, she writes with all the subtlety of a canon ball to the face, screaming "This is what's going on!" as loudly and clearly as possible. Typically, she writes as if we, the reader, would be completely lost in the narrative if she didn't hold our hand the entire way and tell us exactly what was happening--down to Bella's inhaling and exhaling. She writes too much detail about the wrong thing, as mentioned before, and when she gets into detail about the right things the descriptions fall flat due to their lengthiness and their lack of elegance. Smeyer uses common teenage vernacular most of the time, and then suddenly you're slapped in the face with a word like "apropos" used only loosely correctly; in doing this she succeeds only in sounding like she's trying much to hard to appear eloquent and intelligent. Furthermore her tone throughout the entire book is so hopelessly melodramatic that you can't help but feel that Bella is nothing more than a complete self-insert of the author herself, and that she's ridiculously proud of the story she created. Creatively, she is average, technically, she's a tenth grader.
When I read a book, it needs only one of two things for me to in good conscience recommend it: a more than average plot, or more than average writing (and if it has both well then it's a party). Twilight is mediocre in both aspects, therefor I cannot recommend it.
On that cheery note, on to New Moon!
Vampires sparkle in the sunlight. Sparkle. That's the word Smeyer uses; not even "gleam," or "emit an otherworldly glow." They sparkle. And it's supposed to be something beautiful and alluring and inhuman, and it's just....silly. It's the same as Bella being so completely clumsy--it's meant to be quirky I suppose, and original, but instead I can't help but think, "Okay now, this is just unrealistic that she fears walking up a trail because of her clumsiness--I think there might be something wrong neurologically with her." And you end up feeling concerned for the inner workings of her brain instead of relating to it. It's the kind of thing that would work much better in a romantic comedy, but she chooses to utilize it in the most awkward of times, where humor wouldn't exactly be appropriate.
So Edward is now completely on my "Leery List"--we find out in chapter 14 that since Edward doesn't sleep, being a vampire and technically dead I suppose (Smeyer never actually explains the reasoning behind why he doesn't sleep, he just doesn't), he entertains himself by coming to watch Bella sleep. Every. Single. Night.
Creepy.
And his whole authoritative, my-way-or-no-way thing is still going quite strong. If Bella doesn't want to do something he wants her to do, like go to prom, or ride his back up a mountainside, he either bodily forces her to do it anyway or seduces her until she gives in--because conversely, Bella is literally unable to say no to him because of his handsomeness. She never once, in the entirety of the book, actually in the end sticks to her decision of "No" after she tells him so. Now, I firmly believe that the man should be the leader of a relationship--but there's a huge difference between leader and dictator, and between communication and manipulation.
The whole relationship is just completely unhealthy. Edward tortures himself because he's afraid he's going to eat Bella, but he won't leave her alone because he's completely blurred the line between "want" and "need." And the entire relationship is based solely upon lust--they barely know each other, and primarily what they do that really gets them excited is cuddle. Extensively. It's just...uncomfortable. So, Edward is territorial, overprotective, and something of a despot, and Bella is besotted, reckless, and a bit loose. Bad kids.
Furthermore, Edward refuses to make her a vampire. He expresses that he doesn't want to end her life or put her through the pain of the transformation. He also doesn't trust himself to be with her for more than the periods of time they spend together (slightly less than a married couple). Which means that they can't get married, and they can't be together after Bella's about....twenty-five (because Edward still looks seventeen and that would be really creepy). So they know that if they continue the way that they are, they have no real future together. They acknowledge that...and then that's it. Bella's actually the reasonable one in this argument (relatively), because she wants him to make her a vampire so they can have a future together (nevermind that she's willing to throw her entire life away--turn her back on her family and her friends--to be with Master Edward). But still they're content to just live in the state of limbo in their relationship, knowing that as long as Edward doesn't give in they have no real future with each other, but loving (and lusting) each other too much to just do the healthy thing and move on.
Everything about it is just unhealthy, not to mention melodramatic. There's nothing realistic about their romance or their relationship--they have no basis for loving each other, they barely know each other before they claim to. Bella is seventeen, how does she even know what love is? It's just this floaty, abstract idea to them: they're hopelessly attracted to each other, and can't keep their hands off each other despite the dangers on both sides, so it must be love.
But enough about them.
The other Cullens are actually pretty cool--Smeyer gave each one of them separate histories that are intriguing. And even though every time Alice moves more than three inches Smeyer describes it as "dancing," calling to mind some hilarious visuals on my part, other than that Smeyer spends very little time describing how attractive the other Cullens are aside from their initial introduction (side note: Smeyer never ever stop reiterating how gorgeous every single aspect of Edward Cullen is).
The vampires for the most part are pretty cool--the problem I have is this: the Twilight Saga is supposed to be a breakthrough original piece of work in the vampire novel genre. As far as representing vampires go, Smeyer does a pretty poor job. The cool aspects of her vampires--their immortality and all the fascination that comes with endless lives (histories, etc.), their super-senses, and their inhuman beauty (which make no mistake can be cool when you don't beat it to death, reanimate it like the Electric Man, and then beat it some more, Smeyer)--are all things about them that aren't exclusive to vampires. Basically every humanoid fantasy creature out there shares those characteristics--take elves for example. All other aspects Smeyer tries to put her own twist on are either unoriginal--such as vampires having venom in their bite that will turn people if they don't die (hearkens to the more Scifi version of vampires where's it's more like a disease or a parasite)--or just silly--like them sparkling instead of combusting in the sunlight. She even managed to sort of screw up the most basic thing about vampires: their blood sucking. Her vampires don't have fangs. They just sort of eat people. They're glorified cannibals, hairless werewolves.
My problem is, they aren't really vampires. And that makes me sad.
The climax of the book is completely random, seeing as how it's unrelated to what the book is previously about--Edward and Bella ttly in wuv--in every way. A random group of other vampires shows up, and one of them decides that Bella "Tripping Toes" Swan would be the ultimate hunt because it would make Edward so darn upset. So the Cullens take her away and try to protect her but of course she gets lured into a trap, and Edward saves her after she almost dies. Woohoo!
The Final Review:
So, this is the part where I feel I can be completely free with my comments, and unleash the reserved judgement.
Plotwise, Twilight has some intriguing and original aspects; unfortunately, those aspects take the sideline to the main plot, which is nothing we haven't seen before. Buffy the Vampire Slayer covered that whole tortured vampire love pretty thoroughly, and other than the fact that Edward's a vampire it's a pretty standard steamy romance. It lacks any realism or nuance that would make on the caliber as romances like the classics. Some of the sideline parts are really interesting, like the different pasts of the Cullens and what the heck is going on with poor Jacob Black's family, but about 2% of the entire book is devoted to that. Overall, the plot lacks any true creativity or originality to set it apart from your run-of-the-mill grocery store steamy romance novel.
As for the writing: at her high points, Smeyer is an average writer. At her lower points, which are more frequent than her high points, she writes with all the subtlety of a canon ball to the face, screaming "This is what's going on!" as loudly and clearly as possible. Typically, she writes as if we, the reader, would be completely lost in the narrative if she didn't hold our hand the entire way and tell us exactly what was happening--down to Bella's inhaling and exhaling. She writes too much detail about the wrong thing, as mentioned before, and when she gets into detail about the right things the descriptions fall flat due to their lengthiness and their lack of elegance. Smeyer uses common teenage vernacular most of the time, and then suddenly you're slapped in the face with a word like "apropos" used only loosely correctly; in doing this she succeeds only in sounding like she's trying much to hard to appear eloquent and intelligent. Furthermore her tone throughout the entire book is so hopelessly melodramatic that you can't help but feel that Bella is nothing more than a complete self-insert of the author herself, and that she's ridiculously proud of the story she created. Creatively, she is average, technically, she's a tenth grader.
When I read a book, it needs only one of two things for me to in good conscience recommend it: a more than average plot, or more than average writing (and if it has both well then it's a party). Twilight is mediocre in both aspects, therefor I cannot recommend it.
On that cheery note, on to New Moon!
1.13.2010
The Twilight Experiment--Twilight, Chapters 4-10
To quote Bella: "The next day was better...and worse."
Of course, I feel it makes much more sense than in the context she uses it--for her it's better because things are getting better at school and worse because Edward Cullen, the smexy boy she has never talked to wasn't at school. For me it's better because I'm chugging right along--there's something about the narrative that lends itself to momentum--and worse because, well, the story is getting worse.
Let me explain.
Our story thus far:
Intrepid Bella, after being thrilled by actually having a conversation with Edward, is even more obsessed with him before. Which is somewhat logical--one assumes that if a girl can become so obsessed with a person that she focuses on little else without having talked to him that she would become more obsessed with them after having an actual conversation. Prolonged exposure to Edward Cullen = copious amounts of lust, so it seems. Not necessarily unnatural, considering he's a vampire. Things are starting to look up for young Bella, and now that she's on speaking terms with Master Cullen and is pretty sure he doesn't hate her or want to vomit at the sight of her face (as his original reaction implied) she has time to waste paying attention to other people around her--like poor Eric Snape, Mike the Retriever (her nickname, not mine--charming girl, no?), and Jessica.
A subplot develops: shockingly, every male in the school wants to date her, which of course means all the girls are catty and jealous. No, Bella just assumes that about Jessica because dear Jessica likes Mike and Mike frolics around the irresistible Bella's heels. So the subplot is, Jessica likes Mike, Mike likes Bella, and Bella is beginning to feel heavily the burden of being so sought after. Gosh Bella it must be terrible to have boys actually like you; I'm sure you'd rather go back to being ignored like you were complaining about in the first chapter.
Anyway, back to the real plot: Bella goes shopping for groceries and cooks Charlie steak and potatoes. Oops, no hold on a moment....ah yes. Bella almost gets slammed into a Bellacake by a van in her school parking lot, and Edward heroically saves her. They have an argument, stretching from the asphalt at the school to the hallway at the hospital, because you see Angel Cullen here was standing at the other end of the parking lot. Oooh mysterious. Edward is kind of a jerk to her, and she's all trying not to cry she's so angry and they don't really speak after that.
I learn from this argument that I don't really understand how Edward thinks sometimes either. Specifically from this exchange:
We scowled at each other in silence. I was the first to speak, trying to keep myself focused. I was in danger of being distracted by his livid, glorious face [don't throw anything at the screen yet--it's early in the book, maybe she stops]. It was like trying to stare down a destroying angel.
"Why did you even bother?" I asked frigidly. [Speaking of him saving her]
He paused, and for a brief moment his stunning face was unexpectedly vulnerable.
"I don't know," he whispered.
Honestly Edward, if your vampire brain really was struggling with the morality behind why you saved her life, you could have at least tried to appear normal as you were striving to convince her you were and say, "Any decent person would, Gawd Bella." Because it's kind of a human reflex; not many people would openly admit that they wouldn't automatically pull someone out of the way of a charging van.
(Also please note that that's about a hundred words, and Smeyer put in three separate descriptions of how beautiful Edward is.)
Edward and Bella don't speak for a while, like I said, and Bella find school a dull dreary place; then one day in science they start blood typing and Bella becomes faint. And who should save the day but: Mike! Unfortunately his heroism thunder is rudely bethieved by Master Cullen (kick him, Mike! Kick him in the head!), who carries Bella to the nurse. They have a conversation, and basically they settle on this:
Edward: You shouldn't be friends with me.
Bella: You said that in the hospital.
Edward: Yah, but I'm dangerous.
Bella: Oh well I don't know, you saved my life and just saved me from Mike, so....
Edward: Well you shouldn't be friends with me. Wanna sit together at lunch?
Bella: Um....I thought you just said we can't be friends.
Edward: Noooo I said you shouldn't be friends with me; not that I wasn't gonna be friends with you.
Bella: O....tay.....
I actually felt a little sorry for Bella during that conversation; Edward doesn't make much sense. So they're friends la-de-da.
However, no one else likes Edward--probably because he's so much prettier than them--so when Bella goes to the beach La Push with all her when-it-suits-me friends Edward does not accompany her. Mores the pity, because he probably would have been able to keep her from falling down as much as she does. She goes for a hike with a few guys to avoid frigging Lauren (the token catty blond! Yes she showed up!), falls down like five times, and when she comes back the camp is invaded by Indians. She meets the "russet-skinned" Jacob Black, a really nice kid who she seems to be interested in making friends with. And who's brother seems to let on he knows a lot about the Cullens, saying that they "don't come here" in a very authoritative tone. Curious, Bella decides to get more information by shamelessly flirting with Jacob, who's just turned fifteen (tooootally illegal). Poor Jacob totally falls for it, and basically tells her the Cullens are vampires: that his ancestors met the Cullens a long time ago and made a treaty with them that they'd leave the vampires alone if they didn't bother their land. He doesn't believe the age-old legend, but Bella sure does.
Luckily for her (though she doesn't see it that way) the days are sunny after that and mysteriously none of the Cullens are at school (gee, I wonder why). Bella doesn't have any more chances to stare at Edward's gorgeous "ocher" eyes, so she distracts herself with a shopping trip with Jessica and Angela, the only friend she really seems to like because the girl doesn't talk very much.
During said shopping trip, Bella wanders off into the seedy side of town after dark--I don't know, I guess she was concentrating too much on not tripping to notice she was meandering down a dark alley. Anyway she's accosted by several large men-types, and abruptly rescued by Edward Cullen. Oh my gosh, it's such a surprise!
Edward takes her to dinner, and drives her home. Their conversation during that time reveals two very important things about Edward Cullen: he is a vampire and, more importantly, he's also a stalker! Yes, he followed her to her shopping trip because he apparently believes that her superpower is getting into life-threatening situations. Then he stalked her around town by reading people's minds to see where she was until she got into trouble. And apparently he's been looking out for her that way this whole time.
Creepy.
There's a brief period of time where Edward is all: "Now you know, aren't you terrified?!" and Bella is all "Well no I feel inexplicably safe around you." And then...they get to the point in their relationship where he shows up at her house randomly to drive her to school, she dreams about him all the time, and they have to literally sit on their hands in Biology to keep from making out as soon as the lights are out. Which is weird because they have plenty of alone time outside of Biology during which they could make out as much as they want in total privacy, but never feel the urge to do so. Apparently there's some sort of quality akin to an aphrodisiac in that dim, science class movie glow.
That's basically the story right now. The big cliff hanger I'm on at the moment is that now Jacob's father, Billy (who has no neck according to his description: "...a heavyset man with a memorable face--a face that overflowed, the cheeks resting against his shoulders...") knows that Bella hangs out with Edward and also knows that he's a vampire. The plot thickens.
Further developments with Edward:
Edward is starting to creep me out. His bipolarity is stilling chewing at the forefront of his newly-developing personality, and as I mentioned before he's a big giant stalker. He spends his entire time keeping track of Bella and saving her when she's in peril, and then treats her like a child. He orders her around a lot and brooks absolutely no argument; which would make sense for a centuries old vampire. The problem is that he also is basically her boyfriend. So...treating your girlfriend like a little child...creepy. Oh Edward.
Smeyer puts in far too much detail--and never the right kind of detail. Example:
I looked down, frustrated. I unrolled my silverware, picked up my fork, and carefully speared a ravioli. I put it in my mouth slowly, still looking down, chewing while I thought. The mushrooms were good. I swallowed and took another sip of Coke before I looked up.
Oh my goodness, Smeyer, we don't need to know all that! Write about what she's thinking, write about her freaking expression, just please don't write about how she eats!
She does this frequently, especially because Edward and Bella have a lot of lunchtime conversation. Ye gods.
I do like Jacob; he sounds like a sweetheart, even if he was naive enough to fall for Bella's wiles. I just hope Bella doesn't do that to him again, it's really unkind. And he's in the next chapter so I'll get to see more of him. And no, I'm not imagining him as Taylor Lautner. Give me some credit.
Anyway, next post I may have finished Twilight. Probably not. We'll see.
Of course, I feel it makes much more sense than in the context she uses it--for her it's better because things are getting better at school and worse because Edward Cullen, the smexy boy she has never talked to wasn't at school. For me it's better because I'm chugging right along--there's something about the narrative that lends itself to momentum--and worse because, well, the story is getting worse.
Let me explain.
Our story thus far:
Intrepid Bella, after being thrilled by actually having a conversation with Edward, is even more obsessed with him before. Which is somewhat logical--one assumes that if a girl can become so obsessed with a person that she focuses on little else without having talked to him that she would become more obsessed with them after having an actual conversation. Prolonged exposure to Edward Cullen = copious amounts of lust, so it seems. Not necessarily unnatural, considering he's a vampire. Things are starting to look up for young Bella, and now that she's on speaking terms with Master Cullen and is pretty sure he doesn't hate her or want to vomit at the sight of her face (as his original reaction implied) she has time to waste paying attention to other people around her--like poor Eric Snape, Mike the Retriever (her nickname, not mine--charming girl, no?), and Jessica.
A subplot develops: shockingly, every male in the school wants to date her, which of course means all the girls are catty and jealous. No, Bella just assumes that about Jessica because dear Jessica likes Mike and Mike frolics around the irresistible Bella's heels. So the subplot is, Jessica likes Mike, Mike likes Bella, and Bella is beginning to feel heavily the burden of being so sought after. Gosh Bella it must be terrible to have boys actually like you; I'm sure you'd rather go back to being ignored like you were complaining about in the first chapter.
Anyway, back to the real plot: Bella goes shopping for groceries and cooks Charlie steak and potatoes. Oops, no hold on a moment....ah yes. Bella almost gets slammed into a Bellacake by a van in her school parking lot, and Edward heroically saves her. They have an argument, stretching from the asphalt at the school to the hallway at the hospital, because you see Angel Cullen here was standing at the other end of the parking lot. Oooh mysterious. Edward is kind of a jerk to her, and she's all trying not to cry she's so angry and they don't really speak after that.
I learn from this argument that I don't really understand how Edward thinks sometimes either. Specifically from this exchange:
We scowled at each other in silence. I was the first to speak, trying to keep myself focused. I was in danger of being distracted by his livid, glorious face [don't throw anything at the screen yet--it's early in the book, maybe she stops]. It was like trying to stare down a destroying angel.
"Why did you even bother?" I asked frigidly. [Speaking of him saving her]
He paused, and for a brief moment his stunning face was unexpectedly vulnerable.
"I don't know," he whispered.
Honestly Edward, if your vampire brain really was struggling with the morality behind why you saved her life, you could have at least tried to appear normal as you were striving to convince her you were and say, "Any decent person would, Gawd Bella." Because it's kind of a human reflex; not many people would openly admit that they wouldn't automatically pull someone out of the way of a charging van.
(Also please note that that's about a hundred words, and Smeyer put in three separate descriptions of how beautiful Edward is.)
Edward and Bella don't speak for a while, like I said, and Bella find school a dull dreary place; then one day in science they start blood typing and Bella becomes faint. And who should save the day but: Mike! Unfortunately his heroism thunder is rudely bethieved by Master Cullen (kick him, Mike! Kick him in the head!), who carries Bella to the nurse. They have a conversation, and basically they settle on this:
Edward: You shouldn't be friends with me.
Bella: You said that in the hospital.
Edward: Yah, but I'm dangerous.
Bella: Oh well I don't know, you saved my life and just saved me from Mike, so....
Edward: Well you shouldn't be friends with me. Wanna sit together at lunch?
Bella: Um....I thought you just said we can't be friends.
Edward: Noooo I said you shouldn't be friends with me; not that I wasn't gonna be friends with you.
Bella: O....tay.....
I actually felt a little sorry for Bella during that conversation; Edward doesn't make much sense. So they're friends la-de-da.
However, no one else likes Edward--probably because he's so much prettier than them--so when Bella goes to the beach La Push with all her when-it-suits-me friends Edward does not accompany her. Mores the pity, because he probably would have been able to keep her from falling down as much as she does. She goes for a hike with a few guys to avoid frigging Lauren (the token catty blond! Yes she showed up!), falls down like five times, and when she comes back the camp is invaded by Indians. She meets the "russet-skinned" Jacob Black, a really nice kid who she seems to be interested in making friends with. And who's brother seems to let on he knows a lot about the Cullens, saying that they "don't come here" in a very authoritative tone. Curious, Bella decides to get more information by shamelessly flirting with Jacob, who's just turned fifteen (tooootally illegal). Poor Jacob totally falls for it, and basically tells her the Cullens are vampires: that his ancestors met the Cullens a long time ago and made a treaty with them that they'd leave the vampires alone if they didn't bother their land. He doesn't believe the age-old legend, but Bella sure does.
Luckily for her (though she doesn't see it that way) the days are sunny after that and mysteriously none of the Cullens are at school (gee, I wonder why). Bella doesn't have any more chances to stare at Edward's gorgeous "ocher" eyes, so she distracts herself with a shopping trip with Jessica and Angela, the only friend she really seems to like because the girl doesn't talk very much.
During said shopping trip, Bella wanders off into the seedy side of town after dark--I don't know, I guess she was concentrating too much on not tripping to notice she was meandering down a dark alley. Anyway she's accosted by several large men-types, and abruptly rescued by Edward Cullen. Oh my gosh, it's such a surprise!
Edward takes her to dinner, and drives her home. Their conversation during that time reveals two very important things about Edward Cullen: he is a vampire and, more importantly, he's also a stalker! Yes, he followed her to her shopping trip because he apparently believes that her superpower is getting into life-threatening situations. Then he stalked her around town by reading people's minds to see where she was until she got into trouble. And apparently he's been looking out for her that way this whole time.
Creepy.
There's a brief period of time where Edward is all: "Now you know, aren't you terrified?!" and Bella is all "Well no I feel inexplicably safe around you." And then...they get to the point in their relationship where he shows up at her house randomly to drive her to school, she dreams about him all the time, and they have to literally sit on their hands in Biology to keep from making out as soon as the lights are out. Which is weird because they have plenty of alone time outside of Biology during which they could make out as much as they want in total privacy, but never feel the urge to do so. Apparently there's some sort of quality akin to an aphrodisiac in that dim, science class movie glow.
That's basically the story right now. The big cliff hanger I'm on at the moment is that now Jacob's father, Billy (who has no neck according to his description: "...a heavyset man with a memorable face--a face that overflowed, the cheeks resting against his shoulders...") knows that Bella hangs out with Edward and also knows that he's a vampire. The plot thickens.
Further developments with Edward:
Edward is starting to creep me out. His bipolarity is stilling chewing at the forefront of his newly-developing personality, and as I mentioned before he's a big giant stalker. He spends his entire time keeping track of Bella and saving her when she's in peril, and then treats her like a child. He orders her around a lot and brooks absolutely no argument; which would make sense for a centuries old vampire. The problem is that he also is basically her boyfriend. So...treating your girlfriend like a little child...creepy. Oh Edward.
Smeyer puts in far too much detail--and never the right kind of detail. Example:
I looked down, frustrated. I unrolled my silverware, picked up my fork, and carefully speared a ravioli. I put it in my mouth slowly, still looking down, chewing while I thought. The mushrooms were good. I swallowed and took another sip of Coke before I looked up.
Oh my goodness, Smeyer, we don't need to know all that! Write about what she's thinking, write about her freaking expression, just please don't write about how she eats!
She does this frequently, especially because Edward and Bella have a lot of lunchtime conversation. Ye gods.
I do like Jacob; he sounds like a sweetheart, even if he was naive enough to fall for Bella's wiles. I just hope Bella doesn't do that to him again, it's really unkind. And he's in the next chapter so I'll get to see more of him. And no, I'm not imagining him as Taylor Lautner. Give me some credit.
Anyway, next post I may have finished Twilight. Probably not. We'll see.
1.12.2010
The Twilight Experiment--Twilight, Chapters 1-3
So, I've made it through three chapters; which is actually a little more impressive than it sounds at face value seeing as how that's 67 pages. It was an...interesting experience.
As you probably know, the book is narrated by Bella Swan, so I shall give you what I know of her thus far:
Bella Swan is a something-teen-year-old, who has "ivory" or "almost translucent" skin (Side note: Stephenie Meyer isn't the only author I've seen do this, but it continually bothers me to see any form of the adjective "translucent" used to describe the skin of a human character. When was the last time you saw a living, breathing person who was so pale you could say their skin was practically clear? This is the first physical impossibility of Bella Swan), and does not have red hair or blue eyes, but rather dark hair (brown or black is yet to be determined--perhaps chapter four will tell?) and as-of-yet undiscovered colored eyes. She is five-foot-four and "slender" without being athletic or athletically-inclined in the least--the second physical impossibility of Bella Swan; I know of no one who is as sedentary as Bella Swan is (which she is--she's a reader, not a player) who is also "slender" without the added bonus of being not-short. This is not to say that my shorter friends/acquaintances are fat, merely that "slender" is a very specific adjective that I would not be able to apply to that type of person. Bella Swan must have a truly enviable metabolism.
Bella has nobly exiled herself to the little town of Forks to live with her father so that her mother can travel around with her Minor League boyfriend. The standing explanation as to why that was necessary was that Bella wants to take care of her mother and make her happy; I'm holding out for a more detailed and plausible explanation, seeing as how if her school life as described thus far is anything to go by, she'd probably get a better education on the road with her mother and step...boyfriend than at Forks Highschool, her mother seems perfectly happy to be with her daughter and therefor probably wouldn't mind her daughter travelling with them, and Bella would really rather not be in Forks/with her father at all.
As far as I can tell Bella dislikes the cold, rain, snow (snipe), wet, ice, fog, clouds and cloudy days, idle chit chat, sports and most physical activity, math, being the topic of conversation, and Forks. She likes reading, sunlight (presumably, since it's the only weather they haven't had as of yet in Forks and the only weather she hasn't complained about), the truck her dad got her, and Edward Cullen. This last one is particularly random because she has had all of two conversations with one Edward Cullen, and one of them was an argument that left her so angry she literally says she couldn't move for a few minutes. By the second chapter she's become completely obsessed with this boy--he consumes her thoughts during the school day when he doesn't return for a week after their first meeting--and it's all only because he's a beautiful kid. He doesn't speak a word to her until page 43 and by page 26 she's already focused her thoughts almost completely on the mysterious enigma that is Edward Cullen.
I do not like Bella Swan.
I'm actually surprised, since usually I'm very readily able to relate to main characters (especially if it's a first person narrative, as in Twilight). But thus far Bella is just a disgruntled, angsty teenager who seems determined to be unhappy with everything. She says "Ew." when it starts snowing. And you, dear reader, know how I feel about snow. It isn't even because she doesn't like driving in it--she just plain doesn't like it. She is unhappy when she first comes to Forks because she is afraid everything will treat her as an oddity and think she's a freak; but when people are perfectly nice to her and treat her like a normal person she calls them "overhelpful" and doesn't even make an effort to remember most of their names. Her classmates seem to be a nuisance to her; if her father, Charlie, doesn't leave her completely alone then he is an embarrassment and bothers her because she can tell he never got over her mother; and everything at school except for Trigonometry is stuff she already knows. And I simply cannot fathom the way she thinks at times.
For example, here's an excerpt detailing the first person in school who talks to her (skipping short sections of the narrative that are irrelevant to the point I'm making):
When the bell rang, a nasal buzzing sound, a gangly boy with skin problems and hair as black as an oil slick [Severus Snape?] leaned across the aisle to talk to me.
"You're Isabella Swan, aren't you?" He looked like the overly helpful, chess club type. [If he has a sweater vest back off Bella, I want some]
"Bella," I corrected. [...]
"Where's your next class?" he asked.
[...] "Um, Government, with Jefferson [teehee...oh Stephenie], in building six."
[...] "I'm headed toward building four, I could show you the way..." Definitely overhelpful [yeah seriously dude, backupoff. Give a girl room to use her tiny lady-brain]. "I'm Eric," he added.
So that was a pretty friendly, normal introduction. As are most of her other introductions to the students. The part that confused me was when she met Mike, another friendly boy--asks her her name, much like Eric and everyone else, introduces himself, much like Eric and everyone else, etc.:
[Mike asked,]"Do you need help finding your next class?"
"I'm headed to the gym, actually. I think I can find it."
"That's my next class, too." [...]
We walked to class together; he was a chatterer [myeah, a bit awkward, and not a word but okay]--he supplied most of the conversation, which made it easy for me. He'd lived in California till he was ten, so he knew how I felt about the sun [I think that's the clue that she likes the sun (aside from her general grumbles)]. It turned out he was in my English class also. He was the nicest person I'd met today.
...
I can't for the life of me figure out what was so different about dear Mike and that conversation that made him the "nicest" person you'd met that day, Bella.
I also can't help but notice that even though she has little time to pay attention to any of her classmates, she seems to have even less time for the girls. They're the ones who's names she can't remember. I'm going to give her the benefit of the doubt and think it's a coincidence.
So yeah, don't like Bella. The highlight of her stay thus far as been staring at the uberly attractive Cullens, specifically Edward.
Edward seems a nice enough guy so far. Aside from being a bit bi-polar, which I think is due partly to the fact that Bella's trying to "figure him out" and is therefor devoting more attention than is normal to his every minute action, expression, and mood. But (after initially acting like he had the trots when he was sitting next to her in their first biology class) he said hi to her, and drew her out about her mom and why she was at Forks, etc. So he doesn't really have a personality yet, but he's nice.
And despite what Miss Swan thinks about Forks, I think it sounds basically awesome. It's all forest and such (even Bella, between her complaining, says she must admit that it's beautiful), and the town itself is one of those small towns where everyone knows everyone and the police chief (Charlie, coincidentally) still wears a gun belt and boots, everybody seems really nice, especially the highschool kids. I mean really, how many places have nice highschool kids? Bella hasn't even crossed paths with a token catty blond yet. I think I'd really like living in Forks--come now, rain and fog are beautiful too. A little wet, but that's what umbrellas are for, right? And you get to wear wellies.
For the most part I'm reserving judgement on the writing until I at least get further into it--suffice it to say that there are some things irking me, but I'm seeing if they smooth out and/or leaving room for improvement. But I will highlight this one thing: someone needs to both take the thesaurus away from Stephanie Meyer and tell her that there are better thesauruses out there.
You see, Stephenie Meyer (hereafter to be referred to as Smeyer, cordially, for convenience's sake) wants to make it abundantly clear that the Cullens are attractive. She does this in two ways. The first is by using either neutral, or, more commonly, downright unflattering descriptions of every other highschooler Bella meets (see description of poor, overly helpful Eric Snape). The second is by using every single synonym for "attractive" she can find; except apparently that's not enough, because she uses the handful of adjectives she collected way more than she should. She goes on for about two pages describing how beautiful the Cullens are in every way when she first introduces them--okay, that's fine. When you're introducing character descriptions it's okay to get it all out there. Yes, Smeyer, I see, the Cullens are beautiful and attractive and graceful. Oooh-aaaah. The problem is that it doesn't stop.
As you probably know, the book is narrated by Bella Swan, so I shall give you what I know of her thus far:
Bella Swan is a something-teen-year-old, who has "ivory" or "almost translucent" skin (Side note: Stephenie Meyer isn't the only author I've seen do this, but it continually bothers me to see any form of the adjective "translucent" used to describe the skin of a human character. When was the last time you saw a living, breathing person who was so pale you could say their skin was practically clear? This is the first physical impossibility of Bella Swan), and does not have red hair or blue eyes, but rather dark hair (brown or black is yet to be determined--perhaps chapter four will tell?) and as-of-yet undiscovered colored eyes. She is five-foot-four and "slender" without being athletic or athletically-inclined in the least--the second physical impossibility of Bella Swan; I know of no one who is as sedentary as Bella Swan is (which she is--she's a reader, not a player) who is also "slender" without the added bonus of being not-short. This is not to say that my shorter friends/acquaintances are fat, merely that "slender" is a very specific adjective that I would not be able to apply to that type of person. Bella Swan must have a truly enviable metabolism.
Bella has nobly exiled herself to the little town of Forks to live with her father so that her mother can travel around with her Minor League boyfriend. The standing explanation as to why that was necessary was that Bella wants to take care of her mother and make her happy; I'm holding out for a more detailed and plausible explanation, seeing as how if her school life as described thus far is anything to go by, she'd probably get a better education on the road with her mother and step...boyfriend than at Forks Highschool, her mother seems perfectly happy to be with her daughter and therefor probably wouldn't mind her daughter travelling with them, and Bella would really rather not be in Forks/with her father at all.
As far as I can tell Bella dislikes the cold, rain, snow (snipe), wet, ice, fog, clouds and cloudy days, idle chit chat, sports and most physical activity, math, being the topic of conversation, and Forks. She likes reading, sunlight (presumably, since it's the only weather they haven't had as of yet in Forks and the only weather she hasn't complained about), the truck her dad got her, and Edward Cullen. This last one is particularly random because she has had all of two conversations with one Edward Cullen, and one of them was an argument that left her so angry she literally says she couldn't move for a few minutes. By the second chapter she's become completely obsessed with this boy--he consumes her thoughts during the school day when he doesn't return for a week after their first meeting--and it's all only because he's a beautiful kid. He doesn't speak a word to her until page 43 and by page 26 she's already focused her thoughts almost completely on the mysterious enigma that is Edward Cullen.
I do not like Bella Swan.
I'm actually surprised, since usually I'm very readily able to relate to main characters (especially if it's a first person narrative, as in Twilight). But thus far Bella is just a disgruntled, angsty teenager who seems determined to be unhappy with everything. She says "Ew." when it starts snowing. And you, dear reader, know how I feel about snow. It isn't even because she doesn't like driving in it--she just plain doesn't like it. She is unhappy when she first comes to Forks because she is afraid everything will treat her as an oddity and think she's a freak; but when people are perfectly nice to her and treat her like a normal person she calls them "overhelpful" and doesn't even make an effort to remember most of their names. Her classmates seem to be a nuisance to her; if her father, Charlie, doesn't leave her completely alone then he is an embarrassment and bothers her because she can tell he never got over her mother; and everything at school except for Trigonometry is stuff she already knows. And I simply cannot fathom the way she thinks at times.
For example, here's an excerpt detailing the first person in school who talks to her (skipping short sections of the narrative that are irrelevant to the point I'm making):
When the bell rang, a nasal buzzing sound, a gangly boy with skin problems and hair as black as an oil slick [Severus Snape?] leaned across the aisle to talk to me.
"You're Isabella Swan, aren't you?" He looked like the overly helpful, chess club type. [If he has a sweater vest back off Bella, I want some]
"Bella," I corrected. [...]
"Where's your next class?" he asked.
[...] "Um, Government, with Jefferson [teehee...oh Stephenie], in building six."
[...] "I'm headed toward building four, I could show you the way..." Definitely overhelpful [yeah seriously dude, backupoff. Give a girl room to use her tiny lady-brain]. "I'm Eric," he added.
So that was a pretty friendly, normal introduction. As are most of her other introductions to the students. The part that confused me was when she met Mike, another friendly boy--asks her her name, much like Eric and everyone else, introduces himself, much like Eric and everyone else, etc.:
[Mike asked,]"Do you need help finding your next class?"
"I'm headed to the gym, actually. I think I can find it."
"That's my next class, too." [...]
We walked to class together; he was a chatterer [myeah, a bit awkward, and not a word but okay]--he supplied most of the conversation, which made it easy for me. He'd lived in California till he was ten, so he knew how I felt about the sun [I think that's the clue that she likes the sun (aside from her general grumbles)]. It turned out he was in my English class also. He was the nicest person I'd met today.
...
I can't for the life of me figure out what was so different about dear Mike and that conversation that made him the "nicest" person you'd met that day, Bella.
I also can't help but notice that even though she has little time to pay attention to any of her classmates, she seems to have even less time for the girls. They're the ones who's names she can't remember. I'm going to give her the benefit of the doubt and think it's a coincidence.
So yeah, don't like Bella. The highlight of her stay thus far as been staring at the uberly attractive Cullens, specifically Edward.
Edward seems a nice enough guy so far. Aside from being a bit bi-polar, which I think is due partly to the fact that Bella's trying to "figure him out" and is therefor devoting more attention than is normal to his every minute action, expression, and mood. But (after initially acting like he had the trots when he was sitting next to her in their first biology class) he said hi to her, and drew her out about her mom and why she was at Forks, etc. So he doesn't really have a personality yet, but he's nice.
And despite what Miss Swan thinks about Forks, I think it sounds basically awesome. It's all forest and such (even Bella, between her complaining, says she must admit that it's beautiful), and the town itself is one of those small towns where everyone knows everyone and the police chief (Charlie, coincidentally) still wears a gun belt and boots, everybody seems really nice, especially the highschool kids. I mean really, how many places have nice highschool kids? Bella hasn't even crossed paths with a token catty blond yet. I think I'd really like living in Forks--come now, rain and fog are beautiful too. A little wet, but that's what umbrellas are for, right? And you get to wear wellies.
For the most part I'm reserving judgement on the writing until I at least get further into it--suffice it to say that there are some things irking me, but I'm seeing if they smooth out and/or leaving room for improvement. But I will highlight this one thing: someone needs to both take the thesaurus away from Stephanie Meyer and tell her that there are better thesauruses out there.
You see, Stephenie Meyer (hereafter to be referred to as Smeyer, cordially, for convenience's sake) wants to make it abundantly clear that the Cullens are attractive. She does this in two ways. The first is by using either neutral, or, more commonly, downright unflattering descriptions of every other highschooler Bella meets (see description of poor, overly helpful Eric Snape). The second is by using every single synonym for "attractive" she can find; except apparently that's not enough, because she uses the handful of adjectives she collected way more than she should. She goes on for about two pages describing how beautiful the Cullens are in every way when she first introduces them--okay, that's fine. When you're introducing character descriptions it's okay to get it all out there. Yes, Smeyer, I see, the Cullens are beautiful and attractive and graceful. Oooh-aaaah. The problem is that it doesn't stop.
- Bronze-haired
- Muscular
- Fluid
- Attractive (most commonly used, once to describe his voice)
- Musical (describing his voice)
- Like velvet (voice)
- Absurdly handsome
- Dazzling
- Flawless (lips. Psh.)
- Enchanting (laugh)
- Beautiful
Those are only describing Edward. And only in one chapter. Also not even the whole chapter, as I got bored of paying attention to all the ways in which Edward is apparently the smokinest thang since turkey bacon. Any one of those adjectives was used at least twice, usually to describe two different features of that beautiful creature, Edward Cullen.
Well, dear reader, I'm only three chapters in. I'm optimistic that Bella might improve as a person (I've read plenty of stories/series where the main character starts out as a jerk and becomes a better person--Artemis Fowl, The Merlin Conspiracy...), and that Smeyer will finally rest assured that her readers know that the Cullens are the only attractive people in Forks.
Back into the fray!
1.11.2010
The Start of Something New(ish)--There's a Monster Under My Bed
Or, more specifically, next to my bed.
Three, in fact.
Yes, you guessed it: I'm currently in possession of the first three novels in the Twilight Saga (saga, what a pretentious word for series). It's quite terrible, I know. One even has Robert Pattinson's face on it. Horrors.
Allow me to explain myself. Since I was made aware of what Twilight really is, I've looked upon it with derision (there was a very small period of time when I considered reading it, but that was when the only knowledge I had of it was that it was called "Twilight"). Not only did everything I hear about it offend me as a writer, but it also offended me as a basic person with some imagination (sparkling vampires. Honestly).
However, you, dear readers, may have noticed that key word that has been irking me myself for some time. "Hear." Everything I hear about it. The only personal hands-on experience I have with Twilight is my viewing of the movie (which I'd highly recommend if you need a good long laugh). I of course know that's nowhere near sufficient as my personal philosophy is to never judge a book by its movie or vice-versa. Therefor, it's simply unfair of me to judge the Twilight Saga without first at least reading them. Know thy enemy and all that. I've always been an avid supporter of forming my own opinions, especially about what I read; so I hate to think of myself as one of those mindless, spiteful Twilight haters who ravage the series simply because it's been said to be better than Harry Potter (codswallop!).
So I devised a simple yet brilliant plan: to borrow the Twilight Saga and read them.
So I have (save for Breaking Dawn--anyone have a copy I might procure for a short period of time?), and I'm about to.
And I thought, since I haven't been posting in a while and this will most likely be the most interesting thing to happen in my mind for a while, I might do a series of posts detailing my Twilight Experiment. Sort of narratives/summaries/reviews as I go along, much like that British fellow on Youtube (but with much less profanity and probably much less hilarity; also I had this idea before I knew that British fellow had done it, so I'm really not copying promise.
So, dear reader, please bear witness:
I solemnly swear that I am up to no good...and also that I will go into this Experiment with as unbiased a mind as possible. I will keep all thoughts of pre-formed opinions and scorn completely from my mind, and read the Twilight Saga as if I know absolutely nothing about it, falling back into the readerly innocence that fueled my slight desire to read them in the very beginning. I solemnly swear that as much as is humanly possible by the grace of God that you will get an honest, unslanted, fresh opinion of all that I read. I will not let RoPat affect what I think, I will not let the twelve-year-old fangirls affect what I think, I will not let what I thought affect what I think.
So, let's see how this goes, shall we?
Three, in fact.
Yes, you guessed it: I'm currently in possession of the first three novels in the Twilight Saga (saga, what a pretentious word for series). It's quite terrible, I know. One even has Robert Pattinson's face on it. Horrors.
Allow me to explain myself. Since I was made aware of what Twilight really is, I've looked upon it with derision (there was a very small period of time when I considered reading it, but that was when the only knowledge I had of it was that it was called "Twilight"). Not only did everything I hear about it offend me as a writer, but it also offended me as a basic person with some imagination (sparkling vampires. Honestly).
However, you, dear readers, may have noticed that key word that has been irking me myself for some time. "Hear." Everything I hear about it. The only personal hands-on experience I have with Twilight is my viewing of the movie (which I'd highly recommend if you need a good long laugh). I of course know that's nowhere near sufficient as my personal philosophy is to never judge a book by its movie or vice-versa. Therefor, it's simply unfair of me to judge the Twilight Saga without first at least reading them. Know thy enemy and all that. I've always been an avid supporter of forming my own opinions, especially about what I read; so I hate to think of myself as one of those mindless, spiteful Twilight haters who ravage the series simply because it's been said to be better than Harry Potter (codswallop!).
So I devised a simple yet brilliant plan: to borrow the Twilight Saga and read them.
So I have (save for Breaking Dawn--anyone have a copy I might procure for a short period of time?), and I'm about to.
And I thought, since I haven't been posting in a while and this will most likely be the most interesting thing to happen in my mind for a while, I might do a series of posts detailing my Twilight Experiment. Sort of narratives/summaries/reviews as I go along, much like that British fellow on Youtube (but with much less profanity and probably much less hilarity; also I had this idea before I knew that British fellow had done it, so I'm really not copying promise.
So, dear reader, please bear witness:
I solemnly swear that I am up to no good...and also that I will go into this Experiment with as unbiased a mind as possible. I will keep all thoughts of pre-formed opinions and scorn completely from my mind, and read the Twilight Saga as if I know absolutely nothing about it, falling back into the readerly innocence that fueled my slight desire to read them in the very beginning. I solemnly swear that as much as is humanly possible by the grace of God that you will get an honest, unslanted, fresh opinion of all that I read. I will not let RoPat affect what I think, I will not let the twelve-year-old fangirls affect what I think, I will not let what I thought affect what I think.
So, let's see how this goes, shall we?
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