Twilight Saga

I was just wondering what everyone thinks about the Twilight Saga by Stephanie Meyer

I really enjoyed the first two books. However, I felt that the third wasn't as good. It seemed to go on and on without much happening. It's been a bit since I read it, but I also remember thinking that Jacob's character changed in a way that seemed forced. The first book was pro-Edward, the second pro-Jacob, and the third clearly pro-Edward but in a way that seemed unbelievable. Just my two cents. Opposing thoughts welcome.

I'm about 1/2 way through the first book now and I think that how you describe book 3 is a good description for this book. Its just page after page of Bella telling the reader just how perfect Edward is and how she is so in love with him. Obessively so. This disturbs me. This book is hugely popular among teen girls and I think that it sends a horrible message.

Take when Bella gets attacked in the begining & is rescued by Edward. She is the one who was traumatized yet Edward demands that she needs to calm him down because of what he is going through. That and the fact that he pretty much stalks her throughout the whole book....but rather then be rightly wary about this fact Bella finds it endearing that "he cares so much".

I honestly can't see how this lovefest obessesion that bella has with Edward can be continued for another 3 books. Its getting to the point where I feel like screaming everytime Bella says that Edward is so handsome.....or gorgeous....or godlike...or inhumanly beautiful....and every other synonym for handsome that exists. Which pretty much means every other sentence that I read since that seems to be all that Bella seems to think about.

Irisheyz: If you hate Edward in book 1, wait til you read book 2... or the first half of book 3.

I personally am rather addicted to the *books*, but I hate Edward. So much. And I am worried about anyone who doesn't recognize the abusive aspects of their relationship.

At this point I'm not even sure that I want to read book 2 or 3. I don't understand why people find these books so enjoyable. What is the draw?

I see this book reviewed in many places and many people call it an epic romance. A great love story....but I just don't see how they get that conclusion. Edward and Bella are no Romeo and Juliet. No there is an epic love story. Albiet, another not so healthy one.

When I read the first one, I read it obsessively in two days. I couldn't wait for the 2nd one. I did a little research about the book and author and read that the demographic that this book was selling best in was women in their 30's. (ahem, ME!)

I can't even put my finger on why I like them so much, but I do understand other people's criticism about the books. I live in the Northwest and I love Meyer's descriptions of the Olympic forest. I enjoy her twist on vampires and werewolves. This old forest seems to lend itself to these fabled creatures.

It's a soap opera and I'm a sucker. Can't articulate why....

Finished Twilight today and I'm more fully convinced that this is a bad book. The time that I spent on this can never be got back. Its 500 pgs of...what where the publishers thinking when they sent this to print?!?

I rated it 1 star and for those interested my full review of it is here:
http://tickettoanywhere.blogspot.com/2008/03/twilight-by-stephenie-meyer.html

I also know that I am apparently in the minority in my thinking when it comes to this book. At this point, I don't see myself reading the rest of the books in the series.

I understand what you're saying about obsession and the story being a bad example of a healthy relationship etc. I can agree with you about teen girls reading too much into the story, especially since I've heard many call it the next "Harry Potter".

But I picked it up because it was a fantasy, and it included vampires. Lately, that's what I'm into reading about. And because it's a fantasy, I threw right and reason out of the window. Bella being drawn to Edward was unreasonable after his earlier actions, but I chalked that down to E being a vampire. It doesn't mean that the next time I see an overly handsome guy I'll let him bite my neck... (well at least not until he buys me dinner)

Anyways, I did enjoy the first two stories, and while I felt that Meyer ruined the third, I think that people should still give the stories a chance- as long as they remember that it's fiction and a fantasy story about vampires.

kegsoccer - if Bella and Edward's relationship was a minor aspect of the story then I probably could have ignored its toxicity. But their relationship was the focal point. Even the fact that Edward was a vampire seemed to take a back seat to it. Take out all the talk about Bella and Edwards relationship and what do you have left? About 200 pages or so when James and his clan roll into town.

Also, IMO, even if the story is a fantasy the relationships contained inside it should be more healthy and positive in nature. Especially since the story is geared to teenage girls. Adults might be able to segregate the unhealthy obessive relationship from the rest of the plot (and I use that term lightly in reference to this book) but what about the young girls that read it? Especially when the book is often billed as a romance.

Again all this is just my opinion....which is that there are tons of better vampire tales out there. I love vampire stories too, that's why I picked this one up but it never lived up to its promise.

I'm most of the way through Twilight and really don't see it as anything more than a good book aimed at teenaged girls. It's lightly romantic, there's a little danger and it can be read in an afternoon. The main character isn't anymore boy crazy than any other teenaged girl and seems to otherwise have a good head on her shoulders. The vampires are tame in comparison to the many others I've read in vamp-romance-lit.

Has it really been that long since the people who find the romance obsessive been teenagers? The words obsessive and teenager just go hand in hand to me.

Or perhaps it bothers people that she's 17/18 and he's something like 100?

I will admit that I did not like the books in the begining. To me it just felt like a real bad fan-fiction to a better story, but as I kept reading, and I did keep reading because I can't stop reading a book no matter how much I don't like it (it is just something that is wrong with me) it grew on me. I am planning on re reading the 3 that are out before the 4th comes out this fall.

I know this off the vampire topic but I'm really curious to read Stephenie Meyer's The Host, written for adults.

Morphidae: I'm barely 20, and I quite remember what it is to be completely, dependently, and obsessively in love--honestly, I'm still there now.

But honestly, if my favorite boy ever locked me in his basement to prevent me from seeing my best friend while he went out to dinner because he thought said best friend smelled funny, I'd really have to stop and reconsider.

It bothers me that Edward is controlling and abusive and the books seem to pass that off as 'caring about people'. THe age difference is simply a convention of vampire novels, who cares.

I am amazed at the number of people that feel negatively about these books.

Yes, she is way too head over heels for Edward, but the things he does are to protect her. He asks her to calm him down after he saves her from the guys in the alley in Twilight. Remember though, he's undead. It's not like it's Mike just being overprotective. Edward was able to read the guy's minds and know what they were really going to do. Rather than just being upset that he'd want to go beat them up, Edward wanted to kill them (as he had in the time when he'd left Carlisle to attack the mean and nasty people in the world.)

In New Moon when he left Bella. Yes, it was painful for her. Don't you think it was painful for him, too? He was hoping that she would be better off without him. Instead, Laurant and Victoria come after her and she hangs out with werewolves. You needn't look any further than Emily and her scarred face (from Sam Uley) at how dangerous the werewolves "can" be. So, Edward's concern is very real. (As is Jacob's...but the vampires have had more practice at not biting people...)

In Eclipse they both leave her at different points and Jacob proves not to be such a great guy, anyway.

Edward is not as morally verbose as you make him sound. Most of my students that are reading these books are capable of seeing what is unhealthy in the relationships. (Bella does point out the offending qualities.)

Maybe you are too eager to see the bad in the books. (That's not meant to be an attack. Just a possible observation.) Honestly, when reading the books I would have to look for the bad or "unhealthy" since I feel that it's pointed out.

Then again, I'm in my 20s and have experienced love like both Edward's and Jacob's. I've experienced the loss of love and how nasty and restrictive love can be.

This may be one of those topics that depend on your real life experiences to determine your take on the actions that are experienced in the relationships in the book.

I really liked how you put that Connelly! I agree with you that people are focusing on the negative qualities, which I believe, are few. Why can people not focus of the more redeeming qualities of things, instead of persistantly being negative. Anyhoo- just that I'd put my two cents worth in!
I personally LOVE these books, and I'll be the first to admit that I probably like them TOO much! I will say though, that the third one was nowhere near as good as the first two. I hated Jacobs character and Bella's confusion as to whom she should "stay with." However, I am excitedly awaiting Stephenie's fourth installation of the Twilight saga!

I read Twilight to see what all the fuss was about. While reading it, I kept thinking how I couldn't believe I was actually reading it...it's so obsessively romantic, and I felt like I lost brain cells while immersed in the pages. But then I read both sequels. Somehow, they're page-turners, even though they aren't the greatest books. I don't know how that works, haha. I managed to overlook the abusive qualities of Edward and Bella's relationship, probably because I read it as a fantasy. I was also focused on the fact that the romance was quite chaste—a good thing for teenagers to read, imho, unlike the Gossip Girl type series that are out there.

One thing I don't understand...why everyone likes Edward better than Jacob! Jacob is her true friend, always there for her, and much hotter (even literally, haha!).

Okay, that makes me sound more obsessive than I'd like to admit. :P

I am 32 and read all three. I plan on reading the 4th as well. I have enjoyed them all (including The Host). Until people here harped on the negative unhealthy relationship qualities in the story, I didn't even really think about it. I think most teen girls are unreasonable in their infatuation at that age. I don't think that it portrays unhealthy relationships any more than any other teen or adult romance novel. Most of the books I read rely on the unhealthy relationships to make the story. If you don't like the relationships in the Twilight series and you think they are unhealthy and don't enjoy reading it, you probably will not enjoy The Host.

Edward fan!!

For fans of the books, I suggest watching the movie trailer sneek peek that is playing on Stephenie Meyer's website. It looks like they may just do it justice.

GirlMisanthrope: I have to disagree. I don't like who they casted to play Bella. I've seen several scenes from the movie and it kinda seems like its going to be a bad soap opera?!

I hope i'm wrong!

I don't like the actors they cast for Bella or Edward. Bella doesn't act like she should, she seems to.. tough and hard, instead of shy and clusmy like bella, and she can't act very well in the previews. And edward.. he's just not Edward. I'm not saying hes a bad actor exactly, just that he is not Edward. They should have done Henry Cavil instead.

iIalso saw a few previews and I didnt like the people that where cast for the parts either. they just dont look how i pictured them. Another friend of mine who is as into the books as I am feels the same way. so I'm a little worried about seeing the film. I have seen many that just dont do the book justice.

You know, when I first saw the trailer, I was psyched. But, after a couple more viewings, much of the dialogue seems very over-acted. I'm hoping I'm wrong, but how many of our favorite books have been ripped to shreds and badly woven back together in movie form?

Basically... I'm planning on seeing the movie in theaters, but only because I'll be old enough to hit the liquor store immediately afterwards by then.

Honestly, I loooooooooooooooove incredibly bad vampire movies. But the way Stephenie Meyer does vampires, she takes almost all the vampire out of them, so I'm left with what looks like it's going to be just an incredibly bad romance movie with ~sparkly hott people~, and I might have to borrow some love from my friend Captain Morgan in order to love it like I did "Queen of the Damned."

I think part of the reason why its popular with teen girls and 30 year olds alike is because of that obsessive relationship...She may not be the greatest writer ever but she definitely captures teenage passion- girls that age understand Bella's feelings, and we 30 year olds remember.
I would certainly never want my relationship to be like theirs, but in reading this fantasy I can remember that ecstatic feeling.

flemmily: i totally agree. looking back she wasnt the best author... but the topic and the love was what got me

Ok, I'm not sure how to sum up all my feelings so I'll just go. At first, I hated the idea of all the hype surrounding Twilight. Then I attempted to read the first book and put it down after the first 20 pages. I've already been through high school and couldn't handle all the teenage angst again.

Then I saw the first movie and I thought it was alright. Then New Moon came out and I thought it was even better. So I decided instead of picking up the first book to read, I would just start with Eclipse and then move onto Breaking Dawn. I couldn't put them down they were so good. Prime example of why you can't judge a book by its cover. lol

BTW: I'm going to the midnight showing of Eclipse. hehe

Ok, saw Eclipse on Tuesday night and it was AWESOME!! I hope you all enjoy it! I can't wait for the 2 Breaking Dawn movies.