Dear Ms. Meyer,
I’ve been reading the first few chapters of Eclipse, and there are some things I feel that I need to say.
1. When you introduce someone as “my best friend (and werewolf)”, you imply that this person is also your best werewolf. If you want to say that he is your best friend and also happens to be a werewolf, you could say “my best friend (a werewolf)” or “my best friend (who is also a werewolf)”. Or you could stop treating your sentences like clown cars and write the information in totally separate phrases.
2. By the end of the first chapter, I noticed that Bella had another incident of forgetting to breathe. She really is the dimmest protagonist I have ever had the misfortune to encounter.
3. I’m confused.
Bella is up in her room when she smells “the unmistakeable scent of a smoking burner rising from the kitchen”. Now, leaving aside any discussion of the smell of levitating oven elements, it is revealed in the next paragraph that the smell comes from noodles in a pan (a pan?) that were not stirred and have now congealed into a “mushy hunk that was scalded to the bottom.”
It seems like the problem must have been more an issue of boiling dry than stirring, but both are bad, so ok.
While I try to suspend my disbelief to the point where I could accept that a grown man who batched it for 16 years doesn’t know how to boil pasta, I continue reading and see this: “the pasta lump bobbed in the boiling water as I poked it.”
So, wait, it is in water?
It’s in water, but it burned enough to make smoke? Has this ever happened to you?
Please explain. I may need this information for personal reasons.
4. Your readers think independently of your protagonist, so you can’t create a mystery just by making Bella confused. When Bella fails to put two and two together, your readers are not equally mystified. Instead of thinking “OMG double twos, what does it mean??”, your readers are thinking: “four. Four. Four. FOUR, YOU EVERLASTING MORON.”
So when Jacob calls Bella and tells her he desperately needs to talk to her about something, and then asks her if she’s going to be at school tomorrow, there really is no mystery created. Bella may spend the next two pages thinking deeply, desperately trying to figure out how Jacob’s need to speak with her could possibly be related to her attendance at school… but your readers have already figured it out. You aren’t creating mystery or suspense. You’re just showcasing Bella’s idiocy, especially since she never does figure it out.
Now, I haven’t read the next chapter, but let me guess: Jacob’s going to show up at school and try to talk to her alone, right? And Bella will be super surprised?
Thanks for your time,
Carol
Mwahaha, brilliant! Also reminds me that I was reading “New Moon”. Now I know what to continue reading once I’m done with the book I’m reading now. Continue the pain!
Haha, I think you should continue to read this book and post about it. That way I don’t have to but still won’t feel left out.
Btw, I did read The Host which I found compelling enough to finish (a big deal for me because I have attention span issues). So, now I am worried I may be quite as stupid as Bella. The thing that made me decide against any more books by Meyers was that all the characters were so neatly coupled in the end. I felt like I’d been tricked into reading a romance novel by way of sci fi. I didn’t notice flawed English, poor logic or cheap dramaturgy, which must have been present since writing usually doesn’t get worse with time.
Dammit, now I have grammar envy.
The Host is more recent, so maybe her editor smartened up? I haven’t read it.
You’re right, I was tricked by the edition years on Amazon. Which admittedly don’t make sense now, since Eclipse is listed as late as 2010 (and The Host as 2008.) So much for quickie research.
I freely admit that I have read ALL of the Twilight books, but that only means that laughing at them is even more fun. Thanks for the giggles.
I’m reading them because I love to hate them so. It’s like MST3K for books.
Has everyone here seen Alex Reads Twilight on YouTube? If not, go treat yourself to that. His bit about Lauren in chapter seven is my favorite 😀
Oh, I have a whole LAUREN rant.
Isn’t a saucepan a pot? Just sayin’. 😛 (I don’t even remember a Lauren in the books, so I’m not qualified to comment on anything else.)
Of course you don’t. She’s a total non-character. I believe Alex from Alex-Reads-Twilight exclaims “WHO THE FUCK IS LAUREN?”
But we’re supposed to hate her because Bella does.
I think you need to continue this. I have no desire to read this series, but I do enjoy a good laugh. Read on! ;D
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“Instead of thinking “OMG double twos, what does it mean??”, your readers are thinking: “four. Four. Four. FOUR, YOU EVERLASTING MORON.””
Bwahahahahaha so true 🙂
I really, really want someone to sit down and force Meyer to try and defend some of the statements she’s made about her books/characters. I’d really like to know how she would try and tackle the subjects when it’s actually someone who is way more intelligent than her asking the questions (so she couldn’t brush them off), and I also just want to see her being forced to think that hard and attempt to come up with logical answers. My considered opinion is that it might actually break her brain.
I would also love that!