Bill Condon (2) (1955–)

Since I'm generally a fan of vampire novels, and wanted to see what all the buzz was about, I decided to read 'Twilight.' I won't be reading any of the others in the series. This book is not just dull, but offensively dull.
The whole 'vampires in high school' theme was done very well by Buffy (the TV show). Buffy was exciting, clever, and portrayed believable interactions between teenagers with a good mix of action and humor. 'Twilight' takes the whole cute-boy-in-school-is-a-
vampire thing, show more and does it with hardly any action and no humor whatsoever - the whole thing is deadly, roll-your-eyes earnest. It's a romance, not a horror novel - but I was never convinced by either of the characters' feelings. I can very much enjoy love stories - but again, it's a romance, not a love story. It's also a romance with no sex whatsoever, not even implied. Now that's fine, if not very believable, when we're talking about a bunch of high school seniors. But my problem with the book is really the way in which Meyer uses vampirism as a metaphor for sex. Vampirism is, of course, pretty much always a metaphor for sex. But here, we have a 'vegetarian' vampire (he avoids feeding from people, hunting bears instead), who is attracted to a young woman pretty much only because of her scent. He is so attracted to her, he can barely keep himself from ravishing her. Since he wants to be 'good,' he refrains from ravishing her, even though she wants him to. On her part, she seems to be attracted to him pretty much because he's good-looking and dangerous. (Ah, the allure of the 'bad-boy'). The two don't seem to have anything in common, and compared to him, she is a completely powerless partner, passive except for continually putting herself in the way of danger, with what seems to be a deathwish. When a villain FINALLY shows up, 3/4 of the way through the book, he's one of those guys (uh, vampires) who doesn't really care about a girl at all, they just want to ravish her and leave (her dead). The very clear message running through all this is that Most Guys don't care about you and only want One Thing. Occasionally there might be a guy who does care about you, and can refrain from "taking" That One Thing, but Watch Out, because even the nicest guy (vampire) really does want That One Thing, which is just a step into untold disaster and could end up with You Dead. Personally, I feel this is a really terribly inaccurate and unhealthy (not to mention un-feminist) way of viewing relationships, yes, even teen relationships. Considering this, I'm finding the current popularity of the book (and movie) rather disturbing. show less

My wife tells me I'm a reading snob. I tell her I'm a writing snob. Either way, I've definitely been ruined in my expectations for fiction. I love a good story, but I've come to expect highly polished, sophisticated prose in everything I read; perhaps unfairly, I want a minute, perfectionist attention to the language itself. I'll grant you, Meyer has written a fairly compelling story, and she's building an interesting alternate mythology for the vampire (though the characters are still too show more "perfect," to use Bella's thin word, for me to really invest in them yet--even Edward's rough, borderline-abusive dominance of Bella is cause for her to swoon). But her prose is thin at best, unsophisticated and in some places just plain unpolished. I don't want to say this is a bad thing, not in itself. After all, the woman is published, getting rich, and about to watch a film version of her own first novel. She must have done something right. But I can say her style is not to my taste, for whatever that's worth. Her dialogue in particular is stiff and frequently redundant (eg: "'Shh," he shushed me"), and in this first book she's given to relatively juvenile passages, even considering the target audience and the teenage narrator.

On the other hand, given that same younger audience, her characters are distressingly underdeveloped: Edward is, on the one hand, an idealized romantic lover who desperately needs some humanizing flaws (Jane Austen knew this--go read about Darcy!), and on the other hand his one self-described "flaw"--his dangerous nature--expresses itself not as vampiric danger but as obessive, lustful danger: he sometimes comes off as a convicted rapist out on parole and trying to "control" his urges. It's genuinely unsettling, but worse is Bella's unblinking devotion to a man this dangerous. She becomes the very definition of an "at-risk" teenager, behaving in exactly the ways our society warns girls against behaving. I'm not the sort of guy who stands on soapboxes in the park and tells parents to lock up their daughters, but I am definitely disturbed by Bella's unquestioning devotion and dangerous behavior, most importantly her demure acceptance of--even expectation of--Edward's brusque, almost violent dominance. Case in point: I've been teaching teens to write fiction this summer, and one young girl brought in a story in which the romantic hero hits--actually punches in the face--his "leading lady." When I balked and asked her why she'd have her hero do something so terrible, she quietly explained, "I was trying to make him like Edward."

Still, Meyer does have some talent--she's imaginative, and when she gives herself over to descriptions of her home region in Arizona, the prose suddenly dips into beautiful, almost poetic language. I just wish her editors had pushed for more of that throughout the book. I wish we as readers demanded more out of our prose. show less

Yeah, I'm not going to lie. I loved this book. I don't love it now, and I just couldn't stop myself from changing the rating to reflect that--but when I first read it, I loved it.

Let's be honest--no one loves it because it's brilliant literature. We know it's not; in fact, it's fairly mediocre writing, and sometimes downright painful.

But sometimes a book hooks you in spite of its flaws. Sometimes the circumstances in your life have as much to do with your reading as the book itself does, and show more sometimes a book is just what you need... right now. When that happens, that book sticks with you for a long time.

Believe me, I have plenty of complaints. The bizarrely codependent relationships... The main character's utter lack of self-worth and tendency toward self-destructive behavior... The number of times a vampire's eyes are described as "ochre" or "golden." There is cheesiness galore, and besides that, I don't know that I could recommend this book to kids I care about without knowing that they're pretty emotionally stable, since it's basically a parade of unhealthy relationships and stupid choices presented as the ultimate ideal of true love.

But for me, at that time in my life, it worked. And I'm okay with that. show less

This is a totally fun musical. It isn't a documentary about Barnum and makes no pretense of accuracy which is just as well since much of it is totally fictional. The songs are memorable and there is a singalong version included. The dancing as spot on.

The theme of inclusiveness interested me as did the message that work should not overshadow family. "This Is Me" will become the anthem for anyone who has been put down or bullied.

Anyone who enjoys feelgood movies will probably like this movie.