Twilight by Stephenie Meyer

[kelby_lake]

Though this is intended for teens, a lot of adults have read it/are considering it so here's my review:

Basically the book (the first in a series of 4) is about a human girl who falls in love with a teenage vampire. It's a very good idea, that's why I read it, but poorly executed.

For starters, the characters. Bella, the narrator, has all the charisma of a soggy Weetabix. She is also whiny and clingy and doesn't appear to have any hormones until Edward, the teen vamp, shows up. I tried to imagine her but all I could come up with was a soggy nymphomaniac Weetabix.
A lot of teens and adults have tried to imagine themselves as her and live out some fantasy- I did try this but then you'd need to like Edward.
Edward is perfection according to Bella- she cannot mention him without saying how beautiful he is. I wasn't convinced as she tended to sound like a gushy greetings card most of the time and Meyer has written the character so he sounds like a freak and not an outcast.
Edward isn't even an interesting freak- he's a cure for insomnia, he's that boring. And readers think he's polite because he doesn't say 'Yo, you hot!' or something. He doesn't appear very charming but apparantly he dazzles people, Bella says. Not me.

As for the rest of the characters, they don't have personalities either. They just appear to be there in order to populate Forks (the town where the book is set). Edward's vampire family have some midly interesting histories but that is not a characteristic. Alice appears to have a personality but the rest are devoid of one.

Ooh, I missed out Jacob, the guy who likes Bella. Given the choice between wolfy toyboy or vampy boytoy it is obvious who one would choose.

And things that don't add up! Why would Bella, in my preview chapter of New Moon, have a nightmare about being 18 when Edward is still 17, but flirt with Jacob who is only 15?
And if Edward is so turned on by Bella's blood, why does he stroke her face and neck etc? Isn't that playing a bit too close to the jugular vein?

Basically my advice is: read the book if you are feeling hormonal/lazy and want a nice fluffy Mills and Boon vampire story where they don't actually get it on. Because with 'booky' Bella (she's read Austen and now we are led to believe she is literary elite) and 'dazzling' Edward (as exciting as toilet paper) you wouldn't want to read it in an intelligent mood.

[Seabird111]

Price of reviews saying nothing but: Oh my GAWD!!! EDWURDZZ IS LI3K TEH HAWTEST THING EVA!!
$0

Price of reviews that actually dissect the book and show me how bad the book apparently is:

$10,000, plus tax.

I doubt I'll read it now. First really good review I've read of that book .

[Gretchen]

I once tried to read that book and it was awfully written("Why did I go there, oh yes, because I'm stupid" or whatever it was...). The lead character looks like another annoying shallow spoiled teenage girl(like in many other books for teens).

[curlyqlink]

I'm currently reading Twilight even though I am far too old and I'm the wrong gender. And I have to say, I don't hate it. It's a fun read, not badly written (occasionally it gets repetitious or the dialogue turns stilted, or it bogs down in hyperbole, but hey, it's a YA novel). There are some very good bits too, like when Bella remarks on how her cop father casually hangs his gun on a peg nowadays, figuring she's "old enough now not to shoot myself by accident and not depressed enough to shoot myself on purpose."

This book contains a great deal of overheated yet oddly chaste sexuality. It is a bizarre combination, and frankly is a thing I would never have considered possible. Although come to think of it, it's the same kind of thing that infused Bram Stoker's Dracula... a Victorian work that is all about sex even though sex never gets mentioned.

Another curious thing about Twilight is it seems that in spite of 40 years of feminism, girls still apparently dream about taking a strong, moody lover who presents a danger to them. Someone who is dominant and can rescue them... never mind that it is the lover himself who puts the girl in danger. Young Adult fiction is often all about that ghastly thing, the "role model"; Bella makes a curious one, since she seems to have zero self esteem and she's a klutz who falls down a lot.

[Tallon]

I'd never even heard of this book till i joined this forum. Great review though, i love that you described someone as a "soggy nymphomaniac Weetabix"

[Niamh]

I can see where Kelby is coming from but you know what? I really enjoyed those books. The tension at the beginning was gripping. And Edwards blood thirst for her while trying to contain his control on his instincts. Its the control that makes it possible to touch her, but it takes a while for him to do it. The first time he touched her on the face sent his instincts crying out for her blood. Could you imagine what that would be like, battling with your intire being not to rip someone apart for a moment of vampire pleasure? Which is what he was considering at the beginning. A long battle with his nature.
I couldnt put the books down when i started reading them, having the whole series read in a week. My advice to people in regards to these books is judge them for yourself. I had listened to people saying they where rubbish and didnt consider reading them until i got bored in work on day and pick Twilight up and loved it. You either love them or hate them, but judge them for yourself.

[kelby_lake]

I didn't find that they had any chemistry at all. An overload of adjectives and cliche does not equal love.

If you're bent on reading the series, stop after New Moon. Eclipse and Breaking Dawn are an insult to women everywhere.

[ArunSaxena]

i tried to read it when one of my friends referred me the novel, but couldn't go more than 10pages.. guess its not the type of story that i would enjoy reading!

[kelby_lake]

I found it sort of hard to get through...

[SleepyWitch]

hey kelby, I wholeheartedly agree with your review, except I think Edward is kinda cute.
I'm not sure why I find Edward cute, though. I read a review by two teenage girls who said every girl has her own Edward. So it's probably more to do with reader's imagination than with Meyer's talent. Unless you want to say she has a special talent for deliberately describing him in such vague terms that it leaves a lot to readers' imagination.
Bella is so annoying, I think the only reason she is so klutzy is so that Edward can be a little macho and protect her. Keeps him busy when he's not protecting her from himself.
I'll admit I only read three quarters of the first book, so I can't really judge. But on the other hand, I normally finish a book I like and often even finish the ones I hate.
Why doesn't he bite her and make her a vampire right at the end of the first book and spare us a further three volumes? I mean isn't it obvious from the first page on that she'll have to become a vampire?
As I said, I haven't read the other installments yet (and hopefully never will), but I agree with many others that Meyer should have stuck to the 'sensual but not sexual' thingy. I like that idea and it's what makes their relationship special, so why spoil it.
Apart from that, I'd like to see some writer pull off the 'sensual but not sexual' thing without vampires etc. I think it would be a much greater literary achievement to write about such a relationship between two ordinary humans in an interesting way without resorting to fantasy.

[Reccura]

*There's a spoiler in this post

I have read the first two books; Twilight and New Moon. My sisters and I didn't bother buying Eclipse because New Moon left me/us without anything-- no excitement whatsoever. I admit to have enjoyed parts of the story, but it's badly written.
If only Meyer made a short story about her dream about the meadow, it would have been better. Or if she only took time writing it slowly but carefully, like Rowling's and many more authors out there.

Meanwhile, Bella is a negative person who complains about everything she sees, looks for the tiniest flaws, and is like a dead person trying to live. I mean it was a good thing that people in her school were being nice to her, like Mike and Eric, but then she waves them off and says that Mike has somehow turned into a labrador with a wagging tail; how judgmental. Oh, and Meyer described her as an ordinary girl, klutzy and 'relates to no one in the world'. Which, if my experiences aren't wrong, what every teenager feels -- and everyone would feel like Bella, and they'd picture themselves as her in the story.

Then Edward comes like a breath of fresh air, and can be described in one word: Perfect. This is the part where I think Meyer's missing something. >.> Like she's describing her dream man, someone whom she craves or something.
Like everyone else, everyone's attracted to perfection, and they'd ignore everything else in the world just to be perfect; or near a perfect-someone.
Edward is such a control freak, maybe because he hasn't had any chance to boss anyone pathetic around a century. Their love for each other isn't really love at all; Edward's only attracted to Bella because of her mouth-watering blood, and Bella because of his dazzling perfection.

The only real person I see in the book is Jacob Black, because he doesn't pretend for nobody, not at all a control freak, and he isn't negative either. His love for Bella is true; and what Bella felt for him WAS love because he was always there for her, and captured her heart in a 'human' way.

Though I haven't read the last two books, I've seen spoilers and I knew what happened; Bella becomes a vampire, and at seventeen, she had a daughter named Renesmee. Is this a good example for the kids out there? Wanting to have a perfect boyfriend, and get married and pregnant at a young age? To not go to college, abandon her education to be with the one she loves? What a Mary Sue. She's probably the worst heroin I've ever seen.

Read it but don't take anything into account.

[Lost in LOTR]

That is one hell of a review, Kelby Lake. I totally agree with you... especially the "soggy nymphomaniac Weetabix" bit.
A terribly written series. And quite insulting for young women too.
@curlyglink (!) - i think feminism has a longer history than just 40 years...Mary Wollstonecraft and all that... But that aside, I think Mills&boon came along and ruined all the good work... A surly, misanthrophic caveman still seems the most popular turn-on. Stretching it to a teen fantasising about a blood-sucking leech (go Jacob)...that makes the imagination stutter. Sigh.
As a huge fan of fantasy, I cringed at the series.
As a (pardon me) feminist, I cried. A kid at 17? That's just perfect. Ha.

[a_little_wisp]

I had a friend ask me to write a review for our university paper, but I handed the offer off to another friend. I told the reporter that... I simply couldn't.

The only thing I would be able to write her would be

This rant:

~SPOILERS~


Harry Potter was a miracle. They were easy reads and could hook the reader on the first page. The kids (and adults) who read them never became frustrated, never tired out. For those who had not lived between the shelves of a library for 70% of their young life found themselves, quite possibly for the first time, enjoying to read. They didn't have to critically analyze anything within the books, unless they so desired, and there was no time limit.

Twilight comes out- another, apparently "easy read" (You have no idea, but then, you might - if so, yeah). Immediately, I'm impressed with how many young girls are buying the books - my thirteen year-old sister couldn't get enough of them. After some serious peer pressure, I caved in and read them to better understand the hype.

I love the Cullens, let me say that much. Although I wanted to slam Edward's face into the wall by the last book, I can't deny my stomach did a few small happy flops when he came onto the scene. But after the first book, the "Edward-weee!" pretty much died off.

The reader is seeing through the eyes of Bella, cousin of Eeyore, who looks at the world through muggyrainyickyday-colored glasses. She hates grass, anything green- she misses the concrete of her old home. She doesn't like people. She moves out from her mother's home because she doesn't want to be in the way of her mother and stepfather, and yet is completely unhappy with her decision to move in with her wonderful, loving Father (whom she calls by his first name), who gives her a car on her first day in Forks. When she comes home from school, she cooks for her father, reads and does her homework. She has no social life. She doesn't want one. She thinks she's 'different' from every one around her. 'Older', maybe. Wiser, if I dare say so, and I do.

Throughout this whole series, Bella wants to die. In the second book, when Edward is gone, she puts herself in danger countless times so she can hear Edward's voice in her mind telling her stop.

So she can *hear his voice* - which is actually her conscience (she's just, I guess, not used to it being there).

Her life IS Edward.

Without him, she is not Bella. She doesn't want to live. Her whole being depends on him. ...

It's... nauseating.

When we were all in middle school and the heard the story of Romeo and Juliet, we all thought it was very tragic. And now that we're in college, we look at the couple and think, "Poor misunderstood hormonal teenagers."

She is the worst heroine I have ever read of in my life. She doesn't want to go to college, she prefers to hang out with rich, strong, beautiful vampires than regular ol' mortals, she knowingly uses her best friend, Jacob Black, to help herself get over Edward, and she wants to get laid. Immediately. Screw life, she wants to die and have sex with Edward. There are a few, small times where she considers her parents, but... HEY, EDWARD.

I am disappointed in Smeyer. I would have grinned in joy had, in the last book, Bella did not become a vampire, and of her own choosing. I think she would have grown up a little, matured a little- maybe she would have even become a little wiser. I feel sorry for Smeyer, too. I really hope this isn't *her* dream - to throw away her life, rather than have each day that she lives be THAT much richer because you never know which might be your last. I'd always laughed at Louis from Interview with the Vampire for being so dramatic (I'm a Lestat girl, myself), but dear god, why didn't Bella read HIS story, of all the things she has read? Bella should have feared Edward. For one, he was stalking her. Outside her windows. At night. And she even went behind her father's back and let him so they could play around on the bed for awhile. Ladies, stalking is SO NOT CHILL, and it is NOT okay to let younger girls - and boys - think that that is okay. AND of course, because I think people should fear death. cont. in next comment.

They should fear death until they're done with life. Bella had only just begun. A girl shouldn't have to become another creature to see the beauty of the world of around her- it should have been reflected from within herself. Humans are not pathetic creatures.

However. She got young people to read, and I'd rather young people be reading terribly written books than nothing at all. So, Smeyer, try again, when you're older, when you've learned to enjoy life for yourself and no one else, when you've learned to appreciate the verdure of life around you and normal human beings. And also when you've invested in a thesaurus - but I won't get into that.

.... Yeah. That's what I wrote. .... It's a little angry.

The end.

[SleepyWitch]

wow, wisp, I really enjoyed your review. It's extremely well-written. It is angry but it doesn't sound polemical to me.

Bella should have feared Edward. For one, he was stalking her. Outside her windows. At night. And she even went behind her father's back and let him so they could play around on the bed for awhile. Ladies, stalking is SO NOT CHILL, and it is NOT okay to let younger girls - and boys - think that that is okay. AND of course, because I think people should fear death. cont. in next comment.

Yep, that's exactly what I was worried about before I even read the book. She's so passive and literally waiting for the vampire boy to 'pounce' on her. Seeing as the blood sucking thing is a pretty obvious symbol for sex, what does that teach 'our' kids? Even if the symbolism is initially lost on them, Meyer makes it amply clear the way she goes great length to explain that Edward can't play naughty with her because he can't lose control with her blabla. The first word that came to my mind when I heard about Bella's attitude was 'rape'. ... Not to mention that Edward is about 100 years old. Unless his mental development got arrested when he became a vampire, that technically makes him a very old geezer. So, the message is something like 'all little teeny girls are desperate and passive and just waiting for an old geezer to take advantage of them (as long as he doesn't look his age)' ???

[*Classic*Charm*]

Yep, that's exactly what I was worried about before I even read the book. She's so passive and literally waiting for the vampire boy to 'pounce' on her. Seeing as the blood sucking thing is a pretty obvious symbol for sex, what does that teach 'our' kids? Even if the symbolism is initially lost on them, Meyer makes it amply clear the way she goes great length to explain that Edward can't play naughty with her because he can't lose control with her blabla. The first word that came to my mind when I heard about Bella's attitude was 'rape'. ... Not to mention that Edward is about 100 years old. Unless his mental development got arrested when he became a vampire, that technically makes him a very old geezer. So, the message is something like 'all little teeny girls are desperate and passive and just waiting for an old geezer to take advantage of them (as long as he doesn't look his age)' ???

I should hope that parents have taught their daughters better than to think like that, and to passively accept that as a message.

If you read closely enough, you'll find that Meyer says (not explicitly, of course) that a real person like Edward is not possible. She credits his being "so perfect" to a combination of factors that simply aren't possible, that is,

1) his habits, manners and speech are those one would find in a person of another time (100 years ago or whatever it may be)
2) his ability to use hindsight and his self-control are characteristics of someone much older than 17
3) he's obsessive and passionate and ridiculous like a teenager
4) he has all sorts of impossible physical abilities.

He's an impossible being, even if you disregard the vampire stuff, and I think Meyer makes this clear, so to say that the "message" is that girls should wait around for some old guy to take advantage of them is, to my mind, a little far-fetched.

Admittedly, these books are being read by girls who I think are too young to be reading all the sex stuff.

Though, I'm confused on one part- what exactly about Bella and/or her attitude made you think rape? Just curious