Comments on: Why grown-ups shouldn’t read teen vampire love fiction…

By: Elizabeth

Elizabeth — Sat, 18 Apr 2009 20:17:45 +0000

seriously, WHY do they all know karate?

Word. And even bigger WORD on Bella being no Elizabeth Bennett. (My namesake!)

By: Darcy

Darcy — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 22:15:15 +0000

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.

By: Canada

Canada — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 13:37:18 +0000

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 . . .

By: Christopher Barzak

Christopher Barzak — Sun, 20 Jul 2008 20:56:11 +0000

Oh, and thanks for the props about writing good (I mean, not good, but realistic maybe?) teenage sex! LOL.

By: Christopher Barzak

Christopher Barzak — Sun, 20 Jul 2008 20:55:24 +0000

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.

By: lucy

lucy — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 04:46:55 +0000

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!

By: Canada

Canada — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 04:21:51 +0000

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.

By: Lucy

Lucy — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 22:01:48 +0000

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).

By: crseum

crseum — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 20:27:20 +0000

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!

By: Lucy

Lucy — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 19:36:44 +0000

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).