Everyone Loves a Vampire
I intended to leave the topic behind, buried and to not be mentioned again, but while looking for stock images of books to make avatars from I stumbled upon some glowing reviews of Stephanie Meyer. Growing u I read my share of bad books, novels filled with melodrama, clichés, and Mary Sues and Gry Sues, but I plead ignorance, and though some of those books still hold a special place in my heart - some being notable for introducing me to certain themes - I can look back at them now as a more well read adult and recognize their shortcomings. I may recommend them still for someone looking for a certain amount of fluff but only with warnings attached. The reviews I read, however, apparently written by adults too often ignore all the bad. So it is that I grit my teeth an ask myself again,”Why?” Why are people so blindly devoted? Why do they deny the clichés that are so obvious, dancing naked in front of their faces? Maybe they’re not so well read after all.
Take, for example, one of the sequels.
New Moon is particularly aggravating, with Meyer lazily including BLANK PAGES to represent the "OMG, woe!" angst Bella faces when Edward has the nerve to leave her. Meyer has said that Bella is a strong female heroine, but she spends pages literally curled up in a ball, almost comatose because she cannot survive without her precious Edward. Good GRIEF!
Don't even get me started on how utterly 2D all the characters in this series are. Jacob is the only one with a semblance of an actual personality, but Meyer has to ruin that by making him a) a half-werewolf and b) in love with Bella, because of course, EVERYONE has to be in love with Bella. And then Bella turns out to be in love with both Jacob AND Edward? COP OUT! Unbelievable.
A male character who is part werewolf and everyone falls in love with the heroine; that sounds more and more like Anita Blake by the moment. Moreover, the author herself claims in an interview that all her characters are basically good and if not that, their intentions are always good. Doesn't this make for rather boring characters and villains? If the villain is essentially good, why worry?
Thankfully, there are some that, even if they respect the author's writing skills, are not blinded by any sort of devotion. I wish there were more, because it irks me that this book is such a bestseller, more so because I can see some Hollywood type decide what a great movie this would make...
The first time I read Twilight, I loved it until I was about a hundred pages in...something like that. After that, I looked back at the two major characters that had been introduced thus far and realized that they fit two taboo writing stereotypes perfectly. Our beloved lead, Bella? A Mary Sue with the fault of clumsiness pinned on in an effort to balence out her otherwise perfection. Come on, people - on her first day at school in Forks, every named male character with the exception of Edward falls in TWU WUB with her and the competition begins. The attractive vampire, Edward? Our good friend, Mr. Gary Stu. Intelligence, superhuman ability, looks, dark past, eternal life...need I say more?
Now, Twilight had a lot of potential. But the characterization along with the competing slew of vampire novels that followed its release is enough to make me hold a grudge against it. In vampire novels, people use the perfection of vampirism as an excuse to turn their characters into Mary Sues and Gary Stus and I. Am. Sick of it. Mary Sues in fanfiction are bad enough, but when original fiction writers make their main character(s) "perfect", it makes me even angrier. They think they can get away with it by loading the stories with angst and drama and what-have-you, but that only makes it worse. [1]
Just give me a puppy purse instead.
Take, for example, one of the sequels.
New Moon is particularly aggravating, with Meyer lazily including BLANK PAGES to represent the "OMG, woe!" angst Bella faces when Edward has the nerve to leave her. Meyer has said that Bella is a strong female heroine, but she spends pages literally curled up in a ball, almost comatose because she cannot survive without her precious Edward. Good GRIEF!
Don't even get me started on how utterly 2D all the characters in this series are. Jacob is the only one with a semblance of an actual personality, but Meyer has to ruin that by making him a) a half-werewolf and b) in love with Bella, because of course, EVERYONE has to be in love with Bella. And then Bella turns out to be in love with both Jacob AND Edward? COP OUT! Unbelievable.
A male character who is part werewolf and everyone falls in love with the heroine; that sounds more and more like Anita Blake by the moment. Moreover, the author herself claims in an interview that all her characters are basically good and if not that, their intentions are always good. Doesn't this make for rather boring characters and villains? If the villain is essentially good, why worry?
Thankfully, there are some that, even if they respect the author's writing skills, are not blinded by any sort of devotion. I wish there were more, because it irks me that this book is such a bestseller, more so because I can see some Hollywood type decide what a great movie this would make...
The first time I read Twilight, I loved it until I was about a hundred pages in...something like that. After that, I looked back at the two major characters that had been introduced thus far and realized that they fit two taboo writing stereotypes perfectly. Our beloved lead, Bella? A Mary Sue with the fault of clumsiness pinned on in an effort to balence out her otherwise perfection. Come on, people - on her first day at school in Forks, every named male character with the exception of Edward falls in TWU WUB with her and the competition begins. The attractive vampire, Edward? Our good friend, Mr. Gary Stu. Intelligence, superhuman ability, looks, dark past, eternal life...need I say more?
Now, Twilight had a lot of potential. But the characterization along with the competing slew of vampire novels that followed its release is enough to make me hold a grudge against it. In vampire novels, people use the perfection of vampirism as an excuse to turn their characters into Mary Sues and Gary Stus and I. Am. Sick of it. Mary Sues in fanfiction are bad enough, but when original fiction writers make their main character(s) "perfect", it makes me even angrier. They think they can get away with it by loading the stories with angst and drama and what-have-you, but that only makes it worse. [1]
Just give me a puppy purse instead.