Twilight and other crazy things :) (this post contains spoilers)

I guess I should start this post with an explaination for those of you who are huge Twilight fans before you jump to conclusions.  I am not into anything supernatural at all, I hate anything that has to do with demons,  gore or the 'far out there' stuff.  That includes vampires, werewolves, werecats, aliens, witches, etc.  It isn't that I don't have an imagination to think that these things could exist or anything like that it is more that I don't want to think that those kinds of things are out there.  Growing up we were taught all about Heaven and Hell and the free of Hell was something that has never escaped me, and with that goes the fear of demons and anything demonic.  On top of that I believe that a world full of human monsters doesn't need to 'make believe' more monsters.  There are people out there brutalizing other people every day and that is reality I am not sure that reading about vampires and werewolves would be entertainment...more brutality in my opinion.  Now I also have to say that I have tried to read vampire/werewolf kind of stuff before or watch the movies and they are gruesome...it seems that these books are written to scare and gross you out, and that to me is not entertainment.  To me entertainment is taking me to a place that I would rather be than the one I am in at the time, so if the news is full of gruesome and gorry stuff why would you want to read a fiction book that makes the news look like a walk in the park.  

Ariel read the Twilight series long before it became a phanonom, long before it was popular to be a 'Twilight' fan.  She not only waited for the release of Breaking Dawn but of Eclipse as well...so for a long time she has been telling me "Mom I think you will like it, it isn't really about vampires.  It is more a love story with vampires thrown in for good measure."  And of course since these are the types of books she always reads I wasn't sure that I believed her.  Then my husband read the whole series in a few weeks (not a huge accomplishment for him he can read a thousand page book in a day if he wanted to) anyway he told me that it isn't as bad as I think it is and that I probably won't like the last book but it shouldn't be bad.  This picture -->was taken on the night she went to the movie...yes the day it arrived in theatres and she waited in line to see it.  Anyway the DVD came out and she begged us to buy it for her and we did...she went out that night with friends and we decided to watch the movie...I was very reluctant...come on look at the cover.

That guys eyes are creepy...I thought for sure it was going to be just another vampire movie that I would sit with my face covered most of the time and say "I saw it don't make me watch it again!"  Well I was wrong I actually enjoyed the movie, although there were some parts at the end that I wasn't fond of for the most part Ariel was correct it was just a love story with vampires thrown in for good measure.  Once seeing the movie all I heard was the usual comments made after a book is made into a movie...this is missing from the book, or the book was better, that sort of thing so I thought what the heck I will read the book, unless it is much worse than the movie I can handle it.  And besides New Moon is coming out in a year or so and I wanted to be ahead of the game...I am a really slow reader by the way.  I saw the four books and thought if I start reading now I will be done by the time New Moon comes out :)

I amazed myself in less than 2 days I had read Twilight and was on to New Moon.  I noticed a lot more descrepancies fromt the movie than my husband or daughter had and was kind of glad in a way that I hadn't read the book first or I would have been annoyed with some parts of the movie.  I moved on to New Moon and in other three days I was done that one and on to Eclipse.  I loved New Moon about as much as Twilight but couldn't help myself from laughing at the whole thing.  Like really now you have a girl who falls in love with a vampire...like that is going to happen, he will eat her for lunch without thinking twice, then when he breaks her in two and leaves her for her own good (a little late for that now) she starts to fall for a werewolf.  Like give me a break is there not enough supernatural in the story already that you have to reach out for more.  But beyond the absolute craziness of it all it was a very interesting story.  Then we were on to Eclipse and I was having a very hard time with this one...things were really starting to get strange and I wasn't sure that I could continue reading this craziness.  It is hard not to fall in love with the Cullen family.  

In most pictures you see they are creepy looking, they have the golden eyes and the 'I am going to eat you look'...what is that line that Mike makes in the first book, "He looks at you like… like you’re something to eat."  And in the second book when they leave that makes me not like them much like come on you spend all this time with her, have killer vampires after her and then decide that it is in her best interests if you just leave town...really now.  But by the third book you can't help but love them again...I love this picture as they actually look like a family next door...all brothers and sisters  no parents mind you but they do look 'normal'.  I think that the world needs more people like Edward, Carlisle and Jasper (not sure about Emmett) as they are true gentlemen of course they were raised in a different time and they were taught differently but they are a good kind of people (I know they are not real, but one can dream).  I think Alice and Esme are awesome people too and I know that there are people out there like these characters I just haven't been fortunate enough to meet them...and my luck when I did they would be vampires and eat me for lunch :)

Anyway by the fourth book Breaking Dawn I was done...I read the book because I had read the first three and I needed to know how it ended.   I couldn't believe how out there this book was, it streched every thread of reality to its limits....kind of like Bella's shield.  I couldn't believe how much stuff she crammed into this last book.  There were points in the first three books where I said okay come on now get on with it because it felt like she was just trying to fill in pages with constant ramblings that had no real bearing on the story, and then when I got to the last book I wondered why some of this couldn't have been in the other books...the first three although entertaining were very slow compared to the last one in an action sense.

So I guess the bottom line is that I loved the first three books and not a huge fan at all of the last one, although I am sure when the movie comes out I will watch it just to see how the do it.  Twilight has become one of my all time favourite movies and I have already watched it three times.  And I think the next time my daughter tells me that I should read something because I will like it, I might actually believe her.

An aside if you are looking for a quick read and like the Twilight series my daughter got me to read a 15 book series (young adult books about 200 pages each) about Witches...yes another one on my list of no ways...but it is a similar idea to Twilight...the series is called Sweep and it is by Cate Teirnan.  Just to tell a small comparision to Sweep and Twilight...in Twilight new girl comes to school after being very awkward in her old soon falls in love with the guy no one else in school is good enough for and he turns out to be a vampire.  In sweep awkward girl who has lived in town her whole life and is never even looked at falls in love with the cutest guy on the planet...the new kid who only seems to have eyes for her...he turns out to be a witch as does she.  A fun read similar in some ways to Twilight and quick read if you like that kind of stuff...Happy reading whatever you choose :)