OK. I cannot put this off any longer. I am being inundated by references to Stephenie Meyer, Breaking Dawn and Edward (or rather, "OMG EDWARD EDWARD MARRY ME") almost every day. It must be a sign.
Book: Twilight, New Moon, Eclipse, by Stephenie Meyer
Book: Twilight, New Moon, Eclipse, by Stephenie Meyer
The premise for the Twilight series, I have to admit, was cheesy but promising. Next-door-type girl and young, hot vampire-boy fall in love. Only problem? He thirsts for her blood. Needless to say, with my penchant for forbidden-love stories, I was pretty swept up in the first book. It was, despite its unspectacular prose, gripping in that teenage hormonal romance way. If you're not sure what I mean, get on fictionpress.com and find any angsty 30-chapter high school love story penned by a pseudo-emo fifteen year old girl. Page upon glorious page of whining, wondering and wishing!
That's exactly where Meyer's secret to popularity lies, I think. She writes like a lovesick teenage girl. Edward is "perfect", "beautiful" and "flawless". His only personality defect is that he is overprotective of Bella. And by the time I got to the second and third books, my common sense returned to me. When I finished Eclipse, I was irritated to death of all the characters, including Jacob, Bella and (gasp) Edward. The characterisation makes me shudder. Bella claims to be a mature, unselfish girl, but she spends 99% of her time wailing about Edward and wallowing in self-pity. There is hardly a page in the book when she's not thinking about herself. She is not interesting in any way. She does not have talents or flaws. She is "clumsy". Big whoop.
Edward, naturally, is still my favourite character (hawt, what can I say?), but even he began to get on my nerves. After three books, I still haven't figured out why he fell in love with Bella. I think it's because he liked the smell of her blood. Right-o. A bonus, though: he sparkles in the sun.
Don't get me wrong; I'm not slagging Stephenie Meyer. I think she's brilliant at capturing the wild, unrealistic fantasies of thousands of teenage girls across the world. And her writing isn't dreadful. It's just no better than a hundred other stories I've read online. Heck, I've read stories online that are so much wittier, wilier, quirkier, cleverer and more deserving of popularity than hers.
Anyway, I'm not going to be reading Breaking Dawn. I've already read the Wikipedia plot summary, and I have had my fill of gushing proclamations of love, and the fourth and final book is 800 pages long, and that's 800 pages of my life that could probably be better spent, eg. picking wax out of my ears (ouch, that was unnecessarily harsh! I don't mean that!). I apologise to those of my friends to whom I recommended the books during my earlier fangirling days--I'm glad you enjoyed it anyway! And despite everything, yes, I will be going to see the movie when it comes out, just to see Cedric Diggory reincarnated as a sparkling, super-strong, super-hot vampire.
In retrospect, the Twilight series is little more than an online angst saga dressed up in pretty book covers. It's enticing, I'll give it that much, but...sigh. The whole thing could have been done so much better.
Rating: 3.5/10 (extra 0.5 for length and effort)
That's exactly where Meyer's secret to popularity lies, I think. She writes like a lovesick teenage girl. Edward is "perfect", "beautiful" and "flawless". His only personality defect is that he is overprotective of Bella. And by the time I got to the second and third books, my common sense returned to me. When I finished Eclipse, I was irritated to death of all the characters, including Jacob, Bella and (gasp) Edward. The characterisation makes me shudder. Bella claims to be a mature, unselfish girl, but she spends 99% of her time wailing about Edward and wallowing in self-pity. There is hardly a page in the book when she's not thinking about herself. She is not interesting in any way. She does not have talents or flaws. She is "clumsy". Big whoop.
Edward, naturally, is still my favourite character (hawt, what can I say?), but even he began to get on my nerves. After three books, I still haven't figured out why he fell in love with Bella. I think it's because he liked the smell of her blood. Right-o. A bonus, though: he sparkles in the sun.
Don't get me wrong; I'm not slagging Stephenie Meyer. I think she's brilliant at capturing the wild, unrealistic fantasies of thousands of teenage girls across the world. And her writing isn't dreadful. It's just no better than a hundred other stories I've read online. Heck, I've read stories online that are so much wittier, wilier, quirkier, cleverer and more deserving of popularity than hers.
Anyway, I'm not going to be reading Breaking Dawn. I've already read the Wikipedia plot summary, and I have had my fill of gushing proclamations of love, and the fourth and final book is 800 pages long, and that's 800 pages of my life that could probably be better spent, eg. picking wax out of my ears (ouch, that was unnecessarily harsh! I don't mean that!). I apologise to those of my friends to whom I recommended the books during my earlier fangirling days--I'm glad you enjoyed it anyway! And despite everything, yes, I will be going to see the movie when it comes out, just to see Cedric Diggory reincarnated as a sparkling, super-strong, super-hot vampire.
In retrospect, the Twilight series is little more than an online angst saga dressed up in pretty book covers. It's enticing, I'll give it that much, but...sigh. The whole thing could have been done so much better.
Rating: 3.5/10 (extra 0.5 for length and effort)
1 comment:
heyY!! this is the book my brother was looking forward to reading hahahaha
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