There Will Be Sparkle
by cleolinda
13-year-old Erin and I are here to discuss chapters 11-15 of Twilight. There are some vital points, as you will find, on which we disagree...
Okay, the mush is getting ridiculous and I want the plot.
“But that means that bad things will happen!”
But it means SOMETHING will happen other than endless descriptions of Edward’s godlike appearance. I GET IT, HE IS BEAUTIFUL. Or, as my notes from a later chapter in which Bella is still going on and on about Edward’s skin and Edward’s smile and Edward’s breath and Edward’s penmanship express it: “Argh. He’s so fucking perfect. So fucking, fucking perfect.”
“My language really gets a lot worse as I get older.”
Yeah, it pretty much happens when you hit college. But that’s beside the point. I mean, he made her faint. Seriously, what the hell was that? HE MADE HER FAINT. BY KISSING HER. WHAT. WHAT?!
“There’s something I wanted to ask you…”
What?
“Who’s Adonis?”
You don’t-look, just look it up for yourself, we have sparkling to cover.
“Is he in the Lincoln Library?”
Just use Wikipedia.
“What’s that?”
…Wow, I forgot how long ago ten years is in internet time. It’s a website.
“Like Encarta?”
…Kind of.
“Don’t look at me like that. We have the internet. I go to some sites. But Mom won’t let me on for more than an hour, remember? It’s barely enough time to check my email.” 13E scowls and rolls her eyes at the same time. It’s quite a feat.
Right. Anyway, the… wait… why did it take us an hour to check our email again? Oh, wait-you still have dial-up. Wow. I’m sorry about that. It gets better.
“Good.”
So, we finally hit the Meadow of Great Sparkle. And as much as this book as a whole is not as bad as I thought it would be, I absolutely cannot get through the opening of this chapter without laughing. Out loud. I’m going to confess that I don’t actually have a problem with the sparkling as such. If it were described differently, it could even be kind of creepy. But, I mean, they’re in this fairytale meadow where you half expect unicorns to show up, and “Edward in the sunlight was shocking,” and… oh, man. And the blason-like description of his fucking perfect marble glitter body.
“Yeah, that was… detailed. I actually started to feel like I was reading smut. Like a trashy romance novel or something. I can’t stand reading stuff like that. I mean, it wasn’t good writing and it made me all uncomfortable.”
And that’s an appropriate analogy, because I soon came to realize that Bella touching him with her warm hands? It’s like sex for him. It really is. And then he flees across the meadow to hide his vampire boner. I cannot believe I just typed those words.
“Me neither. Gross! Was that really necessary?”
Hey, I didn’t write it. And then they finally do have their first conversation about actual sex, which made me giggle a lot, particularly whenever Edward used the word “hard.” Because as we all know, whenever Edward Cullen, Heroine Addict is around Bella and her freesia blood, “IT IS SO HARD.”
“…What are you even talking about?”
Nevermind. What do you want to talk about?
“Well, I really liked Bella and Edward’s love declaration to one another. I was all, ‘Awww.’”
Oh, my God. YOU SHIP THEM NOW DON’T YOU.
“…Kinda. Sorry?”
But-but-these are the chapters where you found out he’s stalking her!
“He is?”
HE IS WATCHING HER SLEEP, YOUNG ERIN, WITHOUT HER PERMISSION!
“Well, I guess when you put it like that, it’s creepy, but geez…”
And what about that part where he was not-quite threatening to crush her skull? Didn’t that remind you of Edward Rochester, after Jane told him she had to leave him? And we’ve already established that he creeps you out.
“Yeah, that part was way too intense. But then he was so gentle with her! He goes out of his way to be gentle with her all the time! Well, almost all the time.”
Yeah, and that’s another problem-I mentioned last time that he’s treating her like he’s her 35-year-old boss. Well, it’s gone farther. It has, dare I say, gone to Far. Because now he is treating her like a baby. He’s still condescending, but now he’s also singing her lullabies and rocking her and carrying her downstairs all the time. It weird. It’s like the Victorian ideal of young womanhood. And Edward isn’t even Victorian! I think he was born the year Victoria died.
“He’s… Edwardian. Huh. Go figure.”
Yeah, I hadn’t thought of that. I wonder if his parents named him after the new King of England. Wait, you’ve distracted me. Let me build up my rage again. Oh, yeah-I was about to say that then again I guess I shouldn’t be so surprised that Bella has a positive reaction to all of this because she is just surrounded by great male figures, like her dad who detaches the battery cables in her car. Geez.
“You overanalyze stuff, did you know that?”
I’m in grad school. I get paid to think like this.
“What did you like in these chapters?”
I love the Cullens! Now they are cool.
“Yeah, the stories of how everyone turned into vampires were really great.”
And even the explanation of their unfair distribution of powers. Carlisle’s story, which we got in most detail, was particularly good.
“And Esme-the sort of casual way she just says that she jumped off that cliff.”
Well-spotted, yes. I’m so glad the Cullens finally showed up. They’re the most interesting characters in the book. I wish all of the humans could be vampires, if those are the only characters Stephenie Meyer can write as interesting people.