Saint Know-All

Title: Twilight
Author: Stephenie Meyer
Genre: YA supernatural

Twilight is the first book of an explosively popular series centered around supernatural teenaged romance. After reading it, I can understand why it is also such a divisive series, generating ardent fans and disgusted antis. It’s wish fulfillment, and a lot of it.

This is a long review, and I mean long, so for anyone interested only in the gist, here it is: a fast read, but ultimately boring and unintentionally odd.

This review has a structure differing from the norm, simply because the aspects I want to address are too many to lump coherently as “good” or “bad” areas. There will also be many spoilers, so consider yourself warned.

Synopsis: Seventeen year old Bella Swan has just moved to the small town of Forks, WA to live with her divorced father. A plain Jane so clumsy she can’t seem to walk across the room without tripping, she is surprised to find herself the center of attention at her new high school. Upon seeing mysterious Edward Cullen with the “godlike” face and “topaz” eyes, she immediately swoons and never recovers. While Edward seems to share a similar sudden passion for her, he confesses that he’s a vampire, and that he vants to suck her blood. Er, that is, it’s dangerous for them to have a relationship.

The Plot: Notice how I didn’t include the plot in the above synopsis. That’s because there really isn’t one. Nearly 400 out of a 500 page book are devoted on Bella and Edward cuddling, touching (in a very chaste, YA way), and professing their undying love for the other. Things pick up in the last 100 pages when Bella finally meets a not so nice vampire who decides to make her his next prey, and then sinks again when the issue is resolved in time for Bella’s prom.

Still, this flash of actual conflict felt like a breath of fresh air, and a hint of what this book could have been if Meyer had bothered to cut out repetitive, unnecessary scenes and had instilled a freakin’ plot in their stead.

Despite the length coupled with lack of action, Twilight is a fast read thanks to the style of prose, which leads me to my next point.

The Prose: This was the first oddity that I noticed. Though the prose is written in a standard modern style, it felt like I was reading entries on an obsessed teen’s LJ. With the story told in a first person POV through Bella, it should be colored with her personality. Yet the chapters feel flat and mechanical, like dutiful diary entries instead of what Bella experiences right then and there.

Part of this is probably due to the first person POV; the biggest weakness in its use is that the writing can fall into a trap of “I did that and then this and felt that and remembered this”, and this seems to be the case for much of Twilight. Yet part of it may have also resulted from the flatness of Bella’s character. Speaking of which…

The Characters: The characters are all very flat. Bella has no indication of personality beyond being shy, easy to push around, and obsessed with Edward. Which frankly sucks because she’s our narrator for this story. The other major character, Edward, has the unfortunate tendency to act like he suffers from a horrific case of PMS. His mood shifts from angry to angsty to bitchy to weepy, sometimes in the span of one conversation.

The minor characters aren’t really worth mentioning; a few stand in as clueless or concerned parent figures, but mostly the males goggle over Bella and act as foils for Edward, and the females goggle over Edward and act as foils for Bella.

The Romance: Undoubtedly the meat of the book, the romance between Bella and Edward is sudden, blind, and obsessive. Bella is literally pained at the thought of being without him for a few hours. She even faints during a kiss. Not only that, but she follows his every wish and command, unable to form any sign of spine under the strength of his “golden” eyes. When she discovers he’s a vampire, she’s unafraid because he’s just so gorgeous. This isn’t love, folks. This is a mixture of infatuation and stupidity.

I have the sense that Meyer wanted to create a vampiric Romeo and Juliet with these two, a beautifully tragic, destructive love that sweeps up their lives and leaves them thoughtless of all else. The problem is that Shakespeare was freakin’ brilliant at what he did, and he had the wisdom to make his star-crossed pair very young. And people are willing to forgive an extreme amount of stupidity upon the basis of youth. Let’s face it, if Romeo and Juliet had been in their 30s, you’d mostly likely think their behavior was just bizarre.

Well, that’s basically how I feel about Bella and Edward. True, Bella is in her late teens, and while this grants her leeway for stupidity, I still raised an eyebrow over her insane ga-ganess toward Edward. What’s especially troubling is that she is so passive. As a character, she never acts but reacts, and her ultimate goal is to hang onto Edward for dear life. Edward, meanwhile, is very controlling. If he doesn’t want her to do something, he doesn’t let her. He spies on her at night. He eavesdrops on the minds of others to learn more about her. He sulks and rages when another boy looks at her. In short, he’s a creepy stalker, but his actions are immediately forgiven by Bella because one look at his “sculpted” lips and her knees go wobbly. It’s a relationship uneven at best and potentially abusive at worst.

Twists on the Myths: One of the first vampiric myths Meyer does away with is vulnerability to sunlight. Edward and his folks don’t burn in light, they sparkle. I’m serious. They sparkle like diamonds, apparently as a way to lure in their prey.

While I like that Meyer messed with traditional lore, I think that this particular twist is more detrimental than refreshing. The inability to walk under the sun is generally a vampire’s biggest weakness, and without it, Meyer’s version becomes practically invulnerable. And come on, sparkling vampires? Disco balls were banned to the past for a reason.

Personal Thoughts: I generally avoid judging books based upon the potential messages they may send to readers, because it’s a slippery slope that can lead to frothing at the mouth and demanding that Catcher in the Rye be burned to protect children from reading the word “goddam”. With that said, certain things will get my goat, and a passive heroine that acts as a doormat for her boyfriend is one of those. This is a girl who willingly lets herself be treated like a fragile doll instead of an equal partner by her boyfriend because he’s hawt and therefore so worthier than she. A girl who is willing to become a vampire — an undead creature who must live on blood — because that way she can remain with her boyfriend forever, and her family be fucked. A girl so passive that she never takes action for herself.

This is a series that is read by many, many avid female teenagers. This is a series that has resulted in its author being chosen by Time Magazine as one of the most influential people of 2008. This disturbs me.

Final Thoughts: As I’ve said, it’s a fast, easy read, but hardly worth it in the end.

I can easily see why it’s so popular among the teenaged crowd, though; it’s wish-fulfillment to the max. But grow a little older, gain a little more life experience, and you’ll find that the romance in Twilight is little more than a fluffy concept of love, a daydream that shatters in the face of the real world. It sounds too good to be true, and it is.

This isn’t necessarily an uncommon thing, mind. The romance genre is rooted in this. And admittedly, unrealistic fluff like this can be a nice distraction from the drudgery of the real world. But what’s worrisome is that some or even most of the teens that adore this series may not understand this, that some may in fact take it to heart.

Rating: C-, based on the storytelling and actual story. If I factored in my aversion to the message it sends, it would be a fat F.