Twilight of Bookmonkey: Day 28 – The End

And after twenty eight days and thirteen posts my month of Twilight is drawing to a close. What amazes me is how little of the world of Twilight I have actually explored; there are still websites, cookbooks, contests, magazines, documentaries and dozens of spoof videos that I was hoping to get around to blogging about.

What have I learned from my experience in the world of Bella, Edward and Jacob? Basically the following five things.

5) Do not read the Twilight Saga if you like fight scenes – try reading R.A. Salvatore instead.

4) Do not declare yourself part of Team Edward in my hometown (which is decidedly Team Jacob) – My BFF Mike got me a Team Edward Backpack (it even has a picture of Robert Pattinson on it!) and I got nothing but dirty looks on my various outings throughout town.

3) My wife is a saint – she sat through half of New Moon and a bunch of Twilight while I watched and put up with the books as dinner conversation for the last month. Even I would have made me sleep on the couch by the second week.

2) The first and third books are the strongest. If you are interested in reading any of these books, I would honestly stick with the first one – they kind of go downhill from there.

1) If you would like to read some great Supernatural Romance fiction featuring a vampire, try the works of Tanya Huff or Charlaine Harris before you read these (the books are a lot more fun). If you would like to watch some great Supernatural Romance movies, check out Near Dark, The 1992 Dracula (yes the one with Keanu Reeves), or the Swedish movie Let the Right One In – all these films are darker in tone, but quite rewarding - and for the most honest look I have ever seen at how a Supernatural Romance with a vampire would actually end up, see Thirst (but not with any kids, or people who get squeamish around blood, or... well anyone who doesn't like horror, actually.) Which was such a surprisingly good horror flick it will definitely get a review next month.

This last month has been in turns, intriguing, revolting, disturbing, boring, frustrating, horrifying (in the good way – seriously by the time the scary scene happens in New Moon I was getting fearful for my sanity and that brief glimpse of horror did help me get through), and I suppose rewarding. Now when I complain about the series I can do it as someone who has put in the work.

Happy Halloween Everyone!

Twilight of Bookmonkey: Day Eight

For the last two and a half books (I’m working my way through Eclipse now), I’ve been pretty concerned that this horror series wouldn’t have anything, you know, horrific in it. Thankfully I was wrong.

In the twenty-first chapter of New Moon, something scary actually happens! Vampires actually eat a tour group of people, and although it is not described in gory detail (Bella had left the room it happened in) she could still hear the screams! Horray, the Horror series I’ve dedicated the month of October to reading actually had something scary in it!

In the end I was less than enthused with New Moon, as I said back on Wednesday, the majority of the book went nowhere and as much as I like young Jacob (I guess I’m on Team Jacob) for attempting to be best friends with a girl he’d like to be dating, the fact that Bella knowingly uses his affection to make herself feel better just made me wonder why exactly anyone likes her character.

So far Eclipse is a little better – stuff is happening, and a significant body count in nearby Seattle seems to be heading towards some sort of payoff. I do find it funny that Bella hasn’t once considered that after she becomes a vampire, she won’t want to be around Jacob at all (for the record this dynamic was handled much more effectively in Canadian author Tanya Huff’s Victoria Nelson series). Also it’s funny that after Edward sees how upset Jacob is, he tells Bella not to feel bad as she didn’t do anything wrong (making him either ignorant, insane or without morals – oh wait, maybe Bella is simply lying to him about her behaviour in the previous book)

Anyway, the third book is better than the second, which wasn’t as good as the first.

This weekend – the first movie.