Bella Swan has returned to her childhood home in the small town of Forks, Washington, and the father her mother left when she was an infant. Though Bella has spent a little time with her sheriff father, they aren't close, but her flighty mother has remarried and Bella's giving them some space. Never popular in Phoenix, Bella's surprised to be something of the centre of attention in her new school.
She is immediately attracted to her new seatmate, Edward - gorgeous and enigmatic, Bella is dismayed to find him treating her with hostility every time their paths intersect, at least until he saves her from being mowed down in a car accident. She would swear he moved as fast as lightening, and the dents in the van's fender are hand shaped...
Bella is determined to get to the bottom of the mystery. A chance conversation with childhood friend Jacob, who tells her about local Native American mythology, leads Bella to conclude that Edward and his family are vampires. His adoptive father, Carlisle, has a non-human policy and all the members of the group drink animal blood, unlike the vast majority of vampires. Bella's scent is intoxicating to Edward, which is why he avoided her, and she is strangely immune to his ability to read thoughts.
Twilight is the first in a massively successful quartet that I've avoided until now. Lynn reviewed this first installment a few months ago and was less than impressed, which was good enough for me, but in the space of less than a week I've had three people tell me I have to read it, and I succumbed to the pressure.
I can certainly see why Twilight is popular with its' adolescent readership. It is, to the best of my knowledge, the first vampire series aimed squarely at teen girl, and that's certainly a factor. Bella is an archetypal Every Girl - unappreciated, lonely, distanced from her parents and unpopular until she discovers an environment where she blossoms. Edward is the ideal boyfriend - courteous and devoted, attracted but limit setting, gorgeous and faithful. There's a strong tension between desire and restraint, they have a secret that binds them from the outside world, and from the beginning Bella is concerned about the age difference between them.
Of course, like all vampire romance novels there's no concern about the fact that her apparently seventeen-year-old paramour is really a century or so old. Why does no-one ever find this disturbing? Instead the concern is that he will never age while she will continue to grow older and more withered. Bella desperately wants to join Edward as an immortal, a move he resists because of his belief that the turning will damn or lose her soul. With all the passion of young love Bella is deaf to any objections, and there's a strong Romeo and Juliet-type atmosphere, though more in terms of heedless, blind passion than suicidality and death.
Though pleasant and absorbing enough, I have certainly read more captivating and absorbing novels, even in this sub-genre. However, the pace is brisk, the large cast of characters introduced in a measured tempo and well differentiated, and I enjoyed the novel enough that I've reserved the next to read as well. I must say, though, that I still don't understand the strength of the passion this novel has inspired, particularly in middle-aged readers like myself. It's been suggested to me that at least some of this is down to the novel bringing back memories of their own disenfranchised teen years, and I suppose I can see that. However my adolescence wasn't all flowers and adoration and I seem to have moved past that in the intervening twenty years. - Alex
For Lynn's review of Twilight click here
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