Oh dear, I am such a teenage girl. I’m reading Twilight. I didn’t mean to, it just sort of happened. And I liked the cover. Excuses, excuses…
I saw the trailer for the movie ages ago and it looked like pants (I am just not a fan of Cedric Diggory or whatever his non-Harry Potter name is) so I told myself I wouldn’t read the books, but I am such a sucker (tee hee, such a pun) for vampire novels. So here I am, and I can’t put the book down. Very sad but what’s a girl to do, eh?
Oh dear though, the descriptive descriptions in the book are so overdone. You know in primary school when your teacher tells you that there are lots of words you can use instead of the few you know, that “majestic” can be used instead of “big” and for the next week every child writes “The majestic lions saw the majestic elephant near the majestic trees” and the suchlike. Well it’s like that.
Everything is alluring, and intense and intensely alluring and alluringly intense. My book is in the kitchen so I cannot give you an exact example so I shall paraphrase in the style of the book for you:
He was alluring, intense, pale, cold, sinewy (or something like that), aloof, aloofly interested, alluring, intense. He turned his amber, dark, intense, alluring, intensely alluring, amused, intense eyes to me and smiled his crooked smile (wtf is a crooked smile, and why does he keep doing that?). I was allured.
It’s been a learning experience for me, I didn’t know that one can be allured. I knew one could be alluring, but turns out one can also be allured. Repeatedly.
But yet I keep reading, because alluringness aside, it is not too bad and is keeping my interest. And it’s about vampires and I am such a teenage girl when it comes to vampires (oh did I already mention that?). Am I even the book’s target demographic? 30-something housewife with delusions of free-time-for-book-reading?
Will I watch the movie? Even though it looks pants? Sadly, I probably will! Although Hollywood has an excellent track record of disappointing me with their vampire movies. Either they pick the wrong actor (like Tom Cruise as Lestat???) or they pick the oh-so-right actor but mangle the script beyond recognition (like Queen of the Damned) or they just make a crap movie with a gazillion sequels (like Underworld, Blade etc. etc.)
But, I do remember The Lost Boys fondly, it rocked. I love that movie. And Buffy (the tv series not the 80’s movie), I am a big Buffy fan, but not so much Angel, the whole “I’m a lawyer” thing does naught for me 
Did I have a point? Nope, back I go to find out what happens to Buffy and Angel, sorry, Bella & Edward, what is it with centuries old vampires and highschool girls anyway?
Cue gratuitous use of vampire smiley (I’m sorry, it’s not very alluring or intense) …. 
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Oh,, I love the way you try to defend your wanton sucked-inness to this series of novels with a critique of the writer’s teen-centric over-elaborate writing style!!! Face it, You Love It!!!!
Though I have to back you 100% about the Lost Boys – such a good film! And I have to ask… have you ever read any Poppy Z. Brite?
My *husband* is reading this book. (I am still holding out) He’s almost done and he loves it! He’s not even much of a reader.
I do have to agree as well on the Lost Boys. Is it waaay too geeky to mention that my sister and I saw that movie about 10x at the theatre and went kinda sorta dressed up like characters from the movie? Yeah, I thought so. (I was Star, she was David)
If the Seattle gig doesn’t go thru, that’s the first thing I’m picking up because it’s set on the Olympic Peninsula (Forks) in my beloved Pacific Northwest. And, because you gave it a vampire smilie rating
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“It looked like pants”? That’s a new one for me
I agree with you on the overwrought writing style. And I think it’s totally Buffy mixed with Roswell. Glad to hear someone else express the same thoughts. Of course I went on to read the second one, and am looking forward to the third….
I feel a little allured into reading the book now… for reals.
I have to admit that I read all of the books. I completely agree with your assessment of the writing–it’s pretty terrible but highly addictive at the same time! Trust me, they just keep getting worse. And I think that you are actually in the original intended demographic! While working in a bookstore I heard that Stephanie Meyer wrote the book as an adult novel but the publishers thought it would appeal more to teenagers. Little did they know….
I love Vampire novels (I’ve read EVERYTHING by Anne Rice, and Anne Rampling, etc) but I also found the Twilight series to be juvenile (though it hasn’t stopped me from reading the books). I don’t find Edward too appealing in the Trailers, so I may not watch the movie. I just don’t have a thing for blondes, even Brad Pitt doesn’t do it for me.
I read the series (but not the unfinished manuscript) and at points had to tell myself to stop thinking like a grown up, that is, not think too much about it and it was a good pulp fiction read. Literature it wasn’t but … Enjoy and don’t overanalyse. I’m off to the library website to check out Poppy Brite
[...] the series when it was on tv so it’s all new to me- currently, I’m watching it on hulu. Pixie, it’s like we’re living parallel [...]
LOL. Is everyone reading this book? I may have to try it after all; it just sounds too irresistibly alluring…
@DJ, LOL you are so right
@Annette, that’s excellent! I loved Star’s clothes, she was so cool. Black haired background vamp was my favourite.
@Jumbleberryjam, you’d love it, lots of talk of rain, clouds, fog, and general not-sunny weather!
@Angela, yup, pants. I don’t know when I started using that expression but it is a very useful one! I’m on novel 2 now, can’t stop myself….
@Kirsty, come join us on the dark side (or the Twilight side), we’re alluring
@Tara, they keep getting worse? Excellent
@Mom on the Run, yeah blondy haired men do nothing for me either so I have re-imagined Edward as black-haired for the time being!
@Mom on the Go, yup, that’s it. Handily enough my mommy brain is well able to sink into pulp fiction so I am having a great time reading them!
@Schatz, yes everyone seems to be alright. Go on you know you want to…..
This book and movie look so uninteresting to me, that I will end up loving them both eventually. That’s how it goes, first something repels me, and then I give in and adore every single thing about it. Why must I be so weird?
[...] I live in a pop-culture bubble. When we go to play at the train table in our local chain bookstore, I’m always a little freaked out by all the flashy books by authors totally unknown to me. But, who are obviously wildly popular given all the attention lavished on them by the people hovering about their displays. I only learned about Twilight this year when HalfPintPixie fell into it. [...]