Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

This book was a huge disappointment. I was eager to read it at first, because a.) I love young adult lit (it's one of my areas of concentration in my Master's program) and b.) I love vampires and the supernatural (Buffy and Angel are two of my favorite shows.) So I bought it thinking that I was going to read a literary exploration of adolescent love with vampires thrown in there to boot. Instead, I got this overlong, melodramatic, Mary Sueish wish-fulfillment fantasy. There are so many things that bother me about this book, it's hard to know where to start, but I suppose the characterization is one of my biggest gripes. Let's start with the narrator, Bella Swann. I mean her name! It basically translates into "Beautiful Swan" fer Chrissakes! What kind of name is that for a teenage protagonist? Then there's the fact that we're obviously supposed to believe that she's special and wonderful and that she lives her life by putting others ahead of her--or at least that's what the author says. But if you look at the Bella of the novel and her disdain for her fellow classmates, her blatant manipulation of Jacob, and her barely-there relationship with her father--well I call BS on that account. In fact, she seems downright sociopathic at times. Hasn't anyone considered the moral implications of her burning desire to be turned into a vampire? She's going to spend all eternity as an enormous danger to the humans around her, quite possibly killing someone if she loses control for one second. Eternity is a long time...that's a lot of seconds that you could end up possibly losing control. So basically, she's asking to be turned into a potential murderer. Sure, an interesting ethical quandary, but the author scarcely seems to acknowledge it. I guess it's no surprise that this thought hasn't entered Bella's head--girlfriend doesn't seem to have too much going on upstairs. We spend the whole novel reading her thoughts and they basically consist of: "Forks sucks. I hate cold weather. Edward is beautiful and gorgeous and perfect. Forks sucks. People here actually have the nerve to be nice and try to include me in social activities. Obviously they're just using me. Edward is beautiful and perfect and gorgeous. What stupid thing can I do today to get myself nearly killed? Edward is beautiful and perfect and gorgeous. Edward is a vampire. His instinct is to rip me to shreds. But he's beautiful and perfect and gorgeous. I can't exist without him." And Edward! The most boring character in existence. Yes, he's supposed to be gorgeous, yet I have no picture of him in my head. Also, he doesn't have one interesting, charming, or funny thing to say. His dialogue can be divided into three categories: 1.) "Bella, you are my moon, my stars, my sun, my pearl among swine, my angel amongst the unwashed masses...You are marvelous, you are amazing, I adore you...of course, I don't know you at all, because I just met you two weeks ago, but I love you very, very much. Oh and I'm perfect." 2.) "Bella, you silly, silly girl. Who told you that you get to think and state your opinions? I'm the vampire, I'm the one who knows everything, I get to make all the decisions...remember, I'm perfect." 3.) "Behold my [pick one] beauty, strength, power, speed, marvelous, endearingly quirky sense of humor, my amazing family...have I mentioned that I'm perfect?" And the themes! I'm not one to think that children's/YA lit should be preachy and full of Very Special messages, just the opposite, in fact, but Good Lord! If there was ever a book that deserved the medal for Worst Messages of All Time to Send to your Teenage Audience, then this is the one. Girls, life is not worth living unless you have your man. It's okay to have no dreams, ambitions, hobbies, interests, goals, ideas, friends, etc... as long as you have your man. It's okay, and in fact desirable that you stay with a man forever, even though he may very likely kill you, or at least injure you, in the future. Growing into mature adulthood and eventually old age is a fate worse than death. True Love is based on appearances and physical aspects. And the list goes on. Hey vampires are awesome, but not so much when they're turned into superhero supermodels who wear way too much glitter body lotion.