13 things about Twilight!!!!!

Whenever i get internet access, I have a few blogs that I like to frequent once in a while (dramabeans.com - everyday!) for my news dosage of koreandrama, so while i was browsing thru them this tired night, i saw a tag on Twilight on one of the blogs - so what the hell, lets see whats this writer who almost have the same taste in korean dramas as me think about Twilight the series....

Wakaka...his/her writings make me forget about my tiredness, banished my sleepiness... I like it so much that I want to post it here *evil grin*. Couldn't write/express/disseminate the series better... so here are the 13 Reasons Why She/He Don't Like Twilight - courtesy to Sevenses ^_^

1) Define yourself by your boyfriend, Bella, there’s a good way to be a self-actualized woman. “Not a wolf girl” and “I was his” gets tossed around a lot. She also has no personality outside of ‘Edward doesn’t like me, Edward does like me, why does Edward like me, Edward, Edward, Edward.’ Do I need to tell you why this is wrong, or can I just assume all of you know and we can move on to more outrage?

2) Meeting obsessed - most emphatically not meeting cute. HE WATCHES HER SLEEP ALL NIGHT LONG. Guys, do I need to go on? He follows her around, in her house, when she’s cooking, when she’s out for a night with the girls and when she’s sleeping, apparently unaware that there’s freaking stalker right there IN HER ROOM, omg, whut. On the other hand, all she does is think about him and moon and not pay any attention to people around her and omg Edward loves her thus Bella’s life is complete! He talks down to her, like she is a child that constantly needs things explained to her. This is the love of the ages? This is what we’re supposed to aspire to for a perfect marriage?
Let us keep in mind that when they met, Bella was only attracted to the surface hotness of Sir Edward Cullen, Esq. And in return, he was fascinated with how much he didn’t know about her thoughts. And then, two weeks later, they both decide rather like Romeo and Juliet that they’re oh so much in love and need the other like oxygen (err, only metaphorically in Ed’s case). What. The. Hell.
(And, by the way, Romeo and Juliet wouldn’t have lasted.)

3) The only womb is apparently one that reproduces - a viewpoint espoused by Esme, Rosalie, Bella and now Leah … that’s practically a roll call of the female characters. At no point does she present a woman who is self-actualized and happy without feeling the need for a ‘babby‘. Breaking Dawn is all about the baby, and while I think mother love is one of the most powerful forces in the world, if your entire life just revolved around your child… there’s a problem (both for you and the child, actually, and please someone stop me from segueing into child development RIGHT NOW). If you mention Alice, well… the girl’s clairvoyant and pretty much doesn’t think, ever. She just acts on her visions. (Also, if you know your Freud, she’s pretty much in the latent state of things.)

4) When Sparkles breaks up with you, the best, most rational path of action is to go around trying to kill yourself. Seriously. There were four months of catatonia (which thankfully spared us from Bella’s meeblings for a few chapters) and then she decides to take up both cliff-diving and motorcycle-riding to maximize the probability of death. Now, I know she’s not good with math, but hey, why not go with an activity that actually has an 100% chance of killing you? Oh yeah, then we wouldn’t have such cracktastic sequels. All snark aside, though, this is most definitely NOT acceptable behaviour in anyone.

5) Born to be a vampire - just, what? Because humans are obviously not meant to be humans, and live normal lives and die. No, they get to be ever-lasting ice marble vampires (if they are lucky - if not, then they’re just chow). Bella calls her mother her best friend, but we are always seeing/reading her disparaging both Renee and Charlie, as if they’re somehow less intelligent by virtue of Not Being Bella. And you know what? After she becomes vamped, she doesn’t see Renee, ever again. In fact, Bella’s relationship with other humans is so tenuous that after her marriage, pretty much all the humans from before disappeared. (And this girl lived 16 years in Phoenix and didn’t make one best friend? Wow, call me cynical, but someone’s a bit sociopathic.) Conclusion? Bella doesn’t need humans, she’s fine with her superpowered vampirism.

6) Bella wants to have sex with Edward but Edward wants to get married to Bella first but Bella doesn’t want to get married super early but Edward won’t have sex with her without being married and Bella is perfectly okay with dying and spending the rest of her life as a vamp but somehow it is not okay to get married at the tender age of 18. That section of the series was such a cause for headdesking, you have no idea.

7) Marrying at 19, having a kid, pretty much being happy and sexing away forever. No education, no traveling the world, no broadening of your goddamn horizons nor (more seriously in my mind) the desire to. They keep mentioning college but she never goes and I bet you she won’t either, not when she has eternity to somehow gaze with awe upon the perfection that is her vamp family. Someone hand me something to gnaw on now, please.

8 ) Furriners, dey is baaaaaad. Yes, thank you, WASP unconscious. [First of all, as an East Asian, I just have to say here, what happened to 1/6 of the world's population? Somehow they are just not represented?] Second, her non-white characters are severely limited. There’s the Brazilian cleaning lady who is in that classic hispanic stereotype of America - domestic service. Carmen tends to spout random Spanish at random times but has no function otherwise. The Amazon vamps are … warrior-esque, buff, and pretty much bristling with exotic I’m-so-not-American-nor-even-possibly-civilized airs. The Egyptian ones, oh dear. The Italian vamps are Machiavellian, the Romanian ones sinister and decrepit, the English one craven. (And who was it that held out during all the bombing for three years at war with the Nazis? Who was the one that refused to fight until their own harbour got bombed and subsequently took all the credit for being noble? Thank you.)

9) Mary Sues are bad enough within fanfiction, I do not want to see them in print too. Bella can do everything better than you, even while tripping over the air! Bella attracts the hot, mysterious guy! Strike that, Bella has hordes of willing boy victims following her around! But she is not beautiful, no! Bella is a super vampire with super control! BELLA SMASHES THE PREVIOUSLY UNDEFEATED VOLTURI! (Need I go on? Because the list is quite extensive and my fingers are getting tired.)

10) It’s so horrible to be old(er). Okay, this rubbed me in all the wrong ways when I was reading (skimming would be a better word) through the later books, when it’s all, whine I wanna marry Edward whine but he won’t let me whine and now I’m getting old whine. (First of all, SHUT UP.) Seriously, what is wrong with actually seeing the world a bit? She’s not going to be wrinkled and old and stuff if she takes a few years off to see her options instead of immediate vamping. She’ll be more mature, have seen more of the world. But Bella doesn’t want that, no, she wants to settle down immediately. I have to say, if you’re afraid your potential husband will no longer love you after a few years and when you are not so attractive (relatively speaking), you have to look at the strength of the relationship and wonder a little. Living with him for all eternity may not turn out to be such a hot idea.

11) General attractiveness issues. I mean, all the vamps are super attractive, except for the evil ones (James is nondescript and the Volturi are shale-like, old and generally creeeeeeeeepy). Also, point 10 already goes into this, but Bella’s a very superficial girl sometimes. (Okay, all the time.) She cares so much about her outer appearance that she totally wants to be frozen now so she won’t get older (and it is inferred, uglier). Um, yeah.

12) Imprinting. IMPRINTING. Because when a guy stays around you all your life and loves you? You don’t get to refuse him. Yeah. (Both Claire and Nessie are infants when this imprinting thing happens. Other people, like Emily, just deal, I suppose.) No free will whatsoever.

13) Wish fulfillment. I’m okay with wish fulfillment in general (where would we be without Harry Potter?), but I do think this is taking it too far. What does it say about the fanatics that even with all the above indices, they still picture Edward as the ideal and Bella as themselves?

Breaking Dawn

I had the book in my possession for four days before finally brave myself to start reading it, I dont know why I'm kinda hesitant then when I was so fired up to know the ending before... Well, anyway I like the ending of these series (unlike Harry Potter, hmph!). The book was told from two perspective; Bella and Jacob and then back to Bella. I like it better when told from Jacob's perspective :) Not that I hate Bella as from the previous three books, here she seems more tolerable.

Anyway the ending Bella, Edward and Jacob get their happy ending. Though I'm not overly content with Jacob's happy ending. "Imprinting" somehow steal someone freedom of choice; willpower, but hey all in all, I dont think there's a very satisfying happy ending for Jacob; for him to simply fall in love with another girl without the 'soulmate' syndrome will make him a fickle man.

The questions lingering in my mind was about the wolves pack. After all the troubles were overcomes, they remained two separate packs? Because of his 'object of imprintment' Jacob abandon his early plans to leave his village and his former pack, right? So one pack would have Sam as their Alpha and the other Jacob? What would become of Leah? Will she remain bitter and feeling left-out? or wont she found her own soulmate also someday?

Hmm...wonder what children would a half-vampire and a werewolf have? Opps! There are not werewolves; but shape shifters lah...If not because of the 'confrontation' at the ending I would not notice the difference between werewolves and shape-shifters. Werewolves doesnt change into wolves by will, only when there's full moon and when they can infected someone to become like them by biting, while shape-shifter its in the genes and cannot be transfered to another.

Eclipse

Did I say 2 gimme 2 weeks? Hehe this novel is more gripping than the previous two, that it only took me a day and a half. Maybe partly because it was another quiet Saturday night and I feel the need to be downstairs rather than holed up in my room with my kdramas.

Meyer's Eclipse gives me a glimpse of hope for Jacob, but at the same time make me feel sorry for Edward too. Sigh! Its reasonable for Bella to fall in love with two great person, but for them to fall for the temperamental Bella? it boggles the mind - but they said cupid is blind.

I have lots of jumbled thoughts in my head after finishing this novel, that to put it in writing will not make sense even to myself. So I'm gonna make this post short and simple. The epilogue of this novel "nearly" made me shed a tear for Jacob. I empathize with Edward too, but he got the silly girl, didnt he? Sigh! I read my niece blog that she got her hand on Breaking Dawn already, wonder of she can finish it off in 2 days......

I was listening to Ressa Herlambang's Menyesal again, but I think 6ixth Sense's Tak Bisa Memilihmu (I do like Nubhan's version better, but I already posted his video before) is more appropriate...

New Moon

Silent day today...maybe because the house next door was empty. I need to have my car cleaned, tapi malas to clean myself and to hantar to a car wash - nah, dont want to go out. I know I'll end up entering a cds shop somewhere buying either Hong Gil Dong, On Air, or Oh Pil Seung (or all!!!!) or buying some movies that I dont have any time to watch.

Anyway, just finish up New Moon today. It has such as slow beginning that it takes me weeks to finished it - one chapter at a time. Then things started to get interesting with reappearance of Jacob Black - not that he's left or anything (unlike Edward, hmph!), just that his character becomes more prominent.

See, Edward cleaned up everything and left Bella because of the incident on Bella's birthday. So young Bells become a zombie for months, that was until she decided to break her promise and live recklessly - by riding a motorcycle! She enlisted Jacob's help. It turns out his life was destined for greater purpose - protecting his people.

Then, Edward comes back into her life - oh no! and she had to choose if its Edward or Jacob - and of course she choose Edward with his coldness rather than Jacob's warmth. Well, maybe I'm prejudiced because Jacob destined to be the 'underdog' in this story - so naturally I'll take his side. Not that I hate Edward but its just he's too in control, too cold...

I never found werewolves endearing before. I remembered the movie Underworld, they depict the werewolves as worse than vampire, in that they completely transformed into an animal and lost their human instincts and feelings. But in this novel, you kinda grow fond of them... Hope Jacob have a happy ending... I'm gonna start on Eclipse now.

Oh, there's the part where Bella compares her lifestory with Romeo & Juliet. I think this Shakespear's little tragedy gotten so famous among his other works because the lead character died so young. I was never fascinated with R&J, this grand romance that they would rather be dead than live without the other. So selfish! Taking the easy way out- coward! Which makes me wonder how Meyer gonna end this syory with Breaking Dawn...would Edward turns mortal again? or would Bella turns immortal? Would they have their happy ending or died when the other died? Since this book was targetted for young adults, I dont think Meyer would want to show an example that suicide is okay if the love-of-your-life is no longer alive....

What I also found funny is 20-year-old Bella sees herself as someone responsible and cautious. She is???!!! Isnt she the one who begged (or is it forced?) for Edward to change her into a vampire - did she consider the point beyoooooooooooooond where she will spend forever with Edward? I'm intrigued by why she's immune to the vamps' special power, but apart from that she's just a normal-high-strung teenager who's obsessed with someone who is too much for her to handle.

The saleslady at BestEastern promise me that their shipment of Breaking Dawn comes next week, so give my niece a week time to read it - so that's two weeks, enough time for me to finish up Eclipse ^_^

Twilight

Remember my fascination with the western intrepretation of vampires? (Hehe...the eastern intrepretation is too scary!) Anyway, I scan through my niece's blog and how she is so obsesses with this novel, okay... nothing new ^_^ then I dont know in which blog was it that she mentioned about the book is about vampire, that got me stop for awhile, hmm...maybe later after I finish off my kdramasss I borrow it from her- though when will that be I wonder, since even now I'm itching to buy a new one. Then earlier this week, my mother asked me to drive her to my sister's house one afternoon after I got back from work. I peek into my niece's room and saw the second series on her bed, that reminds me to ask her for the first series. I planned to read it only when I was watching astro channel- during commercial breaks- of whatever is on. (When I'm in my small-havenly-room I'm preoccupied either with kdramas or sleeping) but then like always when I'm hooked on a book I cant let go....

At start, I was not expecting much since the novel was written in the first perspective. I found novel of this kind was very boring, limited scope. But the writer has such simple interesting, not overly descriptive style of writing that make me enjoyed it nonetheless with witty sarcasm remarks here and there.

The story start with Bella Swan who choose to go to live with her father at a remote small town of Forks, Olympic Peninsula when her mother remarried - not that she object her mother remarrying. At her Phoenix high school she was just an ordinary girl, but being the new girl in town, grab the attention of several of her male schoolmates. One in particular, the mysterious and dazzlingly beautiful Edward Cullen, intelligent and witty (a deadly combination for sure!) . At school's cafeteria, he always sat with a group of five remarkably beautiful teens, but never eat (then why do they bother to go to the cafeteria? to keep appearances?) As she grows to know, and then love, Edward, she learns their secret, he was part of a coven of vampires! But rest assured his family/coven had renounce human prey.

Edward hasn't aged since 1918 - forever 17 (dont we all wish that?! Well, I like to be a bit older than that). Like all vampires, he's immortal. To Edward, Bella is that thing he has waited 90 years for - a soul mate. But Edward is having a hard time controlling the blood lust she arouses in him- at any moment, the intensity of their passion could drive him to kill her, and he agonizes over the danger. Bella would rather be dead than part from Edward, so she risks her life to stay near him.

Sorry to say, I was going urghh! when I first read the part about Edward's attraction to Bella. It was like having a 90 year old man fall in love with a teenager! What does he see in her? DOESNT he see her as a kid barely out of the schoolroom? Gross! Then, there is this thing where he have to stay in school most of his lifetimes - studying useless facts in countless classroom, reading the same textbook year after year. Gloomy!

What I like is the way the writer potray Edward's inner struggle - he wants to kiss her, he wants to drink her; in one hand he would like to keep his soulmate by his side, but another part of him wants her safe which is away from him. :) Sometimes we know what we should do, the right thing to do but its just seems so....un-do-able

However, I still would want to read the other series, New Moon, Eclipse and Breaking Dawn. This is what I hate about book in series...the waiting part until I can get my hand on a copy. I hate unfinished story! Dinn...are you done with New Moon? Hopefully, my collegue who went to Singapore find Eclipse and perhaps Breaking Dawn...

The movie adaptation will be out on 12.12.2008, not looking forward to it, after Harry Potter and several other adaptations, movie just a pale comparison to the novel itself. Plus the cast they used sometimes dont match with the one in my head.

I was browsing through Stephenie Meyer Official Website and saw the review of this book, hmmm seems interesting...darn when is my next trip to Singapore or KL?

The author of the Twilight series of #1 bestsellers delivers her brilliant first novel for adults: a gripping story of love and betrayal in a future with the fate of humanity at stake. Melanie Stryder refuses to fade away. The earth has been invaded by a species that take over the minds of their human hosts while leaving their bodies intact, and most of humanity has succumbed.Wanderer, the invading "soul" who has been given Melanie's body, knew about the challenges of living inside a human: the overwhelming emotions, the too vivid memories. But there was one difficulty Wanderer didn't expect: the former tenant of her body refusing to relinquish possession of her mind.Melanie fills Wanderer's thoughts with visions of the man Melanie loves-Jared, a human who still lives in hiding. Unable to separate herself from her body's desires, Wanderer yearns for a man she's never met. As outside forces make Wanderer and Melanie unwilling allies, they set off to search for the man they both love.Featuring what may be the first love triangle involving only two bodies, THE HOST is a riveting and unforgettable novel that will bring a vast new readership to one of the most compelling writers of our time.

Amazon Sales Rank: #22 in Books
Published on: 2008-05-06
Released on: 2008-05-06

Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com Amazon Best of the Month, May 2008: Stephenie Meyer, creator of the phenomenal teen-vamp Twilight series, takes paranormal romance into alien territory in her first adult novel. Those wary of sci-fi or teen angst will be pleasantly surprised by this mature and imaginative thriller, propelled by equal parts action and emotion. A species of altruistic parasites has peacefully assumed control of the minds and bodies of most humans, but feisty Melanie Stryder won't surrender her mind to the alien soul called Wanderer. Overwhelmed by Melanie's memories of fellow resistor Jared, Wanderer yields to her body's longing and sets off into the desert to find him. Likely the first love triangle involving just two bodies, it's unabashedly romantic, and the characters (human and alien) genuinely endearing. Readers intrigued by this familiar-yet-alien world will gleefully note that the story's end leaves the door open for a sequel--or another series. --Mari Malcolm

Customer Reviews
Amazing Emotional Rollar Coaster! This book was amazing and full of great characters and had me on an emotional roller coaster. I never knew who I wanted to side with or who the good guys were. The emotional aspect of this book was breathtaking. I have not read a book in so long that had me so on edge in a long time. I cried, I laughed and I took self- inventory. Please note I am not a touchy-feely person at all. Great Book! And I like "alien books"!

So I was all prepared to hate this book I think I ordered this book out of a sick fascination to see just with what other fluff Stephanie Meyer could come up. While I like the "Twilight" books, the emotion is not any stronger than a simple "like". And I was all prepared for that to be my maximum for "The Host". However wrong was I. Maybe because this is a book more aimed at adults. Maybe Stephanie (while still pleasing her fellow Mormons such as I) made it a little sexier. Maybe it was just a dern good twist on a classic sci-fi story. Whatever the reason, this book is excellent. The set-up is simple. True to the classics, mind-controlling aliens have taken over the planet. However... they really aren't bad guys. They are parasites, but that is simply what they are and they can't help it. They don't want to hurt the humans by any means, but they did not expect humans to be so... human. So when a supposedly strong "soul" called Wanderer takes over the body of Melanie Stryder, she is sucked into the very ideals of the namesake Host. I have always admired Meyer's writing style, and the prose continues to not disappoint. However, this book is for other reasons a much higher level than "Twilight". Her characters are more real (plenty of critics will still complain they aren't real enough, but to me it's a huge improvement) and they do not lack the typical stereotypes of those pesky vampires. Having Wanderer as the first-person narrative was a stroke of genius and allows the reader to finally symapthize and even empathize with an evil alien queen mother. I also appreciated how clear Meyer's love of the desert. I live in desert enough, but it made me want to head south. The setting is marvelous and enchanting and, dare I say it, homey. This is a fascinating idea that was well executed and well told. Not only should Meyer's previous fans appreciate it, but this just might grab some new fans.

Absolutely Wonderful This is one of the best books I have read in a long time. I laughed, I cried, and I didn't want the book to end. I have only read the author's first book Twilight and not the rest of that series, but I thought this novel had characters that were better developed and the plot had more depth. The story moved quickly and the author kept me guessing as to how she would end the novel. A wonderful read.