Before you all start hating on me, I am not reading the Twilight series, but I know of at least 5 girls who LOOOVE it. To my embarrassment I'll admit I have watched the first film, it wasn't awful don't get me wrong but I wont remember it in a week or so. The story didn't seem all that compelling, pretty average really. Was just wondering if anyone had read the books and could comment on the actual writing... Essentially I'm asking, what's so special about it?
I forced myself to read all four books. Not because I enjoy them, they're terrible, but so that I could actually slag off the writer's ability to ... write. A lot of people find this series alluring for many reasons. Mainly, it sells sex. It's similar to 9010, and other people's guilty pleasures. Honestly, the entire series is really poorly written. It's got a painfully slow moving plot, undeveloped characters, stupid 12 year old fantasies and some of the worst imagery I have ever witnessed. I like to compare it to mainstream music. Some artists have inspiring, clever lyrics and compositions. Same with writing. The Twilight series is mainstream, irritating, talentless garbage.
I've watched all the films without paying for them - I don't know if I should be admitting that. I don't like Twilight at all: I hear polar opposite opinions of the books, and of what I've read they are nothing special.
Wait are you a pirate? If so then, dude what kind of pirate are you? Twilight? Seriously? If you are going to break some federal laws do it on something worth it. Unless your comment about maybe you shouldn't admit it was about seeing the movies in which case. Yeah. You probably shouldn't mention that sort of thing on the Internet! I tried watching the first movie. Maybe I thought it was destined to be horrible so I got like 20 minutes in and stopped watching. I also read the first book. Well I had maybe 50 or 70 pages left. well it was the part where the Marble Chiseled God that is Edward tells boring Bella she had to leave town for a bit. or something. Maybe I am remembering it wrong. But I could have sworn half the book was quite literally Bella descrbing how some sort of beautiful god that sparkles in the sun and how freaking awesome he looks. Also bugged the hell out of me that Edward actually got away with sneaking into a girls room, one which he doesn't know at all, and isn't like shot to death by the girls father. I mean if I were to do that? Well I wouldn't because I'd get my ass kicked by the girls father/older brothers/her/whoeveristhetoughbadassinherfamily. Also it bugged me when Edward kept joking about how Bella is always getting in trouble when he isn't around and how she needs him otherwise she'd probably get raped or something. I dunno maybe I imagined these things. But it bugged me. It was like Edward was trying to brainwash her into thinking that if she were ever to leave him that she couldn't survive on her own or something. Also haven't read the fourth book. But I am pretty sure it pretty much sums up what Bella is: Mary Sue. But then I think that was obvious three books ago. ... Sorry this is my first post of the day. As such its probably all jumpy and sorta hard to understand. If so. Sorry. If not. I am way to paranoid.
I have also read the series through once. I do not think Meyer is particularly talented in character or plot development or even in general writing but she employs a formula that is very successful in capturing the imagination of her target audience. People don't get that successful for no reason. Bella is an extremely underdeveloped character, and I think her almost complete lack of personality makes it very easy for the teenage female readers to put themselves in her place. The love interest, Edward is handsome, obscenely rich, basically free from real parental influences, and absolutely infatuated with Bella; nothing and no one can possibly ruin his bottomless love for her. Bella herself is beautiful, inexplicably popular, and clearly much smarter than her dumb dad who is not really around much himself. It's a perfect fantasy for teenage girl. That said, I was pretty disgusted by the picture Meyer paints of romance and relationships. Edward exhibits a lot of behaviors typical of an abusive partner or a stalker but it is portrayed as romantic, endearing, or just protective. He makes all of the important decisions for them, mostly against Bella's will as if she is a child. His obsession with Bella is written very unconvincingly and I think it could lead impressionable readers to have unhealthy expectations from a relationship.
I'm the type with the sword and the eye patch. Just kidding - I wanted to check them out really, see what all the fuss was about. Apparently not much.
Ooh, the last Twilight forum didn't turn out good ;D. The books got popular around when I was in the sixth-grade. Back then, shallow and indiscriminate, I loved them. Even now, I will say that Stephenie Meyer isn't a half-bad storyteller. It's the concepts, characters, and plotlines that need some thinking-through. ...then, I realized where the west coast of Brazil IS. THERE IS NO EXCUSE FOR THAT, SMeyer. I went to see New Moon with my friend for her birthday. We counted how many blatant sexual, yet unmentioned innuendos there were (we counted each shirtless guy per scene as one, to beef up the score). ...112 O_O. Oh, and we facepalmed at the "frolicking through meadows" scene. Some Twilight haters are quite funny, though. Cleolinda is full of mocking snark, and this one other LJ girl gives her views on Twilight through her former religion, which she shared with SMeyer. While not quite as funny (the humor relied too heavily on edited pictures), it was certainly intriguing. I didn't take her word for gospel (punny!) though, since my close friend is from what many socialites at our school call "Mormon Territory" (AKA my secondary group of friends -___-) and professed profusely the amount of bias it prolly had. None of them are quite fans of the series either . To quote him, "I was halfway through the book when I realized, 'The story's gonna be like this the whole way through. It would be stupid to waste my time.'"
Haha I like how the hatred of Twilight is so strong around here that you have to start your post out with a disclaimer to avoid being razzed about bringing it up. I'm probably the only person on this forum who likes Twilight. I might even go so far as to say loves it. Edit: I have to admit, I'm kind of curious about the LJ person you're talking about, J. I used to be Mormon, so I'm curious to see what her views on it are.
Before everyone starts calling me some sort of Twilight lover, lemme just preface this by saying it's not that I really LIKE the Twilight series... I mean, I know people who do, sure, but I can assure you I'm not one of them. It's just that, you know, you get a wife, coupla teenage nieces start hanging around, they leave some of their favorite literature lying around and you give it a look, you know? When there's nothing else to read, nothing's on TV, you're bored, then before you know it you're four or five hundred page into the series and- Ahahaha! Jay kay, you're all losers!
I rented Twilight and saved it to my harddrive... will delete it once I manage to watch the whole thing. I blame my furniture for not at least half-passing out while watching a movie. I came into the movie with odd expectations, and haven't even gotten to the good part. As a Suethor, I could find many admirable traits in the description of the books. A main character that ill-adjusted teenagers could romanticize about being. Maybe I should have tried reading the book instead of getting the movie.
I read the first book a long time ago to see what the fuss was about. It's garbage. (In my opinion). ALL of my friends loved it at the time, and they thought I was some kind of freak. One of them actually said to me: "Bayleigh, you're insane! She is such a brilliant writer! This is the best book I have ever read!" (To which I promptly stated that, clearly, she had only read one book.) If you want to read it, have at it. People like what they like. But I reserve the right to cringe each time the series is mentioned.
I more or less ignored the whole thing completely untill I ended up watching the first film when a female friend wanted to watch the DVD - she fell asleep but I ended up watching the whole thing and I was actually pleasantly suprised at how much I enjoyed it. Given I will read just about anything and I had some Smiths vouchers kicking around from a present I ended up picking up the books and reading the whole series. To be honest the writing isn't brilliant, I've certainly read worse though and there are some nice touches. On the whole I was left entertained which is surely the goal of the exercise with that sort of book. I'd actually suspect that most of the hate they recieve is actually down to hatred of the slightly creepy fandom they seem to have developed rather than the books themselves, I highly doubt that most people who "hate" them will have actually read the books or some will have read them with the preconception that they were going to hate them. I'm sure that there are pently of people who genuinely dislike them just based off reading the books - like I said the writing isn't the best and there are some real facepalm moments where you'd love to ask Ms. Meyer what on earth she was thinking of, but something tells me most of those people read, disliked and moved on rather than spouting vitrol about them.
I read them trying to give them a fair hearing even after a lot of trusted friends hated on them - I didn't find the writing itself repellent - a little simple, but it was her first novel. It was the portrayal of the characters more than anything. At times I wondered if it was actually a subversion and people were taking it too literally. And then I read some stuff about Meyer and the things she's said about her characters, and the rigid defence she made of the books... Any sense that there might have been a deliberate awareness of what she was doing flew right out the window, and I realised just why so many people hate on them. On the plus side, I feel like my writing improves a lot whenever I read them, because they make me strive hard to portray my characters better, and to make sure all the relationships are natural. For example, I re-wrote my big main novel (where the main character, incidentally, is called Yzobella - I started it at least 6 years ago now, way before the hype ) from the point of view of the male main character after getting annoyed with how I couldn't get behind Yzobella. I went and read Midnight Sun in preparation - the one told from Edward's point of view - and singled out all the ways of examining the behind-the-scenes relationships with his family and father in particular, and the way he talks about Bella, so I could avoid doing all of that. In fact, Edward's nauseating relationship with his adoptive father made me introduce a totally new subplot of tension between my main guy and *his* father-figure type. I found a freakish number of similarities between the characters of our novels, but I'm doing it better so nyaaaah to Meyer.
Well I actually like the books, the movies not so much but they are getting better the more money they put into it and the more experienced the actors get much like the Harry Potter films. I'm not saying that the writing of the book is perfect, to be honest I don't read books just to pick them apart, if I like them I read them if I don't get into it then it goes back onto the shelf no harm done. I really don't see the point in reading a book just to pull it to shreds. The thing I liked about the book is that it was very easy reading and sometimes you just need something easy and light hearted to read.
My ex and both daughters love these books. I saw the first movie and some of the second. I didn't think the movies were bad, but not great either. Didn't read a word of the books.
I think we've had a thread like this before... Anyway. Same! Well, I only watched the first film online for free but I did it for the same reasons as you. I also bought the first three books (of the few books I buy, I just had to buy these >.> Darn you 3 for 2 offers tricking me!), again mainly just to see what the fuss was about. It was an okay read, I'll admit, but in my copy there were typos and obvious things (characterisation etc.) that really annoyed me. So yeah, I do dislike it but I can see why it's so popular.
I started reading the Twilight series in 2006 before it all became popular. I was a young teenager at the time and I liked the books, but have only grown out of it. As I became older and I realized how many stupid people influential to whatever is mainstream, began to like it, I began to lose interest for it. And only read the rest of the series, because I feel incomplete if I don't complete a series. What really bugged me though, is that just recently, my eldest sister has begun to read the series and has grown quite attached to it. But it was something that she said. When she heard of Stephen King criticizing Stephenie Meyer's writing, she became angry at that statement. She made claims that she didn't think Stephen King's writing was as interesting or good as Meyer's. She made the claim that as long as it holds the reader's interest then it's good writing. She was trying to say that Meyer was a better writer than King. And in our argument, trying (failingly) to prove her point, she said that if Meyer's writing was so bad, then how is it that she is so popular? My Response: *Sigh* This is what happens, kids, when you don't read, especially any great literature.
I didn't say it was explicitly in any part of my post. But in response to your statement, I will disagree.
There are so many, many things that are hugely popular that are just bad. Masses flock to crap just like flies do. There are so many great things that never get recognised.
Stephen King isn't up there with, say, Steinback -- but he's still a great writer on a good portion of his stuff that I've read. This is only my opinion on King, and eveyone else will have his or her own. However this thread isn't about King, it's about Twilight. I tried reading Twilight around 2006 or 2007 when everyone was obsessed with them. My issue with it wasn't her bad writing quality -- which I can forgive if a story is gripping and fast-paced -- but my issue lay with the fact that Twilight sets back feminism about 50 years. Bella has no personality or interests outside of Edward. She also constantly lets Edward control her and tell her what to do. Not cool in my book. The disturbing part is that 12-year-old fangirls girls are running around dreaming about how this is their ideal relationship. Now, I have a question. All I've read was maybe the first few chapters of the first book......does Stephanie Mayer actually use the work "sparkle" in her description of Edward? Is the whole "sparkling in the sunlight" stuff satirical, or did Meyer coin the term herself???
Might not be cool, but sadly, with love/crushes, this happens a lot in real life. Which is probably why so many actually got into it. She did nail the isuse about girls feeling certain ways about themselves and needing someome who see's them as beautiful and perfect.
