I’ve just completed book three, Eclipse, of Stephenie Meyers Twilight vampire love series. Now, let me just preface my choice to read these books by saying that they were recommended to me by other Potterheads as something to fill the gaping hole left after The Deathly Hallows. Also, I read, read, read in the summer. I put away easily 30 books between May and August. The Twilight books are long, and they’re also from the young adult genre, and I do like my fluffy YA reads.
Had it not been for a Barnes and Noble gift card, though, I would have stopped myself from buying Twilight when I read the word “vampire” in the summary. A little history…my dear Reg is a BIG FAT fan of nearly anything, good or truly horrible, from the vampire genre. Among the best are Dracula and the Anne Rice books, among the worst, Blade, which I once described as the most “effing disgusting” movie I’d ever seen (ten minutes in, just before I walked out). There was a time in grad school when Nina and I forbid Reg from mentioning Dracula for one month. So, like the supportive and loving wife that I am, I openly mock the entire vampire genre anytime I’m given the forum…seriously, WHY do they all know karate?
But because of the gift card, an overwhelming sense of curiousity, the aforementioned Potterhead props, and lots of time, I bought Twilight and plunged into Bella and Edward’s saga of teenage angst, star-cross’d love ala Romeo and Juliet and all that. What I liked about Twilight…all of the Austen and Bronte references. About halfway in I thought “okay, this love story is a little bit much, but I’m not the target audience and there is some smart stuff here.” At one point, the first person p.o.v. character Bella muses about the name Edward and weren’t there any other names in the late 19th century, to which I responded by mentally screaming “Yes, Henry Fitzwilliam [Darcy]!” You get my point. I thought the idea of having a 19th century romantic figure in a 21st century high school was kind of a cool thing to do.
I love my 19th century romances and romantic guys: Darcy, Rochester, Heathcliffe, etc. So, I thought that I would just, as I did with book club selection House of Leaves, look past the not-so-good literary elements, understanding that the book is written for 17 year old girls. I’m usually pretty good at this. I can read and enjoy almost anything if I just sort of put my 40-something, MA, white woman stuff aside and look at the book with new eyes.
I still like the vampire as a vehicle to carry the Darcy type character into the 21st, but here’s where it all breaks down for me. If the vampire and the girl can’t actually get it on because he’s afraid his bloodlust , not to mention his superhuman vampire strength, will make him accidentally kill her, where, exactly, is 1500 pages of romance going to go? NOWHERE. I know it’s for the kids, but after about 750 pages, I just wanted them to do it for eff’s sake. I could have handled 300 (about the length of an Austen or Bronte novel) or so pages of steamy foreplay with no payoff, but 1500 pages is too much to ask. And by the way, I’m technically not a pervert because the characters were 18 and 108 years old. Although, one could, I suppose, make lots of guesses about why a 108 year old man is so drawn to an 18 year old girl, but that kind of guessing is going to lead me down the road of sweeping generalities.
Then, I finally got around to reading the author bio and discovered that Stephenie Meyer (the author) belongs to the Church of Latter Day Saints. So I’m guessing that the sex isn’t going to happen in the fourth installment either. And good, because really, we shouldn’t be encouraging teens toward flesh-ripping vampire sex anyway. Sigh.
And once I realized that the sex wasn’t happening and that Edward wasn’t going to turn Bella into a vampire (metaphorical sex, for those less beaten down by the vampire genre), I started to find all of the flaws in the books. I won’t list them here, but let’s just say that I went seriously snobby-ass erudite at this point. However, I do have to mention that because forbidden vampire love clearly isn’t enough, there are werewolves. There is also forbidden werewolf love. There is a forbidden vampire and werewolf love triangle. No sex, but bring on the lycanthropes. Sigh, groan, eyeroll.
So, having completed this month’s book club selection last month, I’m a little fictionally bored right now. Feel free to leave suggestions in your comments. (No vampires, please).
Click here to read a thorough and on point review of Twilight.
23 comments
Comments feed for this article
July 9, 2008 at 12:35 pm
Tyler S Clark
Um, Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man? C’mon, give it another shot! I’ll loan you a copy, if you need one. And if you want some help getting through it, Joseph Campbell wants to help: http://tinyurl.com/6zdvp5
Oh, and I found my notes on that project, too, so let’s talk.
July 9, 2008 at 1:59 pm
Lucy
Tyler, I knew you’d be the first one in with your James Joyce! I almost wrote “Tyler, Joyce understood” into the text of the post.
Alright, alright, I might have a go, but I was kind of looking for something a little fluffier. Is there at least good sex? Joyce was a bit pervy, wasn’t he?
July 9, 2008 at 2:03 pm
Tyler S Clark
It’s been a few years since my last read, but I don’t think you’ll be disappointed. There’s self-flagellation and a prostitute and some other straying from the paths of righteousness.
July 9, 2008 at 7:24 pm
Christopher Barzak
Our August book, The Lover, by Marguerite Duras, will provide steaminess. It’s a fast read though, very slim book, so may not keep you going more than a couple of hours before it’s over. I like little books, though.
July 9, 2008 at 7:49 pm
tylersclark
Something else I’d recommend is The Club Dumas by Arturo Perez-Reverte
July 9, 2008 at 8:01 pm
Tyler S Clark
Did you already read “Wicked” by Maguire? How about “Ragtime” by Doctorow? You know, out of my Library of some 600 books, I think fewer than 50 are fiction. Something’s wrong with me.
July 9, 2008 at 8:30 pm
Lucy
Thanks Chris! By the way, I couldn’t work this thought into my post, but you write teenage sex very well
Tyler, I tried Wicked, but I found it terribly overwritten, and I never finished it. Nothing’s wrong with you; you’re a realist. And often, the real stuff is steamier than fiction anyway.
I picked up a Joanne Harris–of Chocolat fame– book at the library today, but I’ll probably be done with it in two days.
I’m still open to more suggestions.
July 9, 2008 at 8:48 pm
Tyler S Clark
Okay, here’s a novel you probably haven’t read: Popular Music From Vittula by Mikael Niemi
July 10, 2008 at 12:24 pm
Angela
In response to your assessment of Stephenie Meyers vampire series, I would like to point out that there are adult fans of Edward Cullen. In fact, I was just at the book club to discuss Twilight at Barnes and Noble in Boardman last night. For any other fans, we’ll be discussing New Moon on 7/16 and Eclipse on 7/30, both at 7p.m. Plus, on Friday, August 1, there is going to be an engagement party at Barnes and Noble prior to the midnight release of Breaking Dawn. To quote from my computer’s wallpaper, “When you can live forever, what do you live for?”
July 10, 2008 at 1:42 pm
Lucy
Hi Angela! Oh, I know there are adult fans of the Twilight series (including sci fi writer Orson Scott Card), but I just don’t get it.
Once I got past Twilight, which I found charming and sweet and romantic, things started to get a little tedious with too much focus on saving Bella, who becomes the prey of multiple vampires for reasons that are never really believable. The love triangle is trite; Jacob and Edward respond to Bella, and to each other for that matter, in very similar ways. Sure, I can see why adult women might be all hot for Edward Cullen (he is, after all, a 19th century romantic hero), but by the third book, he has become far too paternalistic for my comfort. Do we really want a romantic hero/heroine who are so clearly unequal? Is this romance?
The writing, once one begins to look at words and descriptions, is just not that good. Meyer is forever telling instead of showing. After 1500 pages, I should be able to picture Forks and La Push, and I can’t. Characters are always murmuring or mumbling or clenching fists. Edward laughs nearly constantly, and Bella falls asleep, what, 20 or 30 times, during the middle of the action only to be safely escorted back to her bed by Edward. It seems that there are only two adjectives, cold and marble, that can describe Edward. Nearly all of New Moon reads like the diary of an emotionally unbalanced teenage girl. And by the way, was I the only one who was bothered by the fact that a teenage werewolf “imprinted”…found his soul mate…in a two-year-old girl?
As a feminist and a mother of young daughters, I hate that a young woman character is so selfish, spoiled, and dependent on men. Bella can’t even unwrap a present for God’s sake. She’s presented as a girl who doesn’t like “girly” things like clothing and make-up and prom and as a smart girl who has read nearly everything, and yet, I don’t know when I saw a heroine who was weaker. She’s forever the victim…the damsel in distress, and of course, ALL the boys love her…as if that’s what it takes to validate her as a person.
Now, I will say that the concept behind the Twilight series is interesting…like Card said, “Mr. Darcy is a vampire”…and I love the idea of the Cullens, the vampire family. The literary allusions are also great. We get too little of the good stuff in favor of constant teenage romance angst. The love story goes nowhere. Edward is selfless, Bella is selfish, and Jacob gets caught in the middle. Instead of actual progression of Edward and Bella’s storyline, we get stock fictional turns…the love triangle and the rescues…over and over and over.
Someone asked me the other day if I would let my daughters read the Twilight books, and my answer is yes. The books no doubt hit the mark for a teen audience, and I’m sure that Edward and Bella would provide opportunities for discussion about relationships and responsibility. In short, I think the books are okay for the teens, but Twilight is not the best series to come out of the YA genre, not even close.
July 10, 2008 at 2:13 pm
Lucy
Oh, and Bella is also incapable of maintaining relationships with any of the other girls, aside from Edward’s sister. She uses them to appease her dad’s worries over her obsession with Edward and ditches them as soon as Edward shows up. The depictions of the other girls derive from stereotypes: Rosalie is jealous, Alice is flighty and fashion-obsessed, and those are just the vampires. The human girls are also terribly superficial and canned and, it seems, not really worth anyone’s time, including Bella’s.
I mean, if a writer is going to update Mr. Darcy, then why not Elizabeth Bennett too? Elizabeth was smart and resourceful and willing to reject a man because of his treatment of others…people she loved…knowing that if she did so she might never marry. And not marrying for the Bennett women had potentially devastating consequences–like poverty and starvation. But Bella doesn’t want to get married because then she would be just like all of the other girls, and she’s so above it all.
I will say that I will probably read Eclipse, the fourth and final book, because readers got a much-needed narrator shift away from Bella’s self-absorption at the end of the third book. But then again, book four might be little more than 400 pages of Jacob’s tortured love angst and 100 pages of rescue Bella if Meyer sticks to her current formula.
Sorry, see. I said I was all snobby-ass erudite about these books. It might have something to do with my personally knowing someone who is a FAR better and more original writer than Meyer who isn’t having her smashing success.
And also, it seems like such a waste that a solid fictional idea was so badly handled. Meyer doesn’t take any risks with her characters; they always do the right thing. Even Mr. Darcy behaved like a real jackass sometimes; it’s what enabled him to grow.
July 10, 2008 at 6:31 pm
brookie
woah. i keep hearing about this twilight book (from one of angela’s book club members, then a few other friends) and though i would pick it up as an easy summer read…now i definitely will since you ripped it apart! lol
i am readin the stepford wives…fast….and did you know david sedaris just came out with a new book (something about fire or uhm i forget the title). have you ever read a.m. holmes or amy bloom? or kelly link? these are some authors i like very much…bobbie ann mason also good…and peter hedges (what’s eating gilbert grape, i love that book). i do better referring to authors, not so much books.
July 10, 2008 at 7:08 pm
Maria
Beyond the Latter Day Saints thing, I’m pretty sure Meyer has given an interviewer where she specifically says that she is writing a no premarital sex book because of the mad hot YA sex that is apparently everywhere in books – so that’s just completely dead.
Also, I’m not an English major, so I could have just missed it, but the literary allusions I saw were pretty blatant and hackneyed. Particularly the direct reference to Romeo and Juliet.
Have you read any Dorothy Sayers? Gaudy Night is quite good.
July 10, 2008 at 7:36 pm
Lucy
Brookie–I’ll bring you my copy of Twilight on Saturday. Then we can trash it together! Of course, I’ll still respect you if you love it
Thank you for all of the suggestions.
Maria–thanks for the notice, but then the question is…will Meyer have Edward and Bella get married and THEN have sex? I’m really not as much interested in the sex as in Bella becoming a vampire and perhaps then a more interesting character. I’d just like to see something besides Edward constantly “saving” Bella from both vampires and her own sexual desire. I have two degrees in English, and I’ll tell you that you’re not wrong about the literary allusions…I was just thinking that if 17-year-old girls think that Bella’s cool, then they might actually pick up Austen or Shakespeare or Bronte (BTW: Heathcliffe and Cathy were also fairly simplistically handled).
July 10, 2008 at 8:27 pm
crseum
All I could think of while I was reading this was Reg’s theory about Vampire representation in mass media: (Gill brings it up every time we start another bad vampire movie) “You have a duty to watch/read even the crappiest movies because we need to support the genre”. I just thought Id throw it in for mockability purposes!
July 10, 2008 at 10:01 pm
Lucy
Crse, you don’t even know…a couple of weeks ago, Reg was watching a movie in which Jon Bon Jovi played a vampire hunter. Even Reg said that it was terrible (but he liked Bon Jovi’s performance).
July 11, 2008 at 4:21 am
Canada
Okay, if you want fluffy but interesting, and also like Brit stuff, try to find a copy of Jilly Cooper’s “Riders” (esp one that hasn’t been Americanized – as in, the trunk of a car is still called a boot, a garbage can is called a bin, etc). If you like it, follow with:
Rivals, Polo, The Man Who Made Husbands Jealous, Apassionata . . . and several others (which I can give you the correct order).
I think I am on my 4th copy of Riders, have been reading and re-reading since last year of high school – it got me through exams in university (as in, I could take a break and read this, but since I knew what was going to happen, could put it down and go back to studying)
Also, I don’t remember if you have read Eragon (and Eldest). The movie was worse than awful, but the book was excellent.
July 11, 2008 at 4:46 am
lucy
Canada, You’re so attentive to my needs…fluffy and interesting and British. Yes, all of those! Fabulous. And love the author’s name, Jilly Cooper, so I’m off to google!
July 20, 2008 at 8:55 pm
Christopher Barzak
You have got to be one of the most thorough, critical readers I know. I am amazed by how you can actually see what a book is saying. It’s my belief that some writers aren’t really aware of what they’re portraying, and I wonder if Stephanie Meyers is one of these writers, who are portraying a romantic version of being a girl who is loved and adored for her total willingness to always be saved, rather than giving us a female character who saves herself, without the help of a man. Twilight is fast and fun, but not well written, for the reasons you mentioned, and not very smart beyond the author’s ability to hook readers on facile plot turns that she uses over and over. It becomes like what I imagine it feels like for a hamster to spin in its wheel. Same ole, same ole. Nothing much changing here.
There are movies being made on the series, too, which is going to make it even more popular. Perhaps after the movies come out, it won’t matter that we can’t actually get a picture of the people and places in her books, because the films will have supplied all of that for us.
RE: Brookie’s suggestions, Kelly Link writes amazing short story collections. Stranger Things Happen, and Magic for Beginners. Unfortunately B&N doesn’t carry her books. But Borders does.
Another good read is a novel called “If I Told You Once” by Judy Budnitz. Very interesting melding of folk and fairy tale with an immigration narrative that leads through portraits of the women in the same family as decades pass and they become American. It’s extremely magical, in wonderfully weird ways.
I also liked Jeffrey Ford’s novel “The Girl in the Glass” a historical mystery, very literate and smart, set on Long Island during the depression, and centering around the spiritualist movement and how people used to become spiritualists to con those who still had money and would pay for things like seances. It’s also about racism and various other societal ills.
Kevin Brockmeier’s “A Brief History of the Dead” is great too.
July 20, 2008 at 8:56 pm
Christopher Barzak
Oh, and thanks for the props about writing good (I mean, not good, but realistic maybe?) teenage sex! LOL.
August 18, 2008 at 1:37 pm
Canada
OK, I just finished Breaking Dawn (the fourth book) and I will say SPOILER ALERT (for those who care):
Marriage, then sex (the act is not described, but how wonderful it was is). Then Bella becomes immortal at some point. And the werewolves? Aren’t really true werewolves.
Four books, one week. It was something to read at the cottage with the in-laws. Entertaining, but in no way filling the Potter void.
Must go find something else to read now . . .
September 15, 2008 at 10:15 pm
Darcy
Interesting points you bring up. I completely agree with the vampire story being a good medium to bring the 19th century hero and heroine into more modern times, I just wish that this had been pushed a little further in Twilight or at all in Bella’s case. Elizabeth Bennet would have eaten that brat for breakfast.
April 18, 2009 at 8:17 pm
Elizabeth
seriously, WHY do they all know karate?
Word. And even bigger WORD on Bella being no Elizabeth Bennett. (My namesake!)