I almost bought it a few months ago, fresh from hearing a friend gush about the book series beginning with the book Twilight by Stephanie Meyer. I was at Borders and had the hardback in my hand, it's spooky monochrome cover calling to me. I knew this series had a huge following, enough to warrant a movie version. As it happened, I decided then that I just didn't quite want to fork the money over for it at the time.
But as I was in Costco Sunday, eyeing that inviting bibliophile's paradise, the bargain book table, I spied a copy of Twilight for just $6.89. I decided to see what all the commotion was about. I bought my copy and envisioned myself being drawn into a fantasy tale that some have called, "The Next Harry Potter!"
Well, at the risk of offending droves of pre-teen girls, Pu-lease! The book is lousy! I barely liked any of it.
*FOR THOSE OF YOU WHO HAVEN'T YET READ IT AND DON'T WANT IT SPOILED, DON'T READ ON*
For starters, the first-person point-of-view was not effective. I felt like I was trapped in this silly girl's myopic brain for three days. There was no opportunity to appreciate other characters, or to really even care about them.
Secondly, the book is essentially, a romance novel. Now, I realize I should have known this. I hate that genre. I was banking on the fantasy element, but really, it has all the sappy crap I hate in romance novels. The mercurial moods, the silly he-loves-me-he-loves-me-not shifting that doesn't do a thing for me. Also, if I had to read one more description about how carved-out-of-marble, Adonis-like, impossibly gorgeously, dazzlingly, breathtakingly, sparkly, beautiful Edward was, I was clearly going to chuck the book in the fireplace.
Also - setting. Okay, I know it was important that they were in this awful, rainy town, but how many times can I really read about yet another version of rain? Now it's a mist, now it's a drizzle, now a downpour, now a wet snow, merely overcast today, but back to a drizzle the next day. Seriously, every time Bella looked out the window, I was inwardly pleading, "Don't say it! I don't want to know!"
The climax of the book felt so manufactured. It's not enough that Bella's supposedly in constant peril because she's in love with a vampire and she's fraternizing with his family of vampires, but what do we need to bring the story to it's climax? ANOTHER VAMPIRE! Only this one isn't civilized; he actually does what vampires do; he hunts her. And then, the vampire family does just what you would expect a family of vampires to do for the human girlfriend they met only once - they fly and drive all over the west to protect her. HUH?! Yeah, that would happen.
God, please let Rowling write us another series. Desperation is the only thing that could drive someone to hope Twilight is "the Next Harry Potter!" It was only slightly better than the paperbacks in the supermarket next to The Enquirer.
