I finished Twilight last weekend. Quickly and easily summed up it is book candy. It is fun to read, but in my opinion there is very little substance. Will I read the other books in the series? Probably. They should be quick reads and I didn’t hate the characters or the premise.
But…
Maybe I have been reading too much literature lately, but I had some problems with Twilight.
To begin with, I didn’t feel like the characters had much depth and I saw very little character development. I thought Edward had the potential to be a complex character, but unfortunately he stayed pretty flat throughout the book. He is mysterious, which I think is one of the reasons that Bella is drawn to him, and we do learn something about how he became a vampire, but he doesn’t reveal anything about what it is like to be a vampire. Obviously he is drawn to Bella, but when the reader learns about his attraction it is described in animalistic terms. He claims to love her, but we don’t know why.
The character of Bella bothered me on a number of levels. As I mentioned briefly last week, I was irritated by her whole “damsel in distress” persona. I also didn’t like the way she thinks Edward is so damn perfect. Now, this could be part of his vampire allure or it could just be the fact that she is a teenager with stars in her eyes for the cute brooding guy in the corner, but even after she gets to know him, Bella finds absolutely no flaws in Edward.
Once Bella finds out Edward is a vampire, she isn’t disturbed in the least. Now, I have fallen for a “bad boy” or two in my day and I understand how easy it is to disregard the warnings you get about that “bad boy,” but you still are aware of the risk… that’s what makes the “bad boy” exciting. However, Bella doesn’t even seem to be aware that she is dating a “bad boy”; Even when he tells her.
As far as a “vampire story” goes, it is going to take a lot of convincing to get me to say that this one deserves all the attention that it has received. I love vampire stories and I have read quite a few in my day. I have read ones where the vampires are truly monsters with no conscience, but my favorite ones are about vampires who bemoan the fact that they feed off human blood and are searching for some kind of salvation. Edward is supposed to be this kind of vampire, which is why I was interested in reading the book in the first place, but because his character lacks development I don’t see him searching for any kind of release from what he is… maybe that comes later in the series, I don’t know.
The author also takes a lot of liberties with vampire lore. Of course that is part of the fun writing fantasy: You can disregard convention so, for example, sunlight doesn’t have to be lethal to your vampire. However, if you move too far away from the accepted lore, your reader can find it difficult to identify your character as a vampire and then in some ways your book becomes nothing more than another cheesy teenage love story.