I Read Twilight and Hate It: Chapter 8

Chapter 8: Port Angeles
    On the drive, they're listening to "whiny rock songs¹" on the way (I find it pretty ironic that Bella would describe anything else in this book as "whiny") and chatting about boys, as Jess talks about ho well her date with Mike went.  During this conversation, Bella reveals that she's never been to a dance because (and I don't see why Stephanie Meyer thinks it's necessary to remind us of this) she's clumsy, and also because she's never had a boyfriend before (I guess none of the boys in Phoenix were sparkly enough).  Actually, she says it's because none of the boys asked her.  Jessica points out a plot hole:

        She looked skeptical. "People ask you out here," she reminded me, "and you tell them no.¹" 

    Good point, Jess.  Are we going to get an excuse for the Sue-paradox that Bella is both wanted by every guy with a name and still playing up the whole "unlucky at love" thing?  Nope, it's just used as a segue into the fact that Tyler was telling every that he was going to the Prom with Bella.
    Anyways, their shopping trip continues, and the girls talked about boys, and "giggled while pawing through the clothes,¹" and paid compliments to how each other looked in different dresses and looked at shoes, etc.  I know that Meyers actually is female, so I almost can't make this argument.  But, is it me or does she seem to write the whole "girl time" part like a middle-aged man would, like someone who has never been female and is just basing it off of stereotypes from TV and movies?  Maybe it's just my imagination.  But then again, what girls'-night-out with Bella would be complete without her bringing up Edward?  She asks Angela whether it's normal for the Cullens to be missing school a lot, and Angela rather unceremoniously reassures her: yes, yes it is.
    After they're all done with dress/shoe shopping, they decide to split up for an hour and then meet at a restaurant for dinner. 

        I wanted to go look for a bookstore.  They were both willing to come with me, but I encouraged them to go have fun - they didn't know how preoccupied I could get when surrounded by books.¹

    "You two go do some stupid non-thinky thing.  Only I am allowed to enjoy books and reading."  Bella goes out walking and looking for a bookstore.  In a seemingly-pointless scene, she passes a hippie, New Age looking one and decides to forgo it and look for a "normal book-store.¹"  Screw local business; I'm going to find me a Borders.   While looking, she gets lost, because her mind was busy "wrestling with despair¹" about Edward.  She finds herself in sort of an industrial/warehouse district (which, inconveniently, was just one block away from the main tourist boardwalk), where she passes a group of guys who are "joking loudly among themselves, laughing raucously and punching each other's arms.¹"  So, I guess it's not just girls; Meyer writes "guy-time" out as a ridiculous stereotype of male behaviour, too.
    One of the guys tries to hit on her (all the boys do), but she gets freaked out and starts walking away quickly.  As she's walking, she notices that two of the guys from the group are following her.  She keeps walking quickly down the street, trying to out-pace them, until she finds the other two guys waiting in front of her (I guess they can teleport, too).   As they close on on her, suddenly a silver car bursts through the alleyway, making the guys scramble.  A door opens, and the driver tells Bella to get in.  She does, and gets driven back to the main part of town.  The driver is Edward, obviously.  Oddly though, Meyer doesn't say it's Edward at first, just referring to him as "him¹," until several paragraphs after Bella gets in the car.  Was she expecting us to be surprised that the person in the car was Edward?  Because, if so, she completely failed.
    Anyways, Edward speeds out of there with Bella, "blowing through several stop signs¹."  I guess because he's worried that those guys could outrun his car if he doesn't bolt out of there.  On the way, Edward sounds really pissed off at her for almost getting raped.  After she calms him down, though, he explains that he's really pissed off at the would-be rapists, and was having trouble resisting the urge to hunt them down and slaughter them.  He drives to the Italian restaurant that Jessica and Angela are waiting out side.

        He parallel-parked against the curb in a space I would have thought much too small for the Volvo, but he slid in effortlessly in one try.¹

    Bow-chika-wow wow.  You know how Bella is constantly thinking that all the guys around her are jealous over her?  Well, in the restaurant she does the same thing the whole time, except with thinking that the hostess and waitress are jealous over Edward.  You could tell the hostess would be trying to steel her man, because of her "unnatural blondness¹."  Curse you bleach-blondes and your inherent evil!
    After they get seated, Bella gets jealous an tells Edward that she doesn't want him being all sparkle-sexy in front of other girl.  After that the waitress comes out, and Bella is actually thinking, when she sees her, that she was gossiping with the hostess in the kitchen about how smoking hot Edward is.  This is what she's thinking about.  She's so paranoid about other girls getting Edward, that she's actually imagining that they're conspiring together to steel him away.  Not to mention the fact that she was almost just raped, and probably has more to be shaken up about than possible competition for Edward.  Actually, I should note that the word "rape" or "rapist" is never actually used in this chapter.  It's always just replaced with a phrase like "do something horrible¹" or the character trailing off before finishing their sentence.  Why Meyer decides this is beyond me.  Maybe they just didn't want this book to be too adult, so they could put it in the "teen" section at bookstores.  Although, if you ask me, having a chapter about rape is going to make the book just as mature whether you use the word or not. 
    Anyways, Edward makes Bella drink a couple Cokes (the word "Coke" is actually mentioned five times in this chapter.  Sponsorship?) and eat some pasta and bread, the whole time his eyes "golden butterscotch.¹"  He asks her if she's feeling okay after the whole rape thing, but she just keeps turning the conversation back to him.  She mentions about his eyes changing colour again, and says she has some theories.  He asks to hear them, but she says she wants some information out of him first, and he agrees.  Um, that's not really a good deal for Edward; I mean, it's not like Bella's theories are going to reveal any terribly useful information about him; they're just facts about him which may or may not be true.  But, I guess the story has to move forward somehow.
    The fist question, "why are you in Port Angeles?¹" Edward passes on.  The second question, "how can you read minds?" he's oddly open about.  Actually, before he answers it, it sort of evolves into "how did you know I was in trouble?"  Edward responds by saying "Only you could get into trouble in a town this small.  You would have devastated their crime rate statistics for a decade, you know¹."  Okay, so he’s actually saying that it is her fault that she almost got gang-raped.  Also, it did seem really unrealistic that Bella would fall victim to street crime in a town as small as Port Angeles, but now that I've read Edward's explanation... it still seems really unrealistic.  He further elaborates the point:

        "I was wrong about you.. You're not a magnet for accidents - that's not a broad enough classification. You are a magnet for trouble.  If there is anything dangerous within a ten-mile radius, it will invariably find you¹"

    He also says that he would fall into this whole trouble category, "unequivocally¹."  He then goes back on his previous decision to past on her first question and announces that "I followed you to Port Angeles,¹" apparently because he was trying to keep her alive.  How would he know that she'd be in danger, though?  They give the wishy-washy excuse that it's because he knew that she was a "magnet for trouble," based on her clumsiness, but there's no sound logic-track that leads from someone being clumsy to you knowing they'll be raped at a certain time and place, no matter how much you think about it.  It seems like another instance of "I know, because the author told me so." 
    Bella notes that this is the second time he's saved her life and/or virginity, and he says that it's actually the third time; saying that "your number was up the first time I met you,¹" presumably because he was so tempted to kill her to drain her blood when they first met (or just kill her because she was so annoying).  Saving someone's life and refraining from murdering them are hardly the moral equivalent, though. 
    He then gives her some more information regarding her second question and lets her know that he knew she was in danger, because he could tell that she wasn't with Jessica and Angela by reading their minds, and then later was able to read the rapists' minds and see her face and what they planned on doing to her.   Wait, what?  You mean, when he was talking about reading people, he didn't mean just estimating what they were thinking by reading their body language, he actually meant looking into their heads and seeing what they were thinking.  How stupid is that?  Stephanie Meyer, apparently, was sitting in front of her computer thinking, "Well, he's already got super-strength, super-speed, super-hotness, and immortality... but maybe, that's not quite enough powers.  I'll make him psychic, too."    Protip, writers: it is your hero's weaknesses, not their strengths, that makes them great.  He also makes it clear that Bella's mind is the only one he can't read.  Maybe she lacks the delta brainwave from doing the nasty in the pasty at some point².
    Edward laments again, how hard it was for him not to kill the would-be rapists (awww, poor Edward).  He then suggests that they leave and asks for the check, in a voice that's "quiet, rougher, still reflecting the strain of our conversation.¹"  He let her into his car, and as he was walking around to the driver's side, Bella was "amazed, yet again by how graceful he was.¹"  Umm... okay.  Walking to the other side of the car isn't an act that usually requires a lot of grace; but who knows, maybe he was doing some spins and pliés along the way.  They drive off, and Edward lets Bella know it's her turn to answer questions.  So ends chapter 8.
    Nice thing: it is sort of refreshing that Meyer decided to give Edward a Volvo as a car.  Given that the rest of his character design seemed like she was trying to build the "perfect man," one would guess that she'd give him some kind of sexy car, like a Charger or a Corvette, or a roadster, or at least a Beamer..  But instead, she chose to gave him a rather non-descript vehicle from a company that's known for making cars that are reliable but boring.  Kudos.  Stay tuned for Chapter 9.

    

¹Meyer, Stephanie Twilight. “Chapter 8: Port Angeles” Little, Brown and Co., 2005
²Futurama episode 3ACV07 "The Day the Earth Stood Stupid," Which incidentally pre-dates Twilight by four years.

I Read Twilight and Hate It: Chapter 4

       A note on spoilers and what I know about the series.  I feel I should mention, just in case anyone was worried about spoilers, that I don't plan on spoiling anything in the book early.  That is to say, I'm going through everything in order and I'm not going to spoil something that I haven't come across yet.  However, these reviews are meant to be a substitute for actually reading the book, so any spoiler information that occurs in the book will occur in my review as well.  For example, if there were a big spoiler in the 15th chapter, I wouldn't mention it until my review of the 15th chapter.  If you want to avoid spoilers, it'll pay to read my reviews in order.  It would be hard for me to spoil information early on anyways, because I haven't read the book before (each chapter's review is written before I start reading the next chapter), and know little about the events that take place.  What I did know before starting this project is: It's about a girl named Bella and her Romance with a boy named Edward.  Edward is a vampire and sparkles in the sun.  Also, all the fan-girls want to jump his bone.  Even though the fact that Edward is a vampire hasn't explicitly come out yet, I still don't consider it a spoiler, since anyone who knows someone who knows someone who likes Twilight is aware of this fact.  I also know that there's a character named Jacob at some point in the series (whose bone none of the fan-girls want to jump) and a certain piece of information about him which may actually be a spoiler so I wont bring it up now.  For everything else that happens in the book, I'm hearing about it for the first time when I do that chapter.  Anyways, on to chapter 4: 

    The dream that Bella hinted at at the end of Chapter Three was surprisingly boring; just your standard chasing-after-someone-but-can't-catch-up-to-them affair.  "After that, he was in my dreams nearly every night, but always on the periphery, never within reach."¹  
    At school, Bella ponders about why no one saw Edward teleport across the parking lot.  I use "teleport" loosely here, because the book doesn't actually describe how he got from point A to point B; it just makes note of how fast he was there (and, of course, how gorgeous he looked once getting there).  For all I know, he could have ran super-fast, or just made a really long leap. None of these are the kinds of actions that would go unnoticed be a large crowd of people.  Bella has a theory as to why no one noticed him, though: "no one else was as aware of Edward as I always was.  No one else watched him the way I did.  How pitiful."¹  Edward may have super-strength and super-speed, but Bella has acquired her own superpower: Stalker Senses.  Also, I sincerely hope that she's using "pitiful" here to describe herself for obsessing over Edward, rather than everyone else for not obsessing over Edward.
    Actually, this raises the question of why the other girls aren't obsessing over Edward.  I mean, it's not like Bella just has really uncommon taste in men.  It seems like every Twilight fan out there wants to marry Edward, so it only makes sense that lots of the girls in the school would be interested in him as well.  Maybe he did something just a week before Bella arrived that turned all the girls off to him, like showing up to school in nothing but a cape and soiled Spiderman underoos, and everyone remembers it but no one's mentioned it to Bella yet. Who knows.
    Anyways, Edward is back to his Bella-hating stoner mode, and has stopped talking to her in their Biology class (because I guess the plot was just moving too fast).  There's a girls-ask-boys dance coming up and a lot of drama circulating around the school because of that (or at least a lot of drama circulating around Bella's head).  Jessica asks Bella for permission to ask Mike to the dance.  She asks him, he says maybe, because he wants to see if Bella will go to the dance with him before he agrees to going with Jessica.  So, he asks Bella to the dance, and she makes up some excuse about going to Seattle that weekend.  Actually, pretty much every character with a name, including the guy who almost hit her with his van ("Tyler") asks her to the dance.  Edward, however, does not.
    Edward, in Biology class, calmly tells Bella that it would be better of the two of them weren't friends.  He didn't say why not, because that would be all too un-mysterious.  Bella kind of freaks out and has a bitch-fest at him when he tells her this (I guess because she's not used to when guys don't all bow down before her).   She then storms off to P.E., where she continues to think about him some more.
    Actually, when she's storming off to P.E. she stumbles and drops all her books before right in front of Edward, and he picks them up for her.  It's supposed to be one of those "OMG, I was so embarrassed I could die" moments (along with another showcase for Ed's super-speed), but really it's hard to feel sorry for her.  Everyone has a friend (you all know who yours is) who just likes complaining.  They make it sound like they have the worst life in the world by taking every little thing that happens to them and blowing it up like the Hindenburg.  They're not really miserable, though, they just act miserable because they enjoy telling people about all the bad things that happen to them; it's fun for them.  Bella is that kind of person.  She complains about the weather, she complains about her parents, she complains about being unattractive, she complains about being attractive, she complains about Edward being around, she complains about Edward not being around.  I'm sure when she was in Phoenix, that she complained about everything there, too.  So don't feel sorry for her when she dumps her books in front of the guy she lust-hates; it'll just give her complaint fuel for months to come.
    That night, her dad is (allegedly) suspicious when she starts cooking peppers that night because "the closest edible Mexican food was probably in southern California."¹  Yeah, too bad they're not in a Mecca of international cuisine like Arizona.  Actually, as a point of fact, Washington is an agricultural powerhouse, and many people living there have immigrated from Latin America (both legally and illegally).  A quick Google Maps search of Forks reveals that there are no less than four Mexican restaurants in the small town (none of which are Azteca), and the census info states that roughly 15% of the population is “Hispanic or Latino.”²  I’m sure at least a few of those 15% (or 485 people) are from Mexico, but I guess that Meyer doesn't consider the food made by Mexicans to be real Mexican food; only that made by Californians.
    Anyways, she and her dad have some boring discussion about gas-mileage and her getting lost in Seattle, etc.  She points out that she used to live in Phoenix, which is five times the size of Seattle.  I don’t know how she figures this.  Phoenix is actually less than four times the size of Seattle, as far as square-mileage goes.  The population of Phoenix is roughly 3 times that of Seattle, and population of the Metropolitan area is less than double.³  
    The next day, Edward displays his super-speed again, grabbing Bella's fallen keys in the parking lot.  Because he loves drama, apparently, he's now going back on his previous no-friends proposition and offering her a ride to Seattle on the weekend she planned on going (with the pretense of his Volvo getting better mileage than her truck). He does this in a "velvet, muted"¹ voice.  To review,Edward's voice is  "low,"  "attractive," "soft," "musical,"  "velvet," and "muted."  Edward himself  is "interesting," "brilliant," "mysterious," "perfect," and "beautiful."¹  That's not a list from all the descriptions so far, though; all those are from one paragraph.  Anyways, Edward insults her/offers her a ride and Bella hates him/accepts the ride (abusive relationship in the making?) Bella also questions Edward about his flip-flop on the friend issue:

        "Honestly Edward," I felt a thrill go through me as I said his name, and I hated it.  "I can't keep up with you.  I thought you didn't want to be my friend."
        "I said that it would be better if we weren't friends, not that I didn't want to be."
        "Oh, thanks, now that's all cleared up."  Heavy sarcasm.¹

    Yeah, thanks Meyer.  The sarcasm was so subtle; thanks for labeling it.  I wouldn't have been able to guess that that was sarcasm without you cluing me in. 
  And so ends chapter four.  Stay tuned for Chapter Five.

 

¹Meyer, Stephanie Twilight. “Chapter 4: Invitations” Little, Brown and Co., 2005

²Source: US Census.  http://factfinder.census.gov/servlet/SAFFFacts?_event=Search&geo_id=&_geoContext=&_street=&_county=Forks&_cityTown=Forks&_state=04000US53&_zip=&_lang=en&_sse=on&pctxt=fph&pgsl=010&show_2003_tab=&redirect=Y

³Information from Wikipedia, because I’m lazy.

I read Twilight and Hate it: Chapter 2

Previous: Chapter One

Here's the short version: Edward was gone from school the next couple days, then it snowed, them he came back with new eyes and started acting nice to Bella for no apparent reason. That's basically the gist of chapter two. Except it's drawn out over twenty-two pages and sprinkled with lots of trivial teenage social problems and flowery descriptions of how gorgeous Edward is (something tells me that a lot of the chapters are going to be like that).
It starts with Bella talking about how she's been having fantasies about telling Edward off for not bowing down/paying attention to her, or whatever. She notes that she'd never actually do it, though, because she was a wuss and "made the Cowardly Lion look like the terminator."¹ I have no idea why Meyer decided to capitalize "Cowardly Lion," but not "terminator." Some subtle display of her admiration for the Wizard of Oz and disdain for Arnold Schwarzenegger movies, perhaps? Or just a lazy copy-editor. I guess I can't really blame Meyer for that one.
Anyways, all the guys that she met the previous day (except Edward, who doesn't show up to school) are swooning over her and having jealous little almost-fights for her attention. At least that's what she says. Since this is all being related to us by the character of Bella, rather than an impartial narrator, we don't really know that these boys are jealous over here; we just know that she thinks that they're jealous over her. Is this to demonstrate that Bella is self-centered or has a run-away ego? Probably not, because this book doesn't seem that deep.
The helpful guy from the day before (who is named "Mike," by the way) "who was taking on the qualities of a golden retriever, walked faithfully by [Bella's] side to class." She talks about him as though he were a dog for much of the chapter, and notes that she "was going to have to do something about Mike, and it wouldn't be easy."¹ Ouch. Nice guys finish last in Meyer's world. Bella makes a third reference to her being bad at volleyball, and leaves school to get groceries, but not before pausing again (in the parking lot) do note how damned sexy the vampire siblings are (even with Edward being AWOL).
After a pointless-seeming explanation that her dad can't cook, she would be taking over the kitchen duties, and explanation of what she was cooking that night, Bella checks her email to find three "OMG, I'm so worried about you" messages from her mom. She replies with an "I'm fine, but angsty. Also, you're worthless without me." Then, more pointless talk about what she's cooking her and her dad for dinner. The whole dinner things seems vestigial to the plot, except for that her dad gives her some information about the Cullens. Their adoptive-father is a very gifted surgeon, and all the kids act really well-behaved and mature (probably because they're so damned old).
The next week or so passes by in a couple paragraphs. Mike is up to his dastardly tricks, like inviting her on a group road-trip, and Edward continues to not show up. Then it snows, and Bella has more angst about that. Grease-boy from before (who's name is "Eric") hits Mike with a jealousy-snowball. Bella then retreats, but at lunch she finds out *gasp* that Edward has returned to school and he's *gasp* no longer acting freaked out by her. Also, he and his posse no longer looked like they were coming down from a three-day high.
Now, I'm going to go out on a limb here and make a prediction: we're going to be told the reason that Edward voided Bella at first but now doesn't, and it's going to be something incredibly stupid; like... she looked so yummy that he could barely hold himself from biting her neck, or... he heard some ridiculous rumor about her and accepted it without question. Something stupid like that. I haven't actually read this book before, so I honestly don't know what the explanation is going to be. Let's see if I'm right as the book pans out.
Anyways, Bella spends lunch freaking out about Edward's presence to her friend, Jessica. Jessica, incidentally, has a crush on Mike. Or, at least, Bella narrated that she has a crush on Mike. Knowing how Bella perceived all the guys to like her, I'm surprised that she didn't narrate that Jessica had a crush on her.
She heads to Biology, where Edward introduces himself to her today in a "quiet, musical voice."¹ You can add that to "deep" and "attractive" from the first chapter. They make awkward small talk, and go through the lab, demonstrating how much better they both are at science than every other student (probably because neither of them originally went to the vastly inferior Forks public schools). Bella also notices something different about his appearance:

I vividly remember the flay black color of his eyes the last time he'd glared at me - the color was striking against the background of his pale skin and his auburn hair. Today, is eyes were a completely different color: a strange ocher, darker than butterscotch, but with the same golden tone.¹

Seriously, she gave him colour-changing eyes? I guess Meyer just couldn't decide whether she found "dark, piercing eyes" or eyes with a "golden tone" to be more attractive. This is getting to be so fanfictiony, I'm surprised she doesn't give him cat ears.
They continue the small talk and Bella explains her reason for moving to Forks anyways (so her mom would be free to travel around the country with her new husband, a small-time baseball player). Edward, at this point in the conversation, has taken to telling Bella how she feels, rather than asking. To this, Bella says:

"My face is so easy to read - my mother always calls me her open book." I frowned
"On the contrary, I find you very difficult to read."...
"That must mean you're a good reader then," I replied.¹

Bella's kind of an idiot, I realized. Let's look at the logic again. Bella is easy to read, and Edward finds her hard to read, so that would make him a good reader? No, it would be the opposite. For example, if you saw an adult reading The Little Engine that Could, and you walked up to them and said "hey, that's an easy to read book," and they said "actually, I find it quite difficult to read," you would think that they were mentally handicapped. The thought that they're a good reader would be the last thing from your mind.
So, Biology ends and Bella walks out with Mike. He gets a jealousy-face when they talk about Edward (and considering how much she narrates about Edward, Bella probably talks about him a lot). They go to P.E. together, and Mike is on her team in Volleyball, covering the week-spot she creates; a fourth reference to her being bad at the sport in half as many chapters. Is this going somewhere?
After school, she catches a glimpse of Edward outside his car in the parking lot and, in her lust-frenzy, almost crashes into a Toyota Corolla, "just the sort of car that my truck would make scrap metal of."¹ Take that, foreign car manufacturers! Thus end chapter 2.
Stay tuned for chapter 3.

¹Meyer, Stephanie Twilight. “Chapter 2: Open Book” Little, Brown and Co., 2005

I Read Twilight and Hate It: Chapter 3

    Bella wakes up the next morning to find that the snow has stuck, and rain from the previous day has frozen, and has some more angst about this.  Actually, she admits that it looks nice; "all the rain from yesterday had frozen solid - coating the needles on the trees in fantastic, gorgeous patterns, an making the driveway a deadly ice slick," but still complains about it.
    She then spends the rest of her morning thinking about Edward (considering how much she does that, though, it seems like it would just be a time-saver to tell the audience when she's not thinking about Edward) and how much she wants wants him.  I realize that this book was mostly meant to appeal to a female audience, but I'm sure there are some teenage boys out there who read it, and what advice about women is it giving them?  "To get girls to like you, be mean to them as soon as soon you meet them (especially if they're new and don't have any friends).  Then, start being nice, but tell some really obvious lies.  Chicks dig that."  Anyways, Bella describes this part of the chapter better than I could: "I was eager to get to school because I would see Edward Cullen.  And that was very, very stupid."  Yes, yes it was.   
    Bella makes her way to school through the snow, pondering to herself about what hot stuff she is and how all the boys want her.  When she gets to school, she realizes that her dad had put chains on her truck for her that morning.  Every time she mentions her dad, she calls him not-awkwardly-at-all by his first name, Charlie.  Because, you know, I guess it's easier for the author than showing to us that she doesn't think of him has a father figure.  And FYI; if it was that icy out, they would have just closed school.
    After getting out of her car in the parking lot, she suddenly notices something shocking.  That an out-of-control van is heading towards her?  No.  Well, there is an out-of-control van sliding on the ice towards her, but before that she notices that Edward is staring at her (along with a number of other students); staring at her because she's about to get nailed by the out-of-control van.  God knows Bella isn't going to do anything to rescue herself from the van of doom, so Edward teleports across the parking lot, knocking Bella to the ground in the process.  While she's down, Bella narrates, "a low oath made me aware that someone was with me, and the voice was impossible not to recognize." I guess Edward has the only low, attractive, soft, musical voice that she's heard.  Also, I don't know what Meyer thinks that "oath" means, but it's pretty far from it's actual definition, unless she's telling use that Bella heard Edward pledging fealty to his lord.  At this point, Edward pushes the van away.  With his bare hands.
    I'm going to take a minute here and talk about vampires.  First of all, Vampires aren't super-heroes.  It seems that every new writer who thinks that they're the coolest thing ever wants to one-handed-type up a story giving them some amazing new ability that they never had before.  Vampires don't teleport, and they don't have super-strength.  And for that matter, they don't walk around in the middle of the day without dying, overcast or not.  Originally, vampires were just mindless, unholy, reanimated corpses that hungered for human blood at night, while resting in their burial place during the day.   But, Bram Stoker had to go and write Dracula, which wasn't a bad novel per se, but it did pave the way for decades of shitty, semi-erotic vampire-fiction. The kind of vampire fiction, which reached it's nadir with Twilight, and now I'm making fun of it.
    An ambulance arrives to take Bella and Edward to the hospital, but they don't get out of there before Bella's dad (now referred to as "Chief Swan") arrives to give the ambulance a police escort.  People die in ambulances all the time, but (despite Bella's worries) very few of the deaths are by embarrassment.  Don't worry, though, Bella was fine.  Nothing but a bruised ego and a new sense of angst, this time at Edward for A)Teleporting across the parking lot and B)Not falling down himself, so he was allowed to walk into the hospital instead of being carried in on a stretcher with a neck-brace.  Conveniently, despite the fact that there was a large group of people watching the accident, no one but Bella saw Edward teleport, so he asks her to keep it a secret.
    Bella's placed in a room with the driver of the van, who has some minor cuts (or "shallow slices"), and Edward walks in to act nonchalant.  He's followed soon afterwards by Dr. Cullen.  "He was young, he was blond... and he was handsomer [sic] than any movie star I'd ever seen.  He was pale, though, and tired-looking, with circles under his eyes."  What's with all the vampires looking like people you'd see in an Abercrombie and Fitch catalogue?  What happened to the good old days, when the unclean looked like this:

    Dr. Cullen pronounces Bella to be healthy, and she leaves the room to go harass Edward about his apparent super-powers.  He just brushes her off and acts like she's crazy, which she kind of is.  I mean, they're not even dating yet, and already she's being pretty possessive.  Bella then leaves, with a new-found source of angst.  She gets a ride home and continues to obsess about this guy she barely knows.
    "I was consumed by the mystery Edward presented.  And more than a little obsessed with Edward himself.  Stupid, stupid, stupid.  I wasn't as eager to escape Forks as I should be, as any normal, sane person would be. ...
    That was the first night I dreamed of Edward Cullen."
    Ewwwww.  That's where chapter three ends.  I'm sure a steamy, sticky dream description soon to follow in chapter four.

New Feature: I Read Twilight and Hate it

I have decided to read Twilight, by Stephanie Meyer. I've already done some reading about Twilight, which leads me to dislike the series, but I've never read the actual books. This makes is somewhat difficult to impress on people that have read it that it is a bad book, as all the Twilight fans would just accuse me of criticizing something I didn't even know or understand (and they would be right)¹. I've decided to read Twilight partially to give it a fair chance, but mostly so that I can criticize it better. Also, because I usually try to avoid any book or TV series which becomes suddenly and intensely popular, but sometimes (after it's been out for awhile) my curiosity gets the best of me, much like it did with the Harry Potter series.
Actually, Harry Potter became somewhat of a guilty pleasure, where I enjoyed reading it but was still able to recognize that it wasn't actually good² (sort of like when I would watch "Jackie Chan Adventures"). Really, though, my prediction about Twilight is that I will neither think that it is good nor enjoy it, at least not how it was meant to be enjoyed. Still, I'd like to give the series a fair shake before judging it further (well, maybe not fair, but a shake at any rate). What I do believe I will enjoy is tearing it a new literary hole here, on my blog. You see, I'm introducing a new feature today on Dotted Pomegranates; it's called "I Read Twilight and Hate It." It's meant to be a chapter-by-chapter criticism of the book, as well as a synopsis and substitute to actually reading it, for those in the same situation as me. Look forward to installments, soon.
¹: And if you have read it but say that you hated it, then they just ask "Well, why did you read it then?" It's a bit of a Catch-22
²: I still maintain that Harry Potter is not a good series. I will explain why I think this in a separate post, if necessary.