New Moon Chapters 3-5: Psychotic Breaks and Bitchiness.

Sorry for the long wait.  Between computer problems, academics, family stuff, and holidays, we’ve been a bit behind.  But that should be coming to an end now!

New Moon Chapter 3: The End And they all lived happily ever after… with the longest epilogue ever.

Bella-kins does not feel well this morning. Perhaps because of injuries equivalent to having been forced through a window. Even Chev Chelios would feel a little rotten about this, Bella-kins, so we’ll let you get away with starting the chapter by saying ‘I felt absolutely hideous in the morning’, and the revelation you hadn’t slept well and continued to be injured, in spite of the unreality that constantly surrounds you.

Something is wrong with Edward’s face, though, and it’s not the usual: (A few seconds in the fridge, and bam!: Edward. )

Bella meanwhile is using our very own plot-train track-switch Alice as an excuse not to actually talk to Edward about his Moody Blues (which he doesn’t know anything about, because you know, nothing really neat happened in the 90 or so years he’s been a vampire). Why talk to the mind-reader when you can just have Alice tell you the maybe-future!? I mean, come on.

It just occurred to me – again – that there are TWO lazy plot shortcuts here, a mind reader and a future teller. I’m not sure why there’s a book at all when you have these two around.

I mean… technically it happens in comic books, but in comic books character also have more believable flaws. There’s kryptonite and shit. Of course, I guess Alice also has “Things that aren’t weather.” Why ‘weather’ is a stupid basis unless your name is Ororo: Also, Fuck The Planeteers

Edward: Alice and Jasper left for some reason.

Bella: I felt terrible because I ran them out of their home. I’m a plague.

Indeed, you are a pox on their house.

Could she be a plague on both their houses? Which still leaves me wondering who Mercutio is…

Bella: Want to come over after I get home from work?

Edward: Whatevs. I show no interest in you anymore.

This probably doesn’t have anything to do with either The Plot Train or the completely unrelated premonition Bella had either.

Bella: Edward just needs time to recover. He’ll love me again. All I did was drive away four members of his family indefinitely.

Guys usually need a few minutes to recover. You know how it is.

Mike: How was your birthday?

Bella: Sucked, nerd.

-later, back at home-

Edward: is hanging out with Charlie, and pretty much ignores Bella.

“The pizza held no interest for me.” Seriously, there are some great lines in this. If only they were meant to be funny.

Bella pictures the very worst she could live through. I will give you a hint, it’s not the death of anyone. Not even Edward. Or say, a horrible accident or something. Nope. Why? Because in the face of those things, Bella would simply capitulate and kill herself. Remember kids, in this world, nobody has to be strong.

Bella: I’m'a go get my camera and take a picture of Edward!

Edward: Leaves.

Charlie during this whole awkward scene: Whatevs.

Charlie = my new favorite character.

Bella: I’m going to miss the forest and Forks.

Why? You’re leaving again? Are you off to try and kill yourself again? I bet that’s it.

-At School again!-

Bella: Here, nerds, take your pictures. (Gawd the nerds act like such nerds. Taking pictures of each other. GROAN normal human behavior)

Jess(ica): Oops, I think we used all your film.

Bella: That’s okay, I’d already taken pictures of everything important before I handed it to you.

-At Home Again!-

“No thousand words could equal this picture” of Edward. Why not? Just type ‘god angel stone’ for five books or so…

Bella: GOD I’M SUPER FAT AND UGLY IN THIS PICTURE. I’m going to stop eating. That way I look better for Edward, who also doesn’t eat! We’re made for each other!

-Three days of ’same shit, different day’ later-

Edward: Can I come over today?

Bella: Ok.

Edward: “I’ll beat you there.”

Folks, there’s the admission we’ve been waiting for.

Edward: Walk with me. Into the woods.

Bella: Well, I wouldn’t want to make you ask twice…

Edward: We’re leaving.

Bella: Where are we going?

Edward: You’re not going anywhere, NERD.

Bella: Oh, snap.

Edward: Leaving. You’re not coming along.

Bella: Is this about my soul? Cause fuck my soul. I hate it.

Edward: O_o

Bella: Seriously. Soul? Who needs it.

It is as they say, soul is for black people. Therefore, Bella doesn’t want it. Soul, you say? Ha! Soul is for communists and trouble-makers and black people.

“The liquid gold [in his eyes] had frozen solid.” Oh no! The temperature outside had dropped below 1947.52 degrees!

Edward: I don’t want you.

Bella: You don’t want me?

Edward: I don’t want you.

Bella: “‘You… don’t… want me?’ I tried out the words, confused by the way they sounded, placed in that order.” Usually I said it “Want you, don’t me?”

Edward: It is you that I do not want. I’m tired of pretending to be human. So, you know, whatever. Leaving.

“His eyes were like topaz- hard and clear and very deep.” What were they like? Wait, please reiterate, one book-full wasn’t enough.

I just want to mention that we went from “I’m no good for you” to “You’re not good for me.” Can we both be bad for each other?

Baby, we can be bad for each other all. night. long.

Like a pint of Ben and Jerry’s and cigarettes, or better yet, a pint of Ben and Jerry’s, the ice cream guy who sold it to you, cigarettes, and regret.

But it’s ok, because liquor will be there to pick up the pieces.

You know who never lets you down? Jack. Jack Daniels. What would ‘Edward Cullen’ be in the liquor aisle? (I’m going to say schnappes, or some kind of pussy liquor.)

Absolut pepper. I saw that the other day, and threw up a little.

Well, let’s get together and throw up alot! We have lots of bottled friends to help us!

Edward: don’t worry, your entire species is a dumb as you; unlike me and my crystal-clear memory, especially of my human past, you’ll forget this whole relationship ever happened. I … must go into the dark alone… never really knowing love… never really knowing happiness… never really knowing whose cock it is that pokes out of the hole in the bathroom stall.

Edward’s goodbye is, literally, the worst ever. There are so many things he could have done that would have been better. Even just sucker punching Bella and walking out would have been better. At least then he would have reminded her of their relationship. Yeah, I don’t know why but even Alice decided to give her the kick-to-the-nuts exit, along with Edward. Actually, the whole Cullen clan is in on this giant douchery. Glad they’ve got a crest to stamp on it.

Edward: Keep it together, champ, best o’ luck. *gone*

Bella: I am disconsolate, and wander in the woods in a very Werther-esque bit of pointlessness. I trip, and yet I do not care. I am shivering, yet not cold. I am still technically a virgin, though not tehcnicall- hey, look no moon!

“Perhaps there was no moon tonight -a lunar eclipse, a new moon.”

GODDAMN YOU, TITLE.

Hey, take it easy. If there was a new moon, then the vampires would come out. Or something. Is that how this works?

Something like that.

Sam Uley (who?): saves Bella.

Sam Uley: Well, you’re weird.

Bella: No, I’m disconsolate, you ass. Who the fuck is ‘Sam Uley’ anyway? Put me down.

Sam Uley: Whatever. I’m never going to give you up, or put you down.

I’ll put you down Bella. It’s all I ever want to do, you horrible bitch.

Charlie- can’t hold Bella up.

Sam Uley: Want a hand with that?

Charlie: Nope, we’re good. I used to drop her when she was little too. The little tyke loves it.

Bella, at home: I am fainting and woozy, because I wandered into the woods and tried to die of exposure. Alas! If only there were knives or other instruments of speedy demise!

Somebody or other on phone: The natives are getting rowdy, setting bonfires to celebrate the sudden, unexpected departure of the Cullens the same night your daughter wanders and gets lost in the woods. Amazingly unrelated events, all in the same sentence. Anyway, Chief-Charlie-Dad, handle that shit.

Charlie: Calls Billy.

Charlie: Don’t burn down the forest, you superstitious kooks.

Charlie:Sooooo…. Edward left you to die in the woods.

Bella: Nah, it was my fault. Where’d the Cullens go?

Charlie: L.A.- where bloodsucking is the norm.

Charlie: Sooooo… For reals, Edward left you to die in the woods.

Bella: I am distraught! We shall speak no more! I weep for my broken heart!

Charlie: Broken… by the…. guy who left you to die in the woods.

Bella: I don’t want to talk about it *flee*

Edward stole back his Christmas CD, and pictures of him that she had.

For a mind reader, Edward is fucking -awful- with people.

Bella spends four months on the floor of her bedroom.

(That was a weird way to end a chapter, just listing the names of passing months. I don’t think it’s bad… it’s just… clunky. Maybe because I’m not wrapped up in the action. Charlie has a good point, that Edward basically chose the most hurtful and denying way to break up with Bella, and left her in a dangerous situation with all her wittle dreams destroyed. I don’t know how leaving an emotionally vulnerable (or in Bella’s case- devastated) individual with “no sense of direction” and a tendency to be clumsy and self-harming in the woods counts as ‘the easy way’ to break up with someone, unless you wanted them to actually die. I mean, that is pretty much the ultimate breaking up, your s.o. dying, but then you also rule out make-up sex, which I hear is worth it. Though I guess… there is no sex in this series yet… sooo.. Good on ya, Edward?)

Chapter 4:Waking up

We woke up at the beginning of the last chapter, too. And the chapter before that, I think. Well, I think I’ve established a pattern- Bella, if you don’t wake up, nothing horrible will happen to anyone. Decent starting paragraph, though, I’d say. I mean, it’s three sentences of ‘this sucks, and for four months’, but it’s evocative, and a decent way to pave over four months of action in a single swoop.

Charlie: Go home, Bella! All you do here is mope! You’re a lazy shiftless sack o’ crap.

Bella: I do not mope. I exist in a state of constant emotionless shock, damn it. Get it right.

Charlie: Alright, yeah, that’s it, you’re lifeless- like you’ve lost the most important thing to you ever in an abrupt and heartless fashion though it isn’t his fault so you only have yourself and your stupid humanity to blame for it. Right?

Bella: Right. Also, that’s “vampire” lifeless, not “zombie” lifeless.

Charlie: You should see a shrink.

Bella: Don’t want to. I’ll just try harder.

Charlie: Bella, you try so hard it’s amazing you can withstand such emotional bereft-ness. I was weak to continue on with my life when I felt emotionally devastated- or perhaps your mother leaving me and taking you just wasn’t an important enough event in my life. I’m amazed at your strength, and will validate your every feeling right now because what the hell else am I for in this book? By the by, you should do something.

Bella: No.

Charlie: Please?

Bella: No

Charlie: Stop waiting for Edward.

Bella: GOD, I HATE YOU. I AM NOT WAITING FOR HE OF WHOM WE DO NOT SPEAK. Do you not remember that I have forbidden the topic? And just to show you, I will make plans with Jessica! Vengeance is mine! *leaves* Maybe we’ll go back to Port Angeles! I kinda miss Big Papa Flannel and His Gang of Miscreants.

-At School-

Animal Farm: I’m about communism!

Bella: At least you’re not one of those awful romances. Oh, the ennui! I may die of it, in the manner of Neville.

Mike: Working tomorrow?

Bella: Of course I am, nerd. I always work that day. Why do you bother me with these constant questions?

-Next Class-

Bella: Jess isn’t even talking to me because my emotional distress means I haven’t spoken to her in months. What a bitch. Hey, Jess?

Jessica: Are you talking to me?

Bella: Of course I am (Gawd) Let’s go to the movies.

Jess: Okay.

Bella :“I tried to remember if I liked scary movies, but I wasn’t sure.” Then I tried to remember my name, but I couldn’t remember that either.

-Later-

Bella: I’m going to listlessly go through my closet looking for clothes. Only the haze is important to me. Only the darkness. Before I changed I went into the bathroom, lit some candles, listened to some sad music, and cut myself while writing shitty poetry in my own blood. No one understands me.

Bella: ripped her car stereo out by hand and stuffed it in a bag. That’s… frightening. “I didn’t think of the bloody mess my fingernails had been when I finished clawing it out of the dashboard.” That’s… super disturbing.

Bella: fakes interacting with Jess. Like she usually does.

“Jess thought we should hit the twilight showing and eat later…” I don’t think this was purposeful, but I did laugh.

I figured the book had gone meta and we were going to the movie of the last book.

I think maybe we are. This book, where Edward sensibly runs away, is really just pretending the emotional revelations at the end of the last books hadn’t happened… so this is like, Twilight II, like Evil Dead II

Bella: OMG, I UNDERSTAND NOW- THE ZOMBIE MOVIE HAS REVEALED TO ME THAT I AM THE ZOMBIE, AND THE ZOMBIE IS ME. “Not that I hadn’t dreamed of becoming a mythical monster once- just never a grotesque animated corpse.”

Le sigh. It’s just… if you’d actually worked on the vampire mythos, there was plenty of opportunity to invest this idea in an -actual inner conflict-. There is -nothing negative about being a vampire- right now. If you work hard, you won’t even feel the need to kill people, and except for that hard work, you essentially become more beautiful than you were in life, undying, and super-powered. Downside: no nude beaches.  But only in someone’s watching. There is no real indication that Bella gives a shit about immortal soul-ery to begin with, so she doesn’t even have that excuse to be conflicted like Mr. Edward-in-need-of-anti-psychotics Cullen. The fact that Bella feels like a monster while living… well, she sort of is one. In a strange, ‘I Am Legend’ sort of way, Bella is, in fact, the monster of series, inflicting serious damage on all around her both emotionally and physically while we’re supposed to be sympathizing with her as some sort of romantic hero. Because we’re invested in her as a hero, though, we -have to- rely upon her for the solution- which is really more epilogue part in ‘Shaun of the Dead’ than ‘I Am Legend’, so….there you go.

Jess: Movie dude was hot!

Bella: Whatevs. I only remember zombies. I have a bit of a fetish for the undead.

We get out of the movie, but the McDonald’s we’re walking to is through an unlit area in front of a creepy bar named ‘One-Eyed Pete’s (like a penis)’. Ladies and Gentlemen, I suspect we are about to be assaulted by young men in plaid asking after our business again.

Bella: Hey, Jess, I’m gonna go walk towards this guy and his three friends who look suspiciously like the guys who assaulted me last time I was here, to see if they’re the guys who assaulted me last time I was here, k?

I missed these guys.

Jess: WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING I DON’T WANT TO DIE WITH YOUR DUMB ASS.

Bella: Hey, I just realized I’m not suicidal. You see, I care about people that aren’t you too much to kill myself.

Jess: GET THE FUCK BACK

Dudes: Loiter

Loitering -is- a crime, so I suppose they’re more clearly hooliganish than the walking dudes from before.

Edward’s voice: Yeah, you promised not to be stupid, stupid.

Bella: surely ’tis a wonder, to hear the voice of my beloved! Or I’m nuts!

Edward’s voice: Seriously, you promised, promise breaker.

Bella: Subconsciously, I must humoring my extreme desire to hear Edward’s voice, so I’m creating it, in my head, and having it tell me things! This, on the contrary, is not crazy. Hearing voices in your head is crazy.

Bella: steps forward

Edward’s voice: Seriously, woman, I said back off.

Dudes: Hey.

Bella: I walk towards you.

Edward’s voice: growls.

Bella: Just like Edward! Oh… these aren’t the dudes I thought they were.

Dudes: Hang out with us.

Bella: Nah, I thought you were someone else. You’re just more nerds. Bye. Seriously, I thought you were a bunch of creepy rapists. I don’t want to hang out with you if you’re not creepy rapists.

Jess: What the fuck was that- they could’ve been psychopaths, like most young men in this town!?

Bella: Yeah, that’s what I thought, but they were just some other dudes instead.

Jess: “You are so odd Bella Swan. I feel like I don’t know who you are.”

This whole chapter is devoted to getting other characters to say what Bella’s been saying about herself this whole time. I suppose it is one step closer to actual characterization, so good’on ya, I suppose.

Bella: For the first time in four months, I actually thought about stuff.

Turns out, Edward’s existence is enough to keep her going- and believing that he was out there, somewhere, happy, will encourage her to live better. What’s more, she’s attached to Forks because this is the place where her memories of him are. So, like, ‘grief’, man. I suppose you’ve got to stumble upon the steps at some point.

Bella: I can’t believe Jess shut up for an hour. I didn’t think she could go that long without talking.

(I’m fuckin’ serious: “The ride had not taken that long, but, short as it was, I wouldn’t have thought Jessica could go that long without speaking.”)

Bella: Thanks. I hope I’ve said the right words to satisfy your vapid mind.

Jess: You’re a bitch. Bye.

Wait, that wasn’t Jess… that was just me. Sorry.

Jess: Whatever.

Bella: I can’t believe she’s actually still mad at me. I gave her a perfectly insincere apology, that she should’ve been too dim to see through.

Bella:Wow, walking inside, I’ve already forgotten about what’s-her-name.

Charlie: Where were you?

Bella: Seeing a movie, dumbass. Duh.

Charlie: Seeing as I exist for your validation… that’s just fine, and it’s ok to talk to me like that.

Bella: I went upstairs and felt pain for a while. It was ok.

Well… it sounds a little more like ‘my pain validates my existence’

Yeah, ok, Trent Reznor. Cash did it better anyway.

This chapter is seriously weird, either way. Meanders about the point intensely.

At least it has a point, which is better than the ENTIRE FIRST BOOK.

Obviously the point of the first book was to lead to the possibilities of the second book, as this book will apparently fix the gaping loose ends left in the wake of the first (yes, that was a newtonian ‘obviously’.)

I’m not going to bet toooooo much money that we’ll get all the loose ends tied up.

Well, something will get tied up, and I’m hoping it’s a werewolf. I hear they’re weakened by strands of garlic, so we may be in luck, since Bella cooks.

Although I do have to say that this is a fairly realistic portrayal of how a depressed teenager who’s a little bit in love with being depressed would portray herself.

Probably true. There’s an oddness to the way the love story is trying furiously to be valid, though.

Was Romeo and Juliet this…. desperate?

No, because Romeo and Juliet didn’t actually require outside validation, it was clear they both intended to be love with each other (i.e. they pursued marriage as a devotionary step), and they had actual fuckin’ problems.

Romeo and Juliet: Actual Fuckin’ Problems. If I ever stage a production, that’ll be the poster.

Chapter Five: Cheater. This sounds decently hot-and-heavy. Neat. Off to the werewolf-hitchin’ post we go.

As we open Chapter Five, we see Our Heroine at her job with Mike. Two backpackers are going back and forth talking about some huge-ass bears just up the way. Surely that has NOTHING to do with ANYTHING. Is that you, Plot Train? Nah, it’s the backblast of Checkov’s gun.

Anyway, it’s probably not plot or anything. Then Bellakins leaves, and tells us all about her nightmares.

Her nightmarish image is nothing, silent nothing. She looks into the infinite silence of the infinite spaces, and is terrified. It is a good thing to be terrified of, Bella. I approve of this, as does M. Pascal.

Bella’s realization of grief in the last chapter has for some reason turned into this psychotic break, however, which is not really how progressing through the stages of grief is supposed to go.

Sure it is. You know the stages, right? Anger, Denial, Numbness, Crazy. That’s how it goes!

Right. I mean, Who doesn’t go nuts, I guess?

Lesbians, frequently. (ha!) (I concur!)

I don’t suppose there’s even much point in summarizing this for you, since Bella just basically goes right off her rocker. She talks a bit how she already looks like a vampire, and I can sort of see her painting up her face with glitter and muttering things as she rocks in the corner.

And sweet holy God, Bella’s DRIVING as she has her special moment.

Nah, she stopped by the side of the road.

She wakes up and realizes she’s parked in the middle of a road!

Oh… I assumed she’d pulled over. Too much assuming.

Her main line of thought when she wakes up something like “Oh, looks like I’ve parked in the middle of the road.”

She is also parked near the front yard of some weirdos with a sign that says “Sometimes, kismet happens.” I don’t know much about kismet, but it was my understanding that it is not a “sometimes” sort of deal.

I think the sign she’s referring to is the FOR SALE AS IS sign, and Sometimes etcetera is her thought process

You’re totally right. I like the idea of these people being New Age sorts though. Me too. Gives them characterization.

I’ve forgotten what that is.

In this book, it’s using a red herring to shoot yourself in the MacGuffin.

So Bella decides she wants to break some promises (I’m hearing the sultry strains of Mr. Michael Jackson again) and so she gets a free motorcycle, and decides to take it to Jacob for some fixin’. Maybe he can give HER a “push-rod” too, if you know what I mean. I dunno, I mean, he’s only just gotten his ‘master cylinder’, I’m not sure he quite knows how to use it yet.

But Bella does notice that “[he] grew again,” so there’s hope for him and his pistons yet. Maybe he’ll teach her how to really ride her Indian?http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_%28motorcycle%29

Although I do really like this clear teenage rebellion, motor-cycle ridin’, dangerous risk-takin’ turn things have taken, mainly in that it’s more sensibly in character for… ‘teenagers’. Also, the straight-up romance novel description of Jacob is some of the more easy-going prose I’ve seen in a while. Also, we’re back to describing his “big hands” which isn’t sensual at all, just something you notice about every man you consider jumpin’…on the bike of.

So then they go out to see Jacob’s car, presumably so Bella can get better acquainted with the gear-shift. It’s a 1986 VW Rabbit, which is interesting, considering VW started calling it “Golf” after 1984.

Bella: Here’s the deal. You fix both bikes and you can have one. Are you legal?

Jacob: Hell yeah!

Bella: For riding…

Jacob: Hell yeah!

Bella: Motorcycles.

Jacob: Not quite what I thought you were going to say, but sure. Yeah.

Bella: I’ll pay for parts with money from the college fund.

Wait, why not from her job? She’s apparently always there… I don’t get it. I guess it’s much more dramatic to steal from her college fund. Deus Ex Cashina again. Why does Bella even have access to her college fund?

Bella: You’re such an enabler, Jacob. Enablers are dreamy.

Damnit, I hate to admit it, but I actually kind of like this part.

I do too. Girl wants to be rebellious, finds guy to help her achieve the goal. Nothing wrong with that.

Except that there isn’t really anything to like but the dialogue being easy and unrestrained- mostly that it’s not pulling teeth like it is between Edward and Bella.

What if these events happened between Edward and Bella?

Bella: I want to be rebellious.

Edward: Don’t need to be when I’m around, Bella. I’m dangerous.

Bella: Squee!

Edward: No need for a motorcycle. I’d just punch you off it.

Bella: That’s hot.

*stare at each other for about twelve pages*

I suppose Jacob would be annoyingly underdeveloped as a character in any other book, but in this one he practically walks away with the “deep character award”. Even though, I should point out, we’re about 1/4 through this book. Once again, nothing of note has happened. In fact, it has been a POINT of this book that nothing has happened. “Did you hear me?” Stephenie seems to ask. “NOTHING HAPPENS IN MY BOOKS.”

Well, we get that Bella has reached a long, drawn out emotional epiphany, and within the space of 5 pages, she acts upon it decisively. I suspect these five pages will be most of the decisive action.

Turns out this is the climax of the book. The last one we missed due to concussion, this one we’ll miss due to it being sneaky and subtle.

Like kids hiding their car parts with each other.

New Moon Debut (Now Even Moonier)

And With Nougat!

What would go into the ‘New Moon’ candy bar…?

Nougat is right up there, for sure- light, fluffy, nobody’s really sure what it’s made of or how it gets into candy bars, but everyone’s sitting around havin’ their nougat.

Anyway.

Well, just as we have embarked upon our new quest to read New Moon with fully informed consent (like medical testing without being paid!), so, too shall many brave the tweeney screamers and basement upon basement of sparkly vampires (a group of sheep = a flock, a group of vampires = a basement No Seriously, Look It Up) to go see Twilight on the Premier night.

Oh, Come on.  Admit it.

Come on.  It’s okay.

You’re going, aren’t you?  I was thinking that maybe I’d goHA!  SUCKER I’D NEVER GO TO THAT CRAP, HAHAHAHAHA!

No, really, just kidding.

SOME of us are going, whether to amuse ourselves with the fervency of fandom or have a good laugh at how Forks, WA apparently lacks shirts entirely.  Or maybe, for the incredibly spiteful, because if you go see it you can go make fun of your Twilight-fan friends who couldn’t go (way to go, douche).  Or maybe because you love the Twilight schlock like a little kid with a peanut allergy -even though you’ve read the warning on the label says each and every one might kill you, you just can’t give up those candybars.  It’s okay- we all have our little weaknesses (some of mine: Val Kilmer’s lips in Batman Forever- don’t care what you say about the movie, best bottom-half of the cowl ever- and disliking opera but liking talking about opera;  Listening to Tristan and Isolde?  Big Ol’ waste o’ time.  The seminar on Tristan and Isolde?  Freaking fascinating).

So we’d like to invite those of you going out to the premier to come back here and share your experience.  Why?  Because we’re not about condemning stuff off-hand.  Well, maybe we are a little, but mostly it’s important to experience stuff, and then decide.  A Twilight premier ought to be a hell of an experience, too.

Even if you’re not going, feel free to leave your thoughts on the matter.  I’m definitely putting one beer down on the movie being bootlegged and leaked to the internet thirty minutes after the first showtime.  Also, those of us not going to movie can sit around and make fun of the Forty-Fuckin’-Four ‘Trailers’ and ‘Featurettes’ on imdb. Holy Rusted Metal, Batman- that’s some bullshit right there.  44

Eric adds: I was going to see it, honestly.  Coworkers are going, and I thought it would be fun and social.  But it was sold out, all the way up until the 2:30 AM showing.  Seriously, there’s a 2:30 showing.  Maybe I’m just getting old, but I don’t particularly want to stay up until 5 AM watching New Moon.

New Moon Chapters 1-2. In Which Bella Manages To Hurt Herself Opening Presents.

As a reminder, you can always follow us through facebook: By Clicking Here!

A New Moon rises… which means that you actually can’t see the moon at all.  But I assure you, contrary to visual evidence, a New Moon rises.  As Wikipedia informs us (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_moon), “The new moon is also an important event in Wicca.”  I can’t wait to see what mysteries await.

In addition to shaking up our own narrative method a bit, we’ve switched to doing blocks of chapters in an attempt to assuage the existential ennui that a-chapter-a-night inflicted upon us.  As Baudelaire says, “Although it sprouts neither great gestures nor great shouts,/ It would gladly make the earth a shambles/ and in a yawn swallow the world.”  (Au Lecteur)  Commentary by your two lovely hosts shall be in different colors.  Book-narrative will stay black.  Quotes will be green.  Eventually we’ll get some glitter in, and those stick-on rhinestones, and all the colors of the rainbow, and then we can have our Gay-Day Parade.  Who’s gonna bring the May Pole?  I’m going to bring my famous Pride Potato Salad (Untossed).  It’s always a hit.

To sum up everything that happens in the first two chapters: It’s Bella’s birthday.  She’s upset about this, because she’ll get old and not be with Eddiekins.  Then they have a birthday party at the Cullen’s joint.  Bella cuts her finger on wrapping paper, and the vamps go fucking nuts over it.  Carlisle waxes philosophical, and there is Serious Dramatic Foreshadowing, applied with a cudgel.  That’s pretty much it.

So without further ado, Chapter 1 of New Moon:

In Which We Establish that Bad Habits are Hard to Break, and Bella’s Skin is Not.

Preface: I lied, we’re starting with the preface. The preface is basically a book-blurb written by the author. Just like the one for Book One, it’ll have no function except trying to rescue the repeatedly-crashing dramatic tension by moving it slightly to the left.  If you’ll remember, this was basically the function of the last preface, although that one was also a reassurance that there would be dramatic tension at some point.

The preface is wonderfully useless.  “Hey”, it seems to say, “I think there’ll be tension in this one! Possibly dramatic. I’m thinking, conflict, denouement, you know, like a story. Just wanted to give you the heads up!”

It does seem to involve the doomsday clock, which is a wonderful thing. I love it when humanity just gives itself over to its ridiculous attachment to symbolism. Everybody knows there’s going to be some guy running down there to push the clock hands to 12 while the world’s ending, just because somebody’s got to do it. We love symbolism like we love pistachios. Like getting to the bottom of the bag is some kind of crackerjack prize.

Also, Bella’s life means little to her. Surprise surprise. It means little to us too.

Alice is predicting shit again, which means we have no reason to fear any of it coming true. Awesome. Tension, take that sweet kick to the jewels and be one your way. We don’t like your kind here.

Chapter One, for reals this time:

We start our long-awaited sequel to Twilight with a scene of Bella dreaming. Will we learn that the entirety of the last book was a dream? Is Bella actually a kind and thoughtful person? Somehow, I doubt it.

Bella: Hey, it’s my dead grandma! What are you doing in my dream, grandma?

Grandma presumably answers that it’s a dream, and she’ll do whatever she damn well pleases.

Dead Gran showing up is less solid evidence than you think when you’re dating a goddamn vampire and about to jump the hairy bones of a werewolf like an Olympic hurdler. Plus there’s a mirror about.  Could this possibly show Bella as she ages? Also calling your grandma a dried apricot, then talking about her lips, is slightly too sensual to get away with.  Unless you’re Baudelaire.

Bella: Did you and Pop find each other, wherever you are?

Grandma is not pleased at the allegations that she and her husband could have possibly wound up in multiple places. Way to send your Grandpa or Grandma to hell. Even asleep, Bella’s a bitch.

Edward: Sup, I’m in your dream. I put my arm around your shoulder.

Edward shows up like a box o’ prisms, just beaming rainbows out of every pore because it’s daylight.  Bella tries to figure out how to explain this to her ‘grandmother’. I’m sure it won’t be that big a deal. You live to be eighty-something you’re going to have a met a few pretty ‘radiant’ individuals. In dreams things just turn up so literally.

Grandma: Looks upset.

Turns out Granny is actually Old Bella, and Old Bella is upset she isn’t with Eddie. WhatEVER could this enigmatic dream mean?

“‘Happy birthday,’ he whispered.” Dream Edward is a total douche, too. Ha! Look, you’re old! Here’s to another year, withery apricot!

There was no Gran.  There was no spoon.  Gran put on her opaque shades and disappeared into a cloud of pigeons, black leather coat flapping behind her heels.

Bella: I will NOT think of that old dream lady as me. I am very mature.

In the narrative, Bella wakes up, goes on a bit about it being her 18th birthday.  She apparently dreads it.  Bella dreads turning eighteen? What? Who dreads 18? Who dreads porn and cigarettes!? I suppose you could dread being tried as an adult…

Holy Shit, Bella goes into full on barbie-doll fear-mode, checking for wrinkles and bullshit like that. Bella, I have never respected you less. The back of Edward’s hand shows you more respect than I do right now.

Your concern was that ‘Edward would never be’ 18, being now dead and trapped forever in a life he apparently hates, festering melodramatically in his own self-loathing ‘(I will get my ‘Louis stick’, you just wait and see)?  Poor Edward!

So the first thing you go do is check on your own haggish self?  I hate you, Bella.  You’re not even good at being concerned.

-later-

Bella goes to school.  Finds Alice and Edward, who waits for her by his car: “…like a marble tribute to some pagan god of beauty.”

I went ahead and gave a pass on Bella calling Edward angel-face earlier, but I couldn’t let it go unmentioned that this kind of bullshit description is still happening. Here you go, because I’m still going to provide images for this shit. Edward in a nutshell: What’s that under your cloak?

Alice: Happy birthday, here’s a camera!

Bella: God, wretch. Didn’t I TELL you I didn’t want presents or attention for my birthday?

Imagine that! The vampires whose youthful lives were taken from them by violence, accidents, amnesia, and disease are celebrating your birthday.  They act like ‘life’ and ‘youth’ are things worth celebrating in a world filled with harsh truths! WHAT WHORES, GAWD.

“[Edward's] perfect, formal, articulation. It was something that could be picked up only in an earlier century.” Bella represents a humanity devolved, and lacking complex vocal organs. Somebody warn the Clan of the Cave Bear, the neanderthals are comin’ back!

Alice: “Everyone is supposed to be nice to you today and give you your way, Bella.”

Bella: Holy shit, people might be nice to me and give me my way? That hasn’t happened since… well, it’s happened inexplicably since the day I moved here.

Alice: You’re coming over tonight for your birthday party, right?

Bella: I have to work.

What? She has a job now? I don’t buy it. Isn’t money in this book just supposed to appear from the Deus Ex Cashina?

Bella: Edward and I have every class together now. Edward seduced the old office ladies to get his way.

Gee, Bella are you sure you don’t want to get old?

Amazing how he couldn’t do that back in Book One when he wanted to get OUT of Bella’s classes.

Mike: My Golden Retriever Hair is artfully messy now.

Bella: Good luck with that looking like Edward thing, loser. Too bad you CAN’T. Because you’re ugly.

Edward’s ‘look’, like his speech patterns, are apparently something that evolved. Like the noble walrus, I presume the vampires have hit their pinnacle and started losing genes, perfectly fitted to their niche environments (thanks to the ‘perfect’ gene). Also, like the walrus, they seem to possess a ‘douchebag’ gene.  (Walruses are douchebags, just believe it).

Bella: The Cullens are super rich. This is because Alice can predict the stock market.

Way to go, Lazy Writer. Heaven forbid the Cullens have to have jobs.

For fuck’s sake, Alice can’t even reliably predict -lunch-. This is pretty much saying that the Cullens got rich off of guessing, like every other schmuck, which presumably 300 years of practice would make one good at. Why does it have the be the ridiculous Super Friends solution every goddamn time? Why can’t it be that this shit makes sense?

-Later, at lunch-

Lunch Table: I have Bella’s friends at me!

Bella: Except for Lauren.  She’s not my friend, she’s a bitch.

Lunch Table: I have Bella’s friends and TWO bitches at me.

Bella: Edward’s here too.

Lunch Table: I have Bella’s friends and THREE bitches here.

Then there’s some boring crap about Bella’s friends.

Why yes, this single paragraph summation of the lunch table deals with the unhappy task updating us on -all- of the minor characters. Don’t worry, we’re try not to interrupt your whining bitch-fest with any more extraneous details.

-later-

Bella: Hey Edward, let’s go watch Romeo and Juliet for that class assignment. Romeo and Juliet is what we’re learning about in class.  Let’s talk about Romeo and Juliet more! Also, there was a quote in the front matter “These violent delights have violent ends/ And in their triumph die, like fire and powder,/ Which, as they kiss, consume.” (II.vi)

I have my own Romeo and Juliet quote, which I repeated to myself as I saw the front matter quote: “O woe! O woeful, woeful, woeful day!” (IV.v).

Surely R&J has nothing to do with our current situation. Couldn’t have ANYTHING to do with families of werewolves and vampires? Multiple families of vampires? Bella and Edward as star-crossed lovers? Which inappropriate way will Stephenie go with this?

We’re having serious problems with the whole ‘denied love’ thing to start out with, as nobody’s really denying their love. Except maybe the werewolves, and at this point, what the fuck are they gonna do about it? Send more teenage boys to prom to talk about it?

Yeah, pretty much everybody except Old Man Werewolf seems to be A-OK with this relationship.

Edward: During the movie, I repeat all of Romeo’s lines so that we are VERY SURE there is no relation between these two works.

Edward: Also, I envy Romeo. It’s easy for him to die. I can’t commit suicide.

Sure you can, Eddie. You’ve got no dedication at all. A guillotine, gasoline, and a BBQ igniter on a timer should just about cover it… Some people just aren’t creative.

The aforementioned werewolves would handle it, too, I suppose. Go down fighting? Not to mention it was pretty freaking simple for the vampires to take care of whosie-whatsit-evil-dude in the previous book. Surely Eddie-poo can go get in a catfight with another vampire?

Or watch ‘Saw’ I suppose…

Edward: Apropos of nothing, I’m going to tell you MY retarded suicide plan. It involved pissing off the Volturi, a powerful Italian family of vampires so they’d kill me.

An Italian family of vampires? Probably has NOTHING to do WHATSOEVER with Romeo and Juliet.

Bella: Promise me you won’t do that.

Edward: I won’t promise. It’s a moot point since I’ll never put you in danger.

Hello, Plot Point One (and probably only, unless the mysterious title “New Moon” comes into play).

“New Moon” still pisses me right the fuck off. I can’t wait to see how the title fails to apply.

Charlie: Arrives.

Edward: Mind if Bella comes over to my place tonight?

Charlie: Fuck no, the Sox and Mariners are playing tonight.

Dad Of The Year, right here.

Edward must have ‘finessed’ Charlie too, just like the office ladies…. Or Charlie just knows better than to be a dramatically relevant character. By the by, we got no real reconciliation after Bella dropped the a-bomb of divorcee disses on dear daddy last book. Must have been a good game that night.

Edward officially tells Bella to enjoy herself twice.

Specifically: “The last real birthday any of us had was Emmet in 1935. Cut us a little slack…” When Edward is telling you you’re a bitch, you’re a bitch. This information “startled” Bella. She is so not used to thinking of others, it actually catches her unawares.

They go inside, and there’re pink and red decorations, glass plates, a stack of presents, a cake, etc.

Bella: GOD, NERDS. I told you NO.

I have no idea why all the decorations are pink, or red. Could it perhaps be some allusion? As we know Bella’s favorite color (and gemstone) is “Edward’s eyes”, perhaps this is where he announces he’s going carnivorous? Or perhaps they were simply aware that Bella, like a bull, is distracted by red things, and thus they could make their escape by knocking over flower pots and throwing crepe paper, when she raged incoherent at the sight of joy.

Wrapping Paper: I cut you, Bella!

Oh, wrapping paper, you little vato. I heart you.

Vampires: Go FUCKING NUTS trying to eat her.

Wasn’t she all bloody and shit when she was in Phoenix? For that matter, don’t we have problems for the Cullens every, oh, month or so?

Theory: Bella is constantly on the rag, so they’re immune to that sort of thing. ‘nother Theory: They were okay with that because they cleaned up the crime scene, with their tongues.

Chapter 2:  In which Carlisle is back, and is the cause of much rejoicing.

“Carlisle was not the only one who stayed calm.” So who else stayed calm? Are you going to tell us? Who was it? Hello….?  I think this is a typo… anyone want to check for me?

“Edward’s face was like stone.” Was it now? You don’t say? Was it cold too? Maybe you should stick in the oven to heat it up a bit. Then we can make pizzas on it, to further the ‘Italian’ part of the plot, hm? Goodness knows I feel like sticking my head in a oven.

Carlisle: I fix you up, Bella.

Bella: Poor Edward, the thirst was so much worse for him.

Yeah, ok.  A chapter ago you said “the scent of human blood was much harder for him to resist than the others.” Seems to fit with what you just said.  Only problem is that you were talking about Ol’ Chips and Dip Jasper, not Edward. Lazy Writer, you are so lazy.

I’m beginning to wonder if Bella is purposefully written this stupid, though. Maybe the author really is struggling with an idiotic, brutish heroine. Maybe it’s like ‘Encino Man’. Edward is just the Pauly Shore of the series. ( The Weasel )

We spend like a million pages hearing about Bella’s wound and how the vampires all leave so they don’t eat her. It’s boring.

Carlisle: “Like everything in life, I just had to decide what to do with what I was given.”

This man is wise.  I concur, and feel the need to do so aloud.

Now it’s time for Religion Hour with Carlisle.

Bella: “My own life was fairly devoid of belief.”

I am SHOCKED, SHOCKED I say.

“Renee tried out a church now and then, but, much like her brief affairs with tennis, pottery, yoga, and French classes, she moved on by the time I was aware of her newest fad.” And affairs with men, don’t forget that.

Edward: Thinks that vampires lose their souls.

I’d have to think about this, but I think the doctrine of most established churches would probably disagree with them, considering that vampires don’t choose to be made. Except for Bella, the special unicorn. Her soul might well be damned, I dunno.

Super-special-unicorn-damned.

Carlisle spends some time philosophizing. It’s… well, it’s pretty well done. Good job, Ms. Meyer.

Yes, it is actually pretty well done, but it also taunts us with how good a character Carlisle could be, if he weren’t trapped in this horror-world of teenage-stalker romance. CARLISLE COULD BE SO GREAT IF ONLY THE BOOK WEREN’T OBSESSED WITH YOUTH, THE INTEMPERATE HOSEBEAST.

As he was treating the sick during the flu epidemic: “How I hated to go back to my house, to hide in the dark and pretend to sleep while so many were dying.” Which is when Carlisle took up the cape, and became a masked vigilante.

Carlisle rocks the vampiric Casbah for a while, telling us the tale of Edward’s turning, and venting some cool why-things-were-done philosophy on us, until Bella is fixed.  Esme cleans up the bio-hazard as Bella leaves with Edward: “She was mopping the floor where I’d fallen — with straight bleach from the smell of it.” Ah. Solution- the Cullens house is so white because: bleach.  Also: racism, probably.

-later, as they drive home-

Edward: I HATE BEING A VAMPIRE. If you were with Mike, everything would be better.

Bella: “I’d rather die than be with Mike…”

Oh snap.

Bella: “I’d rather die than be with anyone but you.”

Montague and Capulet plot train, now leaving the station…

Does that make Mike Newton Paris? So who’s Tybalt? Jacob (prince of cats… too faux-clever)? Better question: Who’s Mercutio? (Can I be Mercutio!? I wanna be Mercutio!)

At this point, I think Edward and Bella are officially denying THEIR OWN love.  Dearies, I don’t think Romeo and Juliet worked like this.

-Up in Bella’s bedroom-

Bella: “I snuggled into his stone chest”. Ah, I remember the last time *I* snuggled into a rock. Also, stop it.

Falling asleep on rocks: the biggest downside to drunken camping. Also why you should camp on Ponied Island, where the ponies keep the sand nice and soft, and keep strict control over the wizard population.

-she opens remaining presents-

Esme and Carlisle got our lovers plane tickets.  Apparently Edward and Bella are going to Jacksonville. Who doesn’t like Jacksonville? I assume this is where Bella’s Mom The Tramp has gotten off to.

Edward: “I didn’t realize that you were capable of being reasonable.” Sometimes… sometimes we don’t even have to write jokes.

I should point out here that Edward is now unwrapping Bella’s presents for her. I’m really hoping her went the distance and bought her a helmet for her birthday.

Edward: Got Bella a CD of his own compositions, in case you were wondering.

…Starting with the one written for her. Actually not a bad gift, and indeed, he spent no money on it. It may be the first pretty genuinely romantic gesture Edward has ever done.

I’m sort of surprised he didn’t manage to deliver it in a creepifying way somehow.

Edward and Bella: Make out for a while.  Finally, some normal teenage behavior.

Bella: “His body was cold through the thin quilt.” Who doesn’t like cold vampire dick?

You know who doesn’t like cold vampire dick? Your cats. Your cats don’t like it. Therefore, Tybalt also disapproves of this message.

Edward: Stop it right there, harlot!

Bella: “Which is tempting you more, my blood or my body?“ I challenged.

Damn, girl!

Seriously, that’s some hot stuff. Except for occasions involving knock-out breath, Bella’s usually at her best when demanding lovin’.

Bella: Bella’s worried, because she didn’t “get relief” tonight. “Almost as if something worse was coming tomorrow. It was a silly premonition–what could be worse than today?’ Just the shock catching up with me, no doubt.” No doubt. No doubt.

Et, fini, because the next chapter is 21 pages long and appears to cover several months worth of activity.

Twilight Chapter (epilogue): And The Book Ends, Unsatisfactorily.

(Hello to those of you who found us looking for “etruscan porn”!)

Part One: Edward is a Sexy Mime. Who talks too much.

Epilogue

Bella: I know I’ve got styled hair, a nice dress, flowers, etc… but I’m PISSED RIGHT OFF. What the hell is going on here?

Edward: You’re quite the dumbass.

Bella: Edward was dressed like a mime, what with the black clothes and white face. I find mimes hot. Also, I was nervous that my “stiletto heel [was] held on only by satin ribbons.” My other shoes involve steel belts and bolts. And velcro.

Bella: “I’m not coming over anymore if Alice is going to treat me like Guinea Pig Barbie when I do,” I griped. First of all, Bellakins, those were Hamsters that gave your man his Lordship in their country. Get it right. Second, you griped? One of the first non-obsolete definitions: “To grieve, afflict, distress.” Well, I suppose you DID gripe. You HAVE BEEN griping me since the damn book started. You WILL gripe. I can conjugate all day!

Charlie calls, and says something to Edward. Edward says: Tyler, you can’t talk to Bella ever again. No one can, except for me. And no one will ever see her at night again.

Bella: “Rage-induced tears”!

Is Bella finally mad at Edward for his possessive behavior? Am I finally going to have to give her some credit?

Bella: “You’re taking me to the prom!”

O_o

…

Bella gains no credit. Bella owes me credit.

Edward: Shut up, Bella. Seriously, what the hell did you THINK we were going to do tonight?

(Bella takes a moment to remind us that she never ever wears makeup. That’s for conformists, I guess. Not for special little unicorns.)

We arrive at the school, and Bella doesn’t get out of the car, because She Is A Grownup Who Acts Like One.

Edward: “When someone wants to kill you, you’re brave as a lion – and then when someone mentions dancing…”

Stephenie: I don’t know the difference between “brave” and “stupid”! Nowhere does “brave” connote “moronic decisions”. I checked.

Edward: Finally “says” something in this chapter, though he says it Adverbially, so it doesn’t really count. We’ve also seen people (just in the past couple pages!) who have “verified” “griped” “frowned” “laughed” “demanded” (thrice!) “suggested” “yelled” “demanded” “muttered” “insisted” “admitted” “grinned and then chuckled” and “snickered”. And don’t forget Bella “asked grumpily” earlier in the chapter. Grumpily.

Bella: This dance is in the GYM?! In Phoenix, we have dances in hotel ballrooms! Holy crap, what RUBES. There were “actual balloon arches”? How gauche.

Good to know Bella’s graceful and cheery disposition wasn’t affected by her injury.

The vampires are out in the middle of the floor dancing “in a style totally unsuitable to the present[...] music.” That’s called good dancin’, folks. When you ignore the music entirely. I mean, that’ll straight up win you championships, right?

Jacob: arrives.

Edward: Is mad.

Bella: I feel sorry for this schlub who feels awkward at a dance. Truly, I pity such a wretch. He probably can’t even DANCE.

Jacob and Bella: Do the Awkward High School Rock, which I imagine is at least in time to the music, unlike that waltz that the vamps were doing.

Jacob: Pulls out a smooth line.

Bella: Whatevs.

A Sophomore In A Pink Dress: Eyes Edward “with timid speculation”.

I like this Pink Dressed Sophomore. “Timid speculation” makes me think of a crab, just before it steals your hot dog. Maybe this girl is a coconut crab in a dress, come to steal Edward from the book.

Jacob: My old man wants you to break up with Edward.

Bella: He thinks Edward had something to do with my improbable injuries.

Billy: Is a smart old man.

Billy, through Jacob: We’ll be watching.

Jacob: Want another dance?

Edward: Fuck off, Jacob.

Bella: “I could name every face that spiraled past me.” Unfortunately, none of these people have been in the story. Maybe Bella wants to impress us that she’s learned some names over the past school year?

Edward: It’s twilight. Hurdy-hurdy-hur.

Bella: I thought you were dressing me up so you could change me into a vampire.

Me: That’s dumb.

Edward: That’s dumb.

Stephenie Meyer: Is dumb.

Bella: Change me into a vampire.

Edward: No.

Bella: “I love you more than everything else in the world combined. Isn’t that enough?”

Edward: “”Yes, it is enough,” he answered, smiling. “Enough for forever.”

“And he leaned down to press his cold lips once more to my throat.”

And that’s how this book ends. And there’s never really any character development or plot. And there’re no lessons learned. And no one says anything. And the sentences keep on starting with And.

I’m disgusted.

But I’m also finished with Twilight, and thus have earned the right to say “This book stinks.”

Part Two: Guinea Pigs in Little Dresses

Epilogue: An Occasion. About time there was one. As Cervantes said, “I drink when I have occasion, and sometimes when I have no occasion.”

Page 227

“And he knew that.” Did he have to know it ‘and’-ly? Couldn’t he just Know That? Conjunction Junction, what’s your function? For reals this time, though, because I don’t know why you’ve been at the head of every sentence for 227 pages.

“Would I ever get used to his perfection?” No. Just a wild guess: No. We could take a survey, and survey would say: No. We could ask Alice, and Alice would say ‘partly cloudy’ and by that she’d mean ‘No’ and at least then she’d be right.

“…going to treat me like Guinea Pig Barbie…” Which is a brilliant idea. I want to see a Guinea Pig in little pink high heels. I want a little veil tiara. I want a tiny picnic basket filled with Guinea Pig Nuggets in the front seat of a Guinea Pig Barbie dream car convertible. I want to see how long it would take PETA to foam at the mouth and start blowing up Toys-R-Us across the nation.

“These days I had rules that hadn’t existed before: curfews… visiting hours.” Surely no parent would have thought of these before you ran off with your crazy vampire boyfriend. Bella, you set the standard for dumb, and it is high. ‘High’ for dumb people, though. So that’s really pretty low, still. But it’s hard for other dumb people, so it’s -really- high. It’s like you had Edward put it on top of the fridge, and then pile-drive the fridge into Hell. (Have a few beers, read it again, swear to God, it’s funny then).

Page 228

“I could feel the rage-induced tears starting to fill my eyes.” That’s typically Bad. Girl in pointy pointy high heels, crying all over her French chiffon dress? Most men with half a brain would run. Stiletto heels? Most men with a whole brain would be apologizing as they ran. As she is crying and wearing both a fancy dress and mascara, and you’re in Boondocks, Nowhere, State o’ Wash-ing-ton-sofflannel, most anything thing with a penis would immediately whisk it to safety, trying desperately to say ‘I love you’ in a convincing manner. But this Edward. He has nothing to fear…for. It’s also Bella, who is useless, even when using herself.

“I was mortified. First because I’d missed the obvious.” Like with that sadistic killer psycho vampire, eh? Just like then, eh? Bella, has it occurred to you that miss things, and that these things you miss, they are obvious like Elton John’s sexuality?

“‘It’s a death trap!’ … ‘Remind me to thank Alice for that tonight.’” … no I didn’t cut out anything important in this quote. All goddamn book it’s been like this. At this point, I assume the Shyamalan twist will occur and Edward really will kill Bella. (That should be a dance, where you do a normal twist the whole time, and then at the last five bars, abruptly ‘mashed potato’ and walk away with someone else’s dance partner).

Page 229

“‘When someone wants to kill you, you’re brave as a lion…’” Brave as… a … dying, hopeless, nihilistic lion. “We believe in nothing, Lebowski.” Not even Vildebeasts. (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0118715/quotes PS, sometimes imdb basically has the script of a movie uploaded, only out of order).

“Emmett and Jasper were intimidating and flawless in classic tuxedos.” For reference:

Page 230

“…I couldn’t help but feel bad for Jacob. He was clearly uncomfortable —excruciatingly so.” ‘Imagine the sorts of people that are uncomfortable at these things! Oh, how pathetic! Those poor folks who burst into tears on hearing they’re going to prom, or throw a hissy fit and refuse to get out of the car! I weep for the uncultured.’

We do some agin’ up, and now Jacob’s 6′2″. He is at that time when he’d be awkwardly growing, so it’s not too strange that he shows up suddenly as tall as Edward and he’s no longer ‘that child’, but still. He got Jolly Green Gianted while we were away.

Page 231

“‘See anything you like?’ ‘Yeah,’ he sighed. ‘But she’s taken.’” It could be the Rachmaninoff in the background, but I thought that was kind of slick, for a highschool boy. Maybe schlocky, but at least his opening his line wasn’t about frightening her, killing her, or always cutting off the crusts, so good on ‘ya. (It does disturb me that I may like this character solely based on the fact that he is not Edward, but then again ‘not Edward’ excludes a lot really bad ground from the race track).

“…if I told you something, he would get me that master cylinder I need.” I will here admit that my first thought was ‘I thought that ‘master cylinder’ was something from He-Man?’ Then I remembered the cars. I felt sheepish, but then I looked up ‘master cylinder’ and came up with this :http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:2008-04-21_1990_Geo_Storm_GSi_master_cylinder.jpg. Isn’t that something from Girl Genius? (http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/)

“‘He thinks Edward had something to do with my getting hurt.’” Which is right. Exactly right. Everyone who thinks this, is right. They’re even right if they believe your lame cover story. They’re right if they believe your lame cover story is lame cover story for spousal abuse. These people, who think this, are right, -even if they’re wrong-. Naturally, Bella gets mad at the very implication of Eddy-poo.

Page 232

“‘Feeling better?’ ‘Not really,’ [Edward] answered tersely.” Edward is -such- a bitch.

Page 233

“‘Twilight, again’” Oh-ho! There’s a title mention again! Time to get excited, because, hey, there could be Relevance here!

“‘So I was hoping that you might’ve changed your mind… that you were going to change -me-, after all.’” …Okay, I thought maybe it could Whatever and Who’s-Her-Face’s wedding, but the day you get your blood sucked and embark upon an excruciatingly painful three days of torturous transformation? That’s… that’s when you break out the tux and french lace? I’m… I’m glad I know, now, I guess.

“‘You thought that would be a black-tie occasion, did you?’” Even Edward thinks that the above thought is dumb, and not in a ‘I said a cold beer, can’t you feel cold through the gauze, damnit?’ way. It’s just… a stupid thought.

Page 235

“‘Enough for forever.’” I… I don’t understand. This is him refusing to change Bella. Apparently, he’d be perfectly okay living with the memory of having taken Bella to prom. I suppose he did die at 17. You’re not really possessed of the greatest perspective at 17. High hopes, there, Youthful McSpanishflu, you don’t think maybe you missed out on some life lessons, do you? Except that’s what he keep telling Bella she’ll have, important life lessons. Except Bella, she don’t do learnin’, as that’s for nerds. Sooo… yes. Hopeless, cyclical, do-nothing, abusive love.

“And he leaned down to press his cold lips once more to my throat.” THAT IS THE LAST SENTENCE IN THE BOOK, ‘AND’ ‘AND’ ‘AND’. The only thing that would make it worse is if it were his ’stone’ lips, which is probably what she had down, it just got messed up in the printing. As a last sentence, this is weak sauce. I suppose since the whole point of the book is that nothing goes anywhere, no one learns or changes, and everything is interrelated yet uniformly irrelevant, it’s fitting we end on an inconclusive, pseudo-romantic note tinged by incomprehensible dialogue. Yes, I suppose it is appropriate to end a shitty book on the brown note, as it were. Well, at least with all the ’stone’ inside, I don’t have to waste tying on a perfectly good rock before I fling Twilight off a bridge. So, that’ll be the end.

And I still hate it.

Twilight Chapter 24: Not-Quite-The-End

Chapter 24: Not-Quite-The-End.

Part One: All Hail Lord Edward Of East Hamstonia.

Bella: I’m in a hospital. And I have some lame tubes in my nose. Eww, people will think I’m a NERD. I’ll go ahead and rip those out.

Edward: Don’t do it! Our relationship is built around stopping you from doing dumb things. Except I’m bad at it, so we both do those things.

Bella: OMG, I was so dumb. Good thing it all worked out, right?!

Edward: Don’t worry, he tricked all of us.

Edward, a hamster with a tiny sombrero could have convinced you he was the long-lost Pancho Villa and you would have given him all your money in exchange for a deed of land in East Hamstonia.

Bella: “The spinning in my head accelerated.”
Technically, spinning things are always accelerating. Just so you know. What’s happening here is “jerk,” the change of acceleration. “Jerk,” incidentally, describes much of this book.

Edward: I told your mom that I had to tell you twice. Or maybe four times. Because “you fell down two flights of stairs and through a window.” Oh, abuse jokes. Will you ever stop being funny? No, you won’t.

Bella: How did you stop from drinking all my blood? Because you said it was real hard (heh), but it looked easy to me.

Edward: “It was impossible. But I did.”

Stephenie Meyer: Impossible is one of the many words I don’t know.

Edward: You shouldn’t have gone to the tracker.

Bella: If I had told you, you wouldn’t have let me. Then I wouldn’t have had the crap beat out of me, and where’s the fun in that? And you took care of the bad vampire, right?

Edward: Nah, Jasper and Emmett did that.  I was busy and stuff.  You know how it goes.

Bella: Did Alice watch the part of the tape where he told where she came from? “She was always in the dark, that’s why she didn’t remember.”

Did I go to sleep last night? I don’t remember, because the lights were off. Curse those lights and their memory magic!

Bella: I’m afraid of needles! Isn’t that super charming and unique? Also, rolling my eyes doesn’t hurt! At least the Teen Staple Emotional Response remains intact!

Oh you mobile eyes. You’ll never desert me.

Edward: We also told our mom that I came around to tell you to come back to Forks. And then you fell down the damn stairs.

Oh, I’m SURE her mom’s going to buy that one.

Then Edward kisses her, and Bella’s heart literally stops. Alas, it restarts.

And now we see Bella’s Mom, absent lo these many chapters!

Mom: GOD EDWARD NEVER LEAVES. Oh hi Bella. You really upset me with all that gettin’ injured. Also, Dr. Cullen is a dreamboat. And Phil got signed to play baseball (what is it with these people and baseball?) so you can move to Florida with us!

Bella: No.

Mom: But I’ll spend half the away games with you! Obviously I can’t spend more, because then I’d be a bad girlfriend.

You’re the best mom ever.

Bella: But I have friends! You know, those friends I like so much. The ones I’m always talking about.

Mom: How much of it is Normal McTotallyNotAVampireson here?

Bella: “”I’m pretty crazy about him.” There — that sounded like something a teenager with her first boyfriend might say.” My head hurts. Did Bella just say something true, and then try to pretend IN HER OWN head that she was better than saying that, because that sounds like the sort of thing -someone like her- would say?  The level of dissonance here is amazing.

Mom: You’re so young.

Bella: “This was the first time since I was eight that she’d come close to trying to sound like a parental authority. I recognized the reasonable-but-firm tone of voice from talks I’d had with her about men.”

You recognized the tone? From those times she hadn’t sounded like an authority? This tone now? And she sounds like an authority now?

It never fails to amaze me how we get sentences that contradict the VERY PREVIOUS SENTENCE in this book.

Mom: I’ve been sleeping here! I’m a good mother!

Bella: ?

Mom: I don’t actually care about you… it was more that somebody burned down that dance studio and now I’m afraid of sleeping at home.

I… I see where Bella gets it.

-later-

Edward: I’m the reason you’re here in the hospital. I know you didn’t do a single thing to help yourself… but… my bad. And also, that evil vampire? Totally not HIS fault you’re here.

Bella: Why didn’t you turn me into a vampy? Then I could be all pretty and stony and marbly and sparkly!

Edward: …

Bella: Because people in relationships need to be equal.

I admit, this is what Aristotle said as well. Not a bad argument, Bella.

Edward: You are a dumbass.

I admit, this is ALSO a valid point.

They banter back and forth for a boring while. Bella is whiny and says a lot of dumb stuff, Edward basically is of the “Hello, McFly… you’d be UNDEAD” line of reasoning. I can’t be bothered.

Bella: FINE I’ll get Alice to do it.

Edward: RAH, I’M MAD!

Bella: He looked mad. “I couldn’t imagine someone brave enough to cross him.” My imagination was limited to exclude evil vampires I met in the past several days.

Edward: Has a curious look on his face.

Bella: Alice saw me as a vampy, right?

Edward: Yeah, but “she also saw you dead.” And probably in space, and riding dinosaurs, and at a picnic…

Bella: “You’ll never catch ME betting against Alice.”

Why the fuck not? Girl’s been straight wrong about almost everything of a non-meteorological nature. Gimme the odds, I’ll take the bet.

Bella, however, is a very “special” unicorn, and the second to last line of this last chapter is “I’m betting on Alice.”

And we’re done with the book. Nothing’s resolved, very little’s happened. I’m SURE it’ll all be wound up in the epilogue. Aren’t you?

Next time we’ll do the epilogue, and maybe some brief thoughts on the whole book.

Part Two: Blagues sur les chevaux.

Chapter 24: An Impasse. It’s good to remember that an epilogue is an epilogue because it’s an addendum to the story, which should theoretically be complete before you get to the epilogue. Why is this important, you ask? Chapter 24 is the last chapter, so the book ends at ‘An Impasse’. Dramatically speaking, there was probably a better point at which an ‘impasse’ could happen.

Page 216

“My eyes opened to a bright, white light. I was in an unfamiliar room, a white room.” Oh, so that’s how it’s going to be? No lessons learned? No acceptance and tolerance gained through struggle and sacrifice? We’re just gonna put you in the -white- hospital. No, I get it, I understand. Because a -black- hospital wouldn’t take care of her as well.

“…his exquisite face was just inches from mine, his chin resting on the edge of my pillow.” He’d just crawled up there for the warmth. Hospitals chairs are uncomfortable, and Bella could share her bed. After all, Edward can just scrunch her up into her Bella Ball and she’ll be good to go.

“‘He tricked us all.’” -Really- easily. Like, all of you. That was, what, seven or eight-on-two, and he whipped you like the pony express. And your team could read minds and tell the future, and sense emotions, and think of conversational ice-breakers super well. I’m not sure ‘he tricked us all’ really covers the severity of the situation.

“‘Why did you tell her I’m here?’” For onesies, super ambiguous phrasing here. Like, vampirically ambiguous. That’s how super it is. And then…

“‘You fell down two flights of stairs and through a window.’” ‘Cause that’s how Edward rolls. None of this ‘ran into a door’ bullshit. Naw, you done got beat, sweetie. I’m sure glad Edward came up with this fantabulous excuse.

“‘It was impossible… to stop,’ he whispered.” Impossible? “‘Impossible. But I did.’” I do not think that word means what you think it means.

“‘I -must- love you.’” Or that one.

Page 217

“‘After I pulled him off you, Emmett and Jasper took care of him.’ There was a fierce note of regret in his voice.” HAHAHAHA, oh, damn! You know, Edward… well, Edward is just really busy, so he can’t help you two take care of that evil vampire, you know… just… dang! You know, he was so looking forward to that, and here he is, hands full of blood, doctor on hand… damn, you know, maybe next time. He’ll get you next time. Totally, got your back then. Also he left his wallet in his other pants, so could you get the cab? (at least the cabbies in Phoenix hate long trips…)

“‘Oh a sadistic vampire intent on torturing her to death, sure, no problem, she runs off to meet him. An -IV- on the other hand…’” I do not have to write jokes. Some could say I never do.

Page 218

I will let you hear, wholesale, the weakest cover story ever: Edward says, “‘I came to Phoenix to talk some sense to you, to convince you to come back to Forks. … You agreed to see me and you drove out to a hotel where I was staying with Carlisle and Alice —of course I was there with parental supervision… but you tripped on the stairs on the way to my room and… well, you know the rest.’” Indeed I do. And so the detectives at SVU, asshole.

“‘There are flaws in that story. Like no broken windows.’” Yep. That’s the flaw. Windows, but oh-ho, Alice has fabricated this evidence, and it is, reportedly, very convincing. It’s good there are no other terrifically wild leaps of imagination involved, or any suspect involvement from near strangers.

They make out to mess around with the heart monitor. If only it weren’t so contrived, it’d probably be a neat thing to do. Unfortunately, all it makes me do is think that Bella’s heart is some sort of horrible toy. Also it stops. She doesn’t die, though. It just stops, for a moment. Ah, the chances we’ve missed.

“…my voice full of love and relief.” …and sundry musical tones, and a spare lunch that I packed, and some plot points, but I think they all expired in there.

“‘He never leaves does he?’” and “‘Bella, I was so upset.’” Are the first two phrases from Bella’s mother’s mouth. No, ‘I’m so glad you’re alright’ or ‘I missed you’. No ‘It’s good that your awake, because I need you to sign power of attorney’. Not even a ‘What, did he have to tell you twice?’

Page 219

“‘You’re lucky Dr. Cullen was there. He’s such a nice man… very young, though. And he looks more like a model than a doctor.’” This is where we find out that Bella’s Mom is actually super in love with Dr. Cullen, and she enters into an eternal and polyamorous relationship with Dr. Cullen and Esme, and Esme becomes Bella’s real mom, and they all go live Dr. Cullen’s secret castle, where nobody will look at the incestuous implications of their unnecessarily complicated familial structure funny.

“‘…and I have a couple of girlfriends…’” Oh, Bella, do you mean your girlfriends Annoying Twat, and Lacks Personality and Opinions? I so love those girls, they’re so sweet. Also, her mother looks at Edward when she says this, because of the words ‘friends’ says the narrative, but I know very well that it’s because Bella’s mom understands their relationship. Goodness knows why it’s always straight women and gay men, but they do make the best of friends.

Page 220

“‘I think that boy is in love with you,’ she accused.” Was it the matching tattoos? Man, that always gives it away.

“‘I’m pretty crazy about him.’ There— that sounded like something a teenager with her first boyfriend might say.” These editorial notes should really be taken out before publication. I mean, it’s good to know that the author took special note of the difficult parts, but it’s a little unprofessional for it to go to print like this.

“‘…I’ve been sleeping here you know,’ she announced, proud of herself.” Bella’s mother is a truly sad individual. Then again, Bella’s mother seems to be made up of spectacularly bad decisions issuing from a mysteriously vacant spot where a person should be. If the book had been about Bella’s mom, there wouldn’t be any of this ‘does it sound like a teenager’ crap.

Wait, wait, wait…. “‘There’s been some crime in the neighborhood…’” Bella’s Mom. Stays at the Hospital. Because she’s afraid of her house. Thanks to a crime in the neighborhood (the dance studio, in case you are unable to add that one up from context). Bella’s mother now qualifies for anti-psychotics. And is a pretty terrible mother. Then again, if my daughter were as shitty as Bella, I’d probably disassociate, too. It does make Bella’s shittiness potentially genetic, though… so that’s good? I suppose from them we could isolate the ‘asshole’ gene. Maybe one day find a cure. I’d march for the asshole gene. Just no goddamn ribbons, I’m sick of that shit. (Only if it’s a black ribbon. I want it to be pitch black. And have a ‘fro stuck on, because, that’s right, Twilight, Damn the Man! Find the cure yourself!)

Page 221

“‘Try to be more careful when you walk, honey, I don’t want to lose you.” When you have to warn someone about walking… that’s about the same time you should start heading towards the ‘acceptance’ stage of grief.

“…’Someplace I couldn’t hurt you anymore.’” We were going to have dinner early, but when Edward got back from the boucheries chevalines, he just absolutely insisted on going out in the backyard and tenderizing it some more. I have no idea why.

“…as my breathing became hyperventilation…” …Then Bella came home with some carrots and some delicious looking jerky, but for some reason, she took out a hammer and started hitting it, over and over again, mumbling something about it not being dead yet. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charqui)

“Edward still as stone…” Now that’s a horse of a different color! (oh-ho! ha-ha! What a zinger!)

Page 222

“‘Don’t leave me,’ I begged in a broken voice.” Ha! Broken like your legs! (Is that not funny? I laughed)

“‘Do you want me to go away?’” The only thing more fun than conversation between Bella and Edward? Irrational and overdue arguments between Bella and Edward. If only it, like an overdue library book, could be settled by a few quarters and shoving it down a dark hole.

Page 223

“His mouth looked as if it were chiseled from stone.” This: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Mangalarga_Marchador.jpg, only dead.

“Evidently he wasn’t angry with -me-. I hoped I’d get a chance to warn Alice before he caught up with her.” Bang! Zoom! To the Moon, Alice! To the Moon! (I’ve been waiting for that forever)

“‘You’re [Edward is] the only thing it would hurt me to lose.’” Eeeeeeexcept for that whole side-lot…where, uhm, James had your Mom? And you were gonna go die? Remember? Like… six pages ago or something? No? Well, anyway, did you hear that, Edward? You’re just a ‘thing’ to her! She only wants you for your alabaster obelisk! Your marble edifice is only thing in her sight! That’s right, I’ve said it, she’s a trophy hunter. Or possibly a British Egyptologist. You’re just an artifact in her V&A, and all she wants is to spend all day polishing your knobs! (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victoria_and_Albert_Museum)

Page 224

“‘And I’m going to get -old-.’” Which is, apparently, a fate worse than death. Damn you progress of time! Damn you biological processes! I want to stay young and stupid, incredibly, unbelievably stupid, for all time! I will never learn! You can’t MAKE me!

“I couldn’t imagine someone brave enough to cross him.” Except for James? No? Okay, I’m pretty much down with forgetting the last few chapters happened, actually. No vampire fight, no kidnapping. Bella just fell down a shit-ton of stairs. But you know how she is.

“‘You’ll never catch -me- betting against Alice.’” If Alice has any brains whatsoever, she won’t be betting on anything. It’s not really ’seeing the future’ as much as ‘let’s take a wild stab’.

Page 225

Edward orders Bella a morphine injection. How sweet.

Page 226

“‘I love you’ … ‘Me, too.’ ‘I know’” I… I hate you. Oodles.

I shall summarize in pictures:

Twilight Chapter 23: Little Mermaids and Ninja Turtles

This post title is short as befits a 2.5 page chapter.

part one: where “den lille havfrue” thwarts the nazis, or something like that.

“As I drifted, I dreamed.” I drifted as I dreamed? I wondered as I wandered…

I think this story would actually be improved if we found out That It Was All A Dream, dreamed by Bella sleeping on her pool float.

Someone: Snarly snarly snarl!

Give you three guesses who just showed up to the party.

“Through the heavy water, I heard the sound of” Joachim Holmboe Rønneberg and Knut Haukelid! The team had come to blow up the plant!

Alas, it was not to be. The German bomb would come to fruition, because Knut et alii would not appear. Instead, Bella heard some crappy angel whining. “Calling [her] to the only heaven [she] wanted.” One where there’s a lot of… alabaster obelisks… running around, I reckon.

If this were written by Hans Christian Andersen (and were thus a GOOD story), we’d hear that unfortunately vampires don’t have souls or something, and thus Bella must choose whether or not to go to heaven or not. Ol’ H.C. did that a lot. Witness the original Little Mermaid (http://www.andersen.sdu.dk/vaerk/hersholt/TheLittleMermaid_e.html). You see, mermaids don’t have souls. And the prince marries someone else, which means she loses her voice AND HER LIFE. She can choose to live by killing the Prince, but she refuses, thus becoming a Sky Maid (seriously, Julia, a Sky Maid. No word on whether she grants wishes). She can get a soul by doing good things for THREE HUNDRED YEARS. Also, every time they see a kid acting shitty, BOOM, one more year of sky maid. Does our Lille Havfrue take it badly? Fuck no! She goes right up and invisibly kisses Mrs. Prince’s forehead. See, shit’s rough for mermaids, as it should be for vampires and those who want to marry them.

“With eyes already glazing she looked once more at the Prince, hurled herself over the bulwarks into the sea, and felt her body dissolve in foam.

The sun rose up from the waters. Its beams fell, warm and kindly, upon the chill sea foam, and the little mermaid did not feel the hand of death. In the bright sunlight overhead,she saw hundreds of fair ethereal beings. They were so transparent that through them she could see the ship’s white sails and the red clouds in the sky. Their voices were sheer music, but so spirit-like that no human ear could detect the sound, just as no eye on earth could see their forms. Without wings, they floated as light as the air itself. The little mermaid discovered that she was shaped like them, and that she was gradually rising up out of the foam.”

THAT is how you do a tragic near-death for your loved one in literature. Also, Mr. Prince’s eyes do one thing. They close. They are closing, and then they remain closed. Way to conjugate, Hans.

I know I’ve spent a lot of time on the Little Mermaid today. But that is as it should be, for it is a good story. If you’re not here for that, then there is the door. I say good day to you.

Edward: WAH! Bella! Speak to me!

Bella: “Yes, I wanted to say. Anything. But I couldn’t find my lips.” Oh-ho! Perhaps the Sea Witch has taken them!

Edward: WAHHHH!

Bella: “This couldn’t be heaven, could it? There was too much pain.” We have now established that Bella both believes in and desires heaven. I want to hear no bitching about how she wants to be a vampire at any point, which would presumably preclude heaven, as it trades a spiritual life hereafter for a temporal. St. Augustine would be very upset with you, Bella.

Bella: Is hurt!

Carlisle: Evil vampire bit her!

Edward: Oh noes!

Carlisle: Suck out the venom, Edward!

Edward: B-b-b-but…

Carlisle: Get to sucking!

Edward: When you put it like that….

Bella: Is all fixed.

Edward: “I love you.”

Bella: “I know.”

DAMMIT. NO. Bella, you are not… there are so many things wrong with this. Among them: we are not now celebrating with the Ewoks.

Bella: Alice, I know where you came from… “I smell gasoline.”

That’s… that’s where Alice gets her visions, isn’t it? Everything is so clear now.

Aaaaaand, that’s all that happens in that chapter. Presumably the big climax (heh) of the book came (heh) somewhere in there. We wouldn’t know though. We skipped it. Where does the idea to SKIP YOUR BOOK’S CLIMAX even come from? Who would ever think that’s ok?

Oh, and so much for Mr. Scary Edward’s lack of self-control once he started drinking her blood. Shit was no problem for him.

One more chapter and then an epilogue. And then New Moon, unfortunately.

To recap, because I was told it was confusing: in this chapter Bella is passed out while Edward & Co. show up and kill The Tracker.  Then Edward sucks out The Tracker’s venom.

part two: which was not written by weepy sisserton iv of crytown.

Chapter 23: The Angel

I have been informed that the downward trend in our mood during this little exercise has been quite noticeable, so I’m going to do my best to be cheery for this chapter. That being said, this is the lamest chapter heading ever, and I do not regret my superlatives.

Page 213

“As I drifted, I dreamed.” That should be reversed, seeing as how Bella is not a boat, afloat without a rudder, on a sea of who-gives-a-shit. (That was cheerful. Imagine that cheerfully. I thought it cheerfully, I swear).

“Where I floated, under the dark water…” Which implies sinking, and not floating, though I suppose you’ve got a kind of neutral buoyancy going, there…so yay! But it’s dark water, so you’ve got to look out, unless you’ve got one of the Thirteen Treasures, you’re pretty screwed… or if you had a monkey bird, he could fly down and save you. But alas, this is unlikely, because where is Niddler when you need him? Of eating minga melons or being enslaved for some stupid reason… (Come on… someone… anyone… coolest series ever when I was a kid… http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Pirates_of_Dark_Water)

“…through the heavy water…” Oh no! Bella has fallen into a reactor! That explains the winky lights and lack of oxygen! And the… radioactivity! And the whole trip to the Arizona desert! Hah! We’ve got it all figured out now.

“And the angel was sobbing tearless, broken sobs.” I contest that in order to know if the sobs were tearless, Bella would need to be awake. Also, there are people who cannot learn to use a restroom that would understand that Edward is the angel, given that angels do not generally carry on like weepy (though tearless) sissies.
Weepy sissy? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Statue_of_Archangel_Michael_over_the_main_Gate_of_the_church_Sankt_Michaelis_in_Hamburg_Germany.jpg
No.
Weepy McCriesalot? http://www.imdb.com/media/rm1058379776/tt0114194
No.
Weepy Weeperson? http://www.vcu.edu/engweb/transcendentalism/authors/emerson/poems/uriel.html
No. (Angels for science!)
Weepy Sisserton IV of Crytown? http://www.angelgift.com/clipart/cherubs/cherub04.jpg
Okay, yes, probably.

Page 214

“‘See if you can suck the venom back out.’” How do you know you have true friends? When they offer to suck the rattlesnake venom out of the bite on your ass cheek, cause ’someone’ squatted without looking. Apparently, it is somewhat the same with vampires. Although this totally means that Edward and James have swapped fluids on a more intimate level than intended. Even if it’s your girlfriend, Edward, just keep in mind that you’re still sucking out all of his nasty, nasty venom.

“I watched his eyes as the doubt was suddenly replaced by blazing determination.” Edward would suck like he’s never sucked before.

“…locked in the vice of his stone arms.” Cut it the hell out.

Page 215

“‘I love you,’ he answered. ‘I know,’ I breathed, so tired.” NONONONONONONONONO, YOU ARE NOT ALLOWED TO USE THAT LINE! AAUUGGGHH! CRAP! Though replacing Bella with Harrison Ford would make me much happier. Then, you could replace the vampire with velociraptors. And Phoenix with Air Force One. And her mother with a turtle, because this non-sequitur has gotten terribly far out of hand, but I still think it’s funny. A ninja turtle. Which makes her a teenage Mom, like a Lifetime movie. I’m thinking… Raphael. He’s always making Bad Choices.

The End.

No kidding? This Chapter is two and half pages long. I didn’t even have time to be furious.

I can be furious now, though. Because that, that right up there, those massive three pages? That’s the climax. Yep. That’s it. Bella is unconscious for the fight. The chapter is made entirely of her dribbling her weak subconscious across the page while presumably cool bullshit goes on in the background. Not that it lasts long, apparently. A few sentences of background info and the fight is over. Not that we saw it. The peak moment of this book, the heroine passes out. The plot train goes whizzing by, while we’re stuck in the bathroom at the station, getting something out of our eye.

I have only one joke to make: “…and the word, ‘premature,’ as well.”

Twilight Chapter 22. Step Right Up! You Can Actually See These Two Writers Lose Their Hope!

We’d like to give a quick shout out to those of you who came looking for the following: “quillayute legend twilight bullshit”, “gazelle’s cousin”, “etruscan bed”, “rape in twilight port”, “badly written twilight describes edward”.  We hope you found what you were looking for.  Especially you, Etruscan Bed and Gazelle’s Cousin.

Part One, where we learn that The Villain is Straight Out of a Bad Cop Show.

22. Hide-And-Seek

“It had taken much less time than I’d thought”.

It had taken much MORE time than I would have thought to get to this point in the book, during which nothing much has happened. Whatever happened to those werewolves, incidentally? Were they just around for kicks? Looks like they turned out to be useless.  Now, before you start yelling about “the other books,” Twilight was originally supposed to stand alone.  It was only after multiple hundred page “epilogues” that she decided to write more.

“I was surprised when I saw Alice bent over the desk,” but not as surprised I was to hear the slap bass and cheesy synth that meant we were still making that porn.

“And then [Jasper] was right behind her, his hands curling over hers…” I think this is illegal in some states.

For whatever reason, even though it’s strongly suggested that Alice just had a vision in which she saw Bella go off to be a moron and kill herself with The Tracker, Alice just tells Bella nothing’s up. The plot train might have arrived, but it got here late, and in pieces. Clearly we’re missing the dining car at the very least. I think it was in a horrible wreck along the way. Maybe it hit the Stupid Train, which is much longer than anticipated.

Bella: “I got ready methodically,” which Stephenie reminds us means “concentrating on each little task.” So little was done methodically here, I can see how it might well be a foreign concept. We clearly don’t need “haphazard” defined. That shit is locked DOWN.  At this point I’ll bring up that there’s a series of books called “Defining Twilight,” where we learn all sorts of foreign words like “methodically.”  This reminds me that we’re going to try and to a Schlock of Twilight post at some point.  Look forward to that, eh?

Bella: Alice, why don’t you blow some more narrative load and mindless expose another concept of the story?

Alice: Some of what I see is uncertain. Some aren’t, “like the weather.” Even Alice realizes she’s one of the Wonder Twins here. “People are harder.” (heh, like Edward with his alabaster obelisk?) Apparently as soon as anyone makes any little decision, everything changes. This is the worst super power ever.  Decide to stop for a Dr Pepper on your way to work?  I guess that changes THE WHOLE FUTURE!  Take THAT, John Calvin!

At the airport, Alice and Jasper spend a couple minutes trying to figure out where they’re going to go. Bella The Thinking Unicorn is optimistic, telling herself she’ll never see those places. If you’ve forgotten, she’s off to go traipse into death at the hands of the tracker.

Then our super smart unicorn decides she’s going to take a page from the Cop Show Cliche book and sneak out the other door of the airport bathroom, eluding Chips and Dip.

The cabbie she finds is unfamiliar with how cabbies works, complaining that this chick wants to go too far.  Next he’ll be complaining that there’s traffic and he’s forced to drive TOO SLOW.  Curse those big numbers on the meter!

Bella: “My path was set. I just had to follow it now.” Didn’t we just talk about how the future wasn’t set, and we can always change things? Oh! It appears the caboose of the plot train has also failed to arrive!

Bella: I imagined Edward if I’d stayed at the airport. We’d go off to the beach or some bullshit and I’d be in his arms, “finally safe.” I think I’m getting whiplash from this chapter. First Edward’s safe, then he’s not. Going to him is a bad thing, then it’s not. Bella is making the worst decisions since Georgie Custer said “We can take those Indians no problem!”  Worse than when the Sheriff of Nottingham said “Robin who now?  I’m sure we can take care of HIM!”

So Bellakins gets to her mom’s house, and there’s the Tracker’s phone number, just as advertised. She FAILS AT PHONE DIALING, and then informs us that it works better when you press the buttons one at a time. I know people who have spent their whole life in the “Special School” who know how to dial a phone better than that. The crazy homeless guys you see around can dial phones. Bella, though? Never got to that part of kindergarten.

After navigating the perils of the phone, Bella has to go to the ballet studio. “I tripped several times, once falling, catching myself with my hands, scraping them on the sidewalk, and then lurching up to plunge forward again.” On the way, Bella was bitten by a (Super) Zombie, which is the only thing that would make this sort of shambling acceptable.

As she runs, she “wishe[s] for the green, protective forests of Forks… of home.” You know, where there are no werewolves, vampires, or EVIL vampires.

Then, Our Heroine gets to the studio. It was just as she remembers it, with “the parking lot in front… empty.” There were no childhood dance lessons, were there, Bella? Your mom just dropped you off at an empty parking lot twice a week and told you to pretend you were a pretty ballerina while she headed down for cheap booze and dudes, right? Cause remembering an empty parking lot needs some Lucy levels of ’splainin.

I’d make fun of Stephenie telling us that Bella had to keep her feet moving “one in front of the other,” but Bella’s motor skills, sadly, are in serious question. This goes past ‘clumsy’ and straight into neurological disorder. Dr. House would no doubt have a field day.

a-HA! It turns out her mother was not there, but it was rather a clever video tape!

Bella: You’re very average-looking, Tracker, and thus below my care. You suck because you are not pretty.

Tracker: You suck too, Bella, because you did not even bother to make a token effort.

Pale people standing around telling each other how much they all suck in the dark. This episode of High School Dances And The People Who Are Too Cool To Go To Them brought to you by Twilight. Later they’ll stand in the parking lot making fun of the “sheep” who play right into “mommy and daddy’s little fantasies.”

We continue the Cop Show Cliche. Mr. Tracker wants to make a sadistic video for Edward. Ho-hum. I’ve seen this episode of SVU.

Bella: “I felt a curl of nausea in the pit of my stomach”. You’re not supposed to eat the curly fortune fish!

The Tracker keeps on his Villain Monologue track. We’ve found nothing at all out for ourselves in this book. There might have been a plot at one point, but it has been explained right out of existence.

And then Mr. Villain takes a left turn and starts telling us about Alice’s origin. I really don’t care. (It was a mental asylum, what an unexpected turn. Never could have guessed, or cared.)

Mr. Villain keeps conducting the Monologue Train right along, dropping some choice Evil Man lines. Some “your little friend”s here, some “quite an honor”s there. I think he made this monologue with a set of Evil Magnetic Poetry.

The Monologue Train takes a brief whistle stop at QuickBeatingburg, where Bella gets smashed into a mirror. Now will be the part where she gets hooked into a slow-killing machine, I’m sure.

And then the chapter ends after some more beating.  I really don’t care what happens to Bella, not even idly.  I don’t care, because it is So Damn Obvious.

Part Two: Where We Learn That The Narrative Is a Liar.

22. Hide-And-Seek. I presume this has something to do with Bella’s hiding of her intentions to go off and suffer from terminal ‘lame’. I don’t know about the seeking, as the tracker hasn’t actually done much hunting, apparently taking the part of the theory of the modern sportsman that sitting in a deer blind with a bunch of corn under it somehow counts as mad hunting skillz. You know what I would like to see? I’d like to see him crawl headfirst down a boar tunnel with a pointy stick. Hide and seek that, asshole.

Anyway. Moving on.

Page 205

“I was afraid to be in the same room with her, afraid she would guess… and afraid to hide from her for the same reason.” Point One: Bella has so thoroughly given up on life that very strong likelihood that Alice will figure out what’s going on (Edward has said that Bella is a bad actor. Ontological Edward is never wrong, and is, in fact, more right than anyone else) doesn’t give her even the barest glimmer of hope, nor reassurance. Bella’s whole consuming goal now, is to -not receive help-. Point Two: Dramatic pause in the middle of that sentence was… entirely unnecessary. These sorts of pauses… inserted haphazardly into scripts… are why the actress playing Bella… seems to suffer from Overactive Eyebrow syndrome… the staple of young actresses… since they realized that nobody looks at their faces when they can just stare at their tits… and collagen began rendering the rest of their features immobile.

“… but I was surprised when I saw Alice bent over the desk…” Jasper’s back!

“My thoughts flew to my mother. Was I already too late?” Because that’s what I would think when my friend went into a future-seeing coma. Goddamn Bella, Cassandra over here is foaming at the mouth, and you immediately think of what your Mom’s up to? You know who else did shit like that? Agamemnon. And we know what happened to him. (By the by, how awesome would it be if Edward went all Clytemnestra on Bella? Or better yet, Mike. I would pay for that sort of stuff).

“‘Alice!’ Jasper’s voice whipped,” …cream? …up a quick bite to eat? … it good?

“‘What did you see,’ I asked —and there was no question in my flat, uncaring voice.” Okay Moody McTeen. Next, leave your filthy dark poetry about and carve ‘cry for help’ into your thigh with your lady bic. Make sure you whine about how no one knows your pain. Thank God you don’t have internet access or this could go on for chapters.

“The peaceful mood Jasper created… helped me think clearly. Helped me plan.” You mean, helped you accept the inevitability of your death, which you’d already accepted, then told us about accepted, then moaned about how accepted your death was. Is that the ‘plan’? I somehow doubt it.

Page 206

“‘Some things are more certain than others… like the weather.’” She said it, not me.

“And she hadn’t seen me in the mirror room with James until I’d made the decision to meet him there.” We do not know this fact. We do not know what Alice just saw, as nobody told us. Also, you do realize what your’e saying here, right? That somehow your immediate capitulation is what gave Alice the shifty future-vision? So if she saw you dying, it’s because you chose the path where YOU DIE, DUMBASS. Geez, I’m so glad fate it all worked out in this story.

“Luck was with me, or maybe it was just good odds. Edward’s plan was landing in terminal four, where most flights landed — so it really wasn’t surprising his was. But it was the terminal I need: the biggest, the most confusing.” ‘Luck was with me, but it wasn’t, because what looked lucky, was actually just extremely likely. In fact, it’s likeliness is what makes its features coincide with ones which, had they also been unlikely, would be described as lucky, had I any understanding of what the fuck ‘lucky’ meant. I rubbed my rabbit’s foot and shattered a mirror, so we’re good to go on that one.’

“That made it very hard.” Made what very hard? I can’t seem to get it from context. Let’s look for clues. “…every cell in my body seemed to know he was coming, to long for his coming.” Oh, well, that’s rather private for an airport terminal.

Page 207

“Jasper stood up.” Oh, no! Chips and Dip is gonna lose Bella! Boo to you, Chex Mix! You are super-useless!

“They would find me in a heartbeat.” They’re going to find you in a heartbeat, kinda no matter what. You do realize that the vampires are so loaded down with super-powers, I wouldn’t be surprised if they crapped Golden Eggs and ruled the undersea world of Atlantis, right?

“‘That’s in Scottsdale,’ he complained.” Is the cabbie seriously complaining about the distance? Seriously? Do you understand how -fares- work?

Page 208

“…in his marble arms.” Stop it.

“I’d never been more alone in my entire life.” Just think about loneliness like sobriety. Everybody slips in and out of it sometimes.

Page 209

“There was no time to look back at my house…” so we’re just going to skip right ahead to-oh wait, sorry, now, “From the corner of my eye…” we’re going to get the description of the memories associated with the house. Narrative, you are lying to me, and I don’t like it.

Except for the fact that Bella is winded running comparatively short distances, and the disturbing lack of necessity I find undermining the desperation that is supposed to underline the ensuing action, it’s a pretty good sequence, I feel. Thanks to lacking vampires, some of the stupid got pushed right out of the text.

Why did they record Bella’s near-death experience as a child? I’m unsure. Why was it clear enough of background noise, in spite of the fact that they were at the beach, that she could mistake the recording, from a television, mind you, for her mother’s actual voice. I don’t know that either! But hey, it moves the dame plot along, doesn’t it? Seems like a clever way to do things, doesn’t it? It at the very least applies to some kind of cohesive plan, which the last few chapters have almost entirely been lacking. Now, all I’m waiting for is the Tracker inevitably relating some stupid contingency plot, like ‘I can only kill you in Forks’ or ‘in front of Edward’ to strain this smorgasbord of stupid to it’s breaking point. Come one, we know it’s coming. And it’s only ‘wafer-thin’.

Page 210

“‘You don’t sound angry that I tricked you.’” Because thanks to her titanic twattery for the first two-thirds of the book, we must now absolutely belabor her immanent beatification by making up miracles of conscience. And we have quite a way to go, because unlike with certain saints I can mention, here we’ve got to start from -fucking zero-. Perhaps we can count among her miracles the reviving of the ‘Bella’s a shitty person’ horse, if only we hadn’t beaten that one -back- to death a few times. And you know, I’m not done with it yet: BELLA, YOU SUCK.

“‘…some of you [humans] seem to have no sense of your own self-interest at all.’” Remarkably enough, I’m still not forgetting the 170 pages of Bella being the shittiest, weakest, meanest, most selfish, possible protagonist, despite the author repeatedly shoving this kind of vomitous bullcrap out of the open and useless mouths of other characters. I say again, Narrative, YOU LIE. (I hate political jokes, but there go. The shoe, she fits).

“He was average looking, nothing remarkable about his face or body at all.” Remember kids, being only average means being only evil and soulless! Beware the super-average vampire, for he has the crappiest of all vampire powers, and he gets bitchy about it.

“‘To be quite honest, I’m disappointed.’” Somehow you didn’t expect Bella to capitulate under the slightest pressure, or to have superior forces melt away before you like war elephants before flaming pigs (for serious, look ‘em up). The entire creation and execution of this villain is a living testament to the weakness of its own plot. What’s more, he spends most of his time commenting on it, dangerously self aware of his own perilous existence within this spreading pool of tripe. Saying the things the reader is thinking and pointing out your own unreality… only Deadpool can do that kind of shit, and that’s because he’s funny. On purpose. (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ThoughtCaption)

“I waited in silence.” Because, despite Bella not being interested, nobody having asked, and an even more than usual burden of damaging irrelevance and needlessness, James has to give a villain monologue to explain what just happened. Not because he has any interest, you see, but because, to be frank, the narration demands it, as none of this has made any sense. If James does not explain this, you will realize you’ve been hoodwinked into reading the last four chapters by the fact that they are between you, and the end of the book. Kind of like that rock you could’ve skipped over, but for some reason you were too lazy to and walked around, even though it was only an inch high and thinner than it was wide. Or that beer you didn’t need to have, but there was only one left and it would’ve felt wasteful to stuff it in the fridge before you opened your new bottle of whiskey. You know that feeling.

Page 211

“‘It was all for him, of course.’” I’m glad that James is comfortable coming out with that. Hopefully his love will help coax Edward out of denial. I’m glad this has turned out to be such a relevant, tolerant teen romance.

And, rather unexpectedly, Alice’s back story is explained. This is… irrelevant. To everything. Alice is only under generous circumstances to be considered an important enough character for this to help drive the plot. There’s also no need for James to be explaining this, or for him to be related to Alice at all. This whole book is just bulimic with information, leaving it both overstuffed and devoid of substance, all at once. There is no need for every single detail to not only be illuminated via the characters just fucking telling you, but also be as interrelated as an Arkansas prom. Or to illustrate by example: Remember how, in Star Wars, we found out that Anakin built C3PO, and most people had the thought: What the fuck was the point of that tidbit? Well, apparently James is the Anakin to Alice’s C3PO. And everyone is Jar Jar, just in general.

Page 212

Bella gets beat up by a vampire, but I figure by now, she should be used to this.

I have problems feeling bad about Bella getting the crap knocked out of her, as it was her own stupidity that left her here. A page of her getting the crap kicked out of her, strikes me as long overdue. Since James is the only vampire who’s managed to make it closer to ’scary’ rather than delicately edging away towards ‘fluffy like bunnies’, I have problems not cheering him on, in spite of the fact that his ‘clever’ plan was entirely made up of stuff most of us did when pretending to spies as children (or if we just had siblings), namely, spying on folks and trying to sneak into their stuff.

So… hooray? James monologued. Bella was useless to a self-damaging degree. Our vampire friends somehow managed to go from ‘Super Friends’ to ‘Just Aquaman and the Wonder Twins’ monkey thing’ in mere moments.

Can’t wait to see what happens next.

Chapter 21, which is very short, but after which may come either the Tale of the Snow Queen, or the Frog Princess.

part one. “the walls of the palace were formed of drifted snow…”

21. Phone Call.

I suspect nothing will happen in this chapter, except a phone call.

Bella: Alice and Jasper were talking loud enough for me to hear. That’s strange. I’ll investigate!

Alice: Draws a house.

Bella: That’s my mother’s house!

The Loud Talking: Is never explained.

Jasper: “uncharacteristically, Jasper slid closer to me.” How is this uncharacteristic? Hasn’t ol’ Chips and Dip been acting all concerned since we got here?

Alice: I just got off the phone with Edward. He’s going to come get you. They’re going to be on the next plane out.

I imagine the vampires flying Southwest, but being all disappointed because they got “C” passes. Just cause you’re a vampire don’t mean you have to abandon good value.

Bella: “Despite Jasper, the hysteria bubbled up in my voice.” I don’t think ol’ Edward quite knows how to treat that hysteria, suspecting what we do about his particular predilections where it comes to the ladies.

Alice: We’ll keep your mom safe.

Bella: “Don’t you see? He’s not tracking me at all.”

Nah, following you to Phoenix, your mom’s house, and your ballet studio TOTALLY doesn’t sound like he’s tracking you.

Alice informs us that the Cullens are boarding their plane, just about 5:30 AM. They’ll get to Phoenix at about 9:45. I know for a fact that the SEA-PHX flight is not that long, meaning they have a stopover somewhere. I really like the idea of the vampires waiting around at an airport. And it means that they weren’t willing to shell out for a non-stop flight. “Bella, I love you, but not enough to pay the extra $50.”

Phone: Ring.

Alice: ’s for you. Yo’ mama.

Bella’s Mom: Oh ho! I am not your mother at all, but rather The Tracker!

Tracker: Has a “generic voice”. Super Generic, I reckon. Maybe “Super Unremarkable” is his Special Unicorn Power.

The tracker pulls from his back of Villain Tropes and tells Bella to go to her mother’s house and not talk to anyone. One would hope that our Super Future Seer would, you know, see this coming, but… you know… it has nothing to do with a rain cloud.

Tracker: Lucky your mom showed up early. I was ready to wait for weeks, but now I don’t have to. Oh, and make sure you get here before noon. It’s not like I can wait for weeks.

Super Contradictory, maybe?

But hey, we’re still good. Plane gets in at 9:45, plenty of time to tell Edward what’s going on and get there by noon.

Bella: O! Looks like I shall die! I had no choice but to go and die.

What? Why? Can’t your best-at-everything-boyfriend fix this?

Bella: I’ll write a note!

Good, good Bella! Write a note to Alice, or Edward, or Carlisle or somebody!

Bella, in note: Edward, please don’t come after him.

Dammit, Bella. You are officially too dumb to live. Literally, you are so dumb that you cannot figure out a way to live.

“Then I carefully sealed away my heart.” Oh no! The devil’s mirror fragment has entered her heart! Maybe now Edward will have to go on a quest to find his girlfriend, who has gone to live with the Snow Queen. He will pass by some suspiciously sexual flowers, but have none of their nonsense. A retelling of the Snow Queen with flipped genders and vampires doing the saving would be kind of interesting. Not the *most* necessary story to tell, but interesting.  Unfortunately, you and I both know that one ain’t happening.  Probably nothing will happen. We are very close to missing the Plot Train entirely.

part two: “many years ago a tsar had three sons…”

Chapter 21: Phone Call. You know what’s great? Whiskey. You know what I’m going to go get, right this very moment, right after reading this chapter heading? Whiskey. You know who doesn’t have a problem? Me. Me and whiskey.

Page 200

“The phone goes there,’ I whispered. Two pairs of eternal eyes stared at me. ”That’s my mother’s house.’” God help us, I actually laughed. So far the chapter opening is actually getting a lot of credit. ‘Cept for eyes that now, not only overly active, but also effectively immortal, this is pretty good. I suppose we’ve been misdirected this whole time, and it’s actually the eyes that are vampiric. Explains a lot, really.

“‘…he’ll hurt someone I love…’” Soooooo, Edward? Soooooo, maybe this whole thing was a trap to get Edward right where he wanted him? Soooooooo, remember that sexual ambiguity thing we had going on earlier? I’m just gonna bring that up again right now. You know. No reason. Just thinkin’.

“‘Do you think it’s only my human family he can hurt me with?’” No, I don’t really think he can hurt you with your human family at all, but because we take everything the characters say or do at absolutely face value, we’re going to let this slide. Because, just like with Edward, we’ve gone from total stranger to eternal love in seconds flat. Mind you, I do love me some chips and dip, but I’m not going to be inviting Jasper to family picnics any time soon. But for Bella, no such thing. Curly-fish and Guacamole here in Phoenix with her, why, they’re family now.

Page 201

“…so I could be free to go to pieces privately.” How dare you try to keep Bella calm, there Six Pack! She can lose her shit if she wants! God, Bella hates it when men try to control her emotions!

“‘No, we’re relocating closer to your mother’s house.’” WHAT? WHY? THAT’S EXACTLY WHERE THE TRACKER IS GOING! WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING? THIS DOESN’T MAKE SENSE EVEN IN CRAZY-TOWN. It might make sense in Funky Town, though. I hear they move around a lot, you know, to keep grooving, with some energy, or at least they talk about it, talk about it, talk about it…

“…a very pleasant, generic voice.” Man, the tracker don’t get no breaks. Generic looks, generic voice. Look out kiddos, the great enemy of this book? The one vampire who was not a special snowflake unicorn.

Page 202

“‘Why don’t you walk into another room now so your face doesn’t ruin everything.’” Oooooo, buuuuuuuuuurrrrrn.

Tracker is actually turning out to be pretty damn clever. Of course, the only reason he’s getting away with this is because Jasper, for some idiot reason (ah, that’s right, he’s checking them out of the hotel so they can frolic merrily into danger), is gone, so he can’t read Bella’s emotions. For this, I credit the author, who usually doesn’t seem to have the presence of mind to do that sort of planning ahead. Also, Alice? Useless. Again. Way to go friend, all you seem to have done is prevented some appropriate tension from developing. And let us play baseball.

Page 203

“For I had no choices now but one: to go to the mirrored room and die.” Bella, you are not a thinker unicorn. I don’t know where the thinker unicorns are, but they are not here. Panic makes everyone dumb, but not everybody has magical mind-reading, future-telling, emotion-feeling vampires to play charades with. This is not a ‘Someone’s listening so I can’t use words to tell them anything’ situations. You are surrounded by people who should have absolutely no issue playing emotional charades with your thoughts. Fortunately for the poor, abused dramatic tension, everyone has displayed such astounding incompetence with even the most basic ideas of security and planning, that I am certain a randomly placed banana peel would result in the death of the entire population of the city of Phoenix, Arizona. Collateral damage, you see.

“Despair gripped me; there was no way to bargain, nothing I could offer or withhold that could influence him.” You could kill yourself. That’d work, I imagine. You know, deny him the final capture, elude his grasp via mortality. There’s a bathtub, right? Hotels have ice machines. Remember, down the street, not across the block. They teach that in Drama Whore Camp, right? (Seriously: killing yourself = lamest possibly victory ever. But very Byronic, so very fitting. Dunno why it’s Byronic, as he was kind of lothario badass who only died because fever got him before he could free Greece, but that’s the term so that’s what we’ll use. Still a lame victory. That’s right, Fuck You, Cato).

“…evading [Alice and Jasper] was absolutely essential, and absolutely impossible. I was suddenly grateful Jasper was gone…” Characters, pointing out flaws/weakness of plot, coconut crabs. That’s all I’ve got to say.

“‘If I write a letter for my mother, would you give it to her? Leave it at the house, I mean.’” Why don’t you….write a letter to Alice? Give her low-down? Or are we keeping this on the down-low? Oh, I suppose at this point it’s not even sub-conscious, it’s subterranean. Between ancient and below ground, it may be that everybody walks that dinosaur. (http://www.lyricsdownload.com/was-walk-the-dinosaur-lyrics.html)

Page 204

“And then I sealed away my heart.” But the Prince Ivan found the iron chest, wherein was the rabbit, wherein was the duck, wherein was the egg, and broke the egg against her forehead by tricking her with a magic-eye picture of a sailboat (schooner), and thereby Bella the Deathless was defeated, as the firebird flew overhead.

The End.

No?

Better than the four remaining chapter, I guarantee. This chapter is -five pages long-, and not really, because there’s only a paragraph and half on the last page. So -why is it a chapter-? Because a phone call where something happened interrupted several chapters of nothing at all. So.

…thereby Bella the Deathless was defeated, as the firebird flew overhead.

THE END.

Twilight Chapter 20. Coconut Crabs Are Trying To Save Us!

the summary. featuring the famous dancing cullens.

This chapter does not make any sense.  Seriously, not a damn bit.  On the other hand, it’s boring.
“When I woke up, I was confused.” That means I couldn’t remember things clearly!

And so was I.

Bella: I tried to remember how I got here, but couldn’t remember (that means I was confused!) Except that I DID remember driving here, in a black car with tinted glass and a quiet engine. Nothing else though, except for how fast we were going. Aside from that, I remembered nothing. Nothing but sitting with Alice on the seat, which was made from dark leather. My memory is so hazy! Maybe Alice slipped me a roofie, because I remember her with a wet shirt, and her cool skin.

Bella’s non-memories continue for the next PAGE. She remembers such fuzzy details as “gray light streaking across the cloudless sky.” I’ll bite, Bella (HAHAHA vampires). How does light streak across the sky without anything to reflect off of?

It’s entirely appropriate that we skip most of the CA-AZ drive. That is a boring-ass drive.

Phoenix sucks. Even Bella thinks Phoenix sucks.

Jasper: Where’s the airport?

Bella: Are we flying somewhere?

Alice: No. But, you know, just in case.

Why do the vampires need to fly anywhere? Why is there even a just-in-case?

Apparently at some point they checked into a hotel? By the airport?

Then these exciting vampires sit around and watch the news.

The big action is that nothing happens. Way to invert the paradigm, Stephenie.

Bella: WHAT IF THE BAD VAMPIRE HURTS ONE OF YOUR FAMILY? She notes that she’s getting hysterical, which, of course, is beause she’s a woman.

Jasper: Bella, you are completely safe here.

Bella: Well, no shit, chief.

I thought you didn’t think you were safe? What’s going on here?

Jasper the Magical Prozac Bottle: I calm you down, Bella.

Bella: I don’t WANNA be calm. It’s not who I REALLY AM.

Ah, the cry of sick people everywhere.

Alice: We’re helping you because Edward will be a whiny bitch if you die. And his awkwardly-mobile eyes just might strike out on their own. For Gold And Adventure, they’ll say!

For the nexxt page, nothing happens. Bella takes her time to tell us about nothing happening.

I think Stephenie’s plan is to make us feel some sort of empathy with Bella by making us as bored as she is.

Bella: Maybe if I go to sleep, I can be afraid. I WANT TO BE AFRAID.

Alice: I shan’t let you go to sleep. Because that might end this boring chapter.

Bella: Will you tell me the truth, Alice?

Alice: I only speak the truth.

That makes Alice that magical sitar. Rosalie is obviously the Courtesan. I like to think of Carlisle as Satie, and of Esme as The Doctor, mainly because she doesn’t actually do all that much. In my mind, Edward is the Narcoleptic Argentinian. His character would go straight awesome if he had narcolepsy. “Bella,” he’d say, “Aren’t you scared of… *snore*”.

Anyway, watch this thinking of Dancing Cullens. Hilarious.

“Her voice was earnest”. Her breath was Jerry, her sight was Jeff.

Let’s

Bella: Tell me a stooooorrrrryyyyy.

Alice: K. Which one? Goodnight Moon?

Bella: No, tell me the one about how you become a vampire.

Alice: Edward will be so angry…

Bella: Fuck off, that’s not fair.

Alice: It involves venom and shit. Basically nothing you couldn’t have figured out from Carlisle’s story, except this eats another page.

Alice: “We’re also like sharks in a way.” We have rows of teeth.

Both of them sit around for a while after that.

Then Alice pulls some psychic bullshit. Sees a horribly vague room, with a VCR. Way to go, Alice!

Apparently this all means that the tracker will go to a room. I can’t contain my intrigue.

Phone: Ring.

I hope it’s Jessica calling to tell Bella all about her day. At this point, the only thing that can save us is some good old fashioned surrealism.

No such luck, it’s Carlisle.

Alice: “Whatever made him get on that plane…”

Who? Carlisle? The Tracker? I can only assume it’s the tracker, in which case… GOOD THING WE DECIDED TO STAY IN THIS AIRPORT HOTEL.

Edward (on the phone): Sup, Bells.

Bella: I was worried!

Edward: I TOLD YOU NOT TO BE WORRIED. NOW I HAVE OFFICIALLY TOLD YOU TWICE.

Bella: I’ll go ahead and give myself a black eye now.

Edward: THANK YOU. Anyway, we lost the tracker. He stayed just outside my telepathy range.

How the hell does he know what Edward’s telepathy range is?

It turns out that Alice saw a ballet studio in her vision.

Bella: That’s the ballet studio I went to!

Jasper: Is it really?

Bella: Maybe. I mean, everything’s in the exact same spot. But it might not be the one. Probably not relevant at all.

Alice: So this doesn’t have anything to do with you, huh?

Bella: Nope.

I’M SURE THIS HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH HER.

Bella: It was right around the corner from my mom’s place. Speaking of that, I’ma call my mom now.

The Worst Bodyguards Ever: OK, sounds like a plan!

-later-

“The touch of Alice’s cold hands woke me briefly as she carried me to the bed…” and the sound of the slap-bass and drum machine reminded me we were making a porn.

the commentary. where we learn who knows what to do.

Chapter 20: Impatience Given how the title of this chapter is a non-sequitur, as far as I can tell, from the previous chapter’s emotional state, I suspect that nothing will actually happen. I may be wrong. I hope I’m wrong. It seems a shame to waste some 10 or so of the remaining 41 pages doing nothing, but I really expect to waste all of the 41 remaining pages on nothing happening, just like we’ve wasted the previous 192 pages on, in essence, nothing happening. Except that beach bit, that was okay.

There you go. Twilight can be known for its beaches.

Page 192

“When I woke up, I was confused.” Gah. Huhgah. Glakhdguensdn. Nothing is going to happen, and we’re going to skip events, in order to get the nothing faster…’When I began reading, I was confused. Luckily, this progressed into shock, horror, and a suicidally plunging disappointment, so I wasn’t confused for very long at all.’

“My thoughts were hazy, still tangled up in dreams and nightmares; it took me longer than it should have to realize where I was.” Yeah. Coming directly on the tail of the previous quote, that is generally speaking what ‘I woke up confused’ implies. If this statement were going anywhere interesting, like a false-dream sequence, or a few out of place descriptions that really show how mixed-up your thoughts were, or maybe additional information that you overheard while sleeping, but you could’ve just made up, so it’s sort of mysterious… yeah, any of those things that would make this description worthwhile? Are they going to happen? No. As the next quotation will tell you, this is yet more irrelevance fluffing out nothing. (woohoo! Two sentences in, and we’re already dying of low expectations! I will give credit though, that is appropriate use of a semicolon. Way to go.)

“This room was too bland to belong anywhere but in a hotel.” Going to show that you’ve never really stayed in many hotels across country, especially cheaply. The mid-range hotels? Yeah, all pretty much the same. But the cheap ones? You never know what you’re gonna get, but it’s probably gonna be interesting in some way, if only ‘interesting’ and ’sanitarily frightening’ can be put in the same category. (I stayed in a Motel Six from the future; I showered in a pod-shower. Also, staying on the 10th floor of an EconoLodge just seems contradictory, but it can be done. 10 Floors of Economy sleeping? Surely not! But lo, there it was, and we did sleep within).

LET’S GO AHEAD AND DESCRIBE A BLAND MOTEL ROOM FOR YOU. BECAUSE THIS WILL ENLIGHTEN YOU AND ASSIST IN THE EXPERIENCE.

“Somehow, during the long night, my head had ended up against her granite neck.” 1) Fucking stop it with the stone, okay? We get it. Rock-solid vampires. They are mineral-like. Granite, marble, if only we sold counter tops, we’d be in business. Hard. Cold. Still. Igneous, even. We fucking get it. Also, you are saying you fell asleep on a rock. That sounds uncomfortable. 2)Don’t pretend to be all innocent here, Bella. We know you dig the vampires. Like you ‘accidentally’ leaned the wrong way into that turn a few miles back? ‘Accidentally’ reached for the air conditioner and brushed a thigh. Come on.

“…Her cool hard skin was oddly comforting to me.” ‘Snot odd! You dig the undead! Come on, Antigone, you’ve got a hot heart for cold things.

“The front of her thin cotton shirt was cold, damp from the tears that streamed from my eyes…” Uhm… Be careful you don’t… erode her stalactites, there.

“I didn’t have enough emotion left to be surprised that we’d made a three-day journey in one.” I am unsurprised that this the wrong amount of time. I can see people taking three days to do it; that’s probably the smart way. Probably longer than that, actually if stories of lackadaisical drives home from college that I’ve heard about are taken into account. According to Google, it is about a one-day, six hour journey, so not stopping for food (which is appears they didn’t, but the vampires don’t need to, and who the fuck cares about Bella. Edward doesn’t even remember to feed her regularly), not stopping for gas (or even stopping for it, though I wouldn’t be surprised if this wasn’t a concern to magical vampire cars), and NOT NEEDING TO SLEEP BECAUSE YOU ARE BEING DRIVEN BY UNSLEEPING MAGICAL VAMPIRE UNICORNS, and going, as she said, twice the speed limit the entire time (because magical vampire unicorns never get pulled over), I can see making it in a day pretty easily. In fact, that’s downright sensible. Provided your entire world is blatantly fictional, and your heroine’s an idiot.

I am leaving this page, now, as it is stricken by ‘The Dumb’ and can’t be saved.
Luckily, the Squirrel Nut Zippers know what to do (as they usually do): http://www.lyricsdir.com/squirrel-nut-zippers-la-grippe-lyrics.html
“There’s a flu bug getting passed around
and it’s spreading like fire through the town
There’s a virus, holing up inside us
Everyone that I know is coming down.”

Page 193

This page shows signs of infection, like ‘The Dumb’ is spreading.
“There’s an Asian influenza
Infecting us all by the score
And it’s turning into pneumonia
So we must go out once more

There’s a full moon howling at the night
and its bark is much worse than its bite
so we must go out, and dance around
yes we must go out tonight…”

“It began to down on my that they were too still.” Please let me know what it looks like when a rock is ‘too still’. ‘I don’t like the looks of that mountain’ ‘Why? What’s wrong with it?’ ‘Well, I’ve been watching…’ ‘Yes…’ ‘…It’s too still.’ ‘Yeah, you’re right, it is kind of suspicious.’ ‘Yeah, and you know- it’s been there for -ages-.’

Page 194

“But her voice was too even, and the air was harder to breathe.” Lucky nobody in the room but you breathes it, then, eh?

“‘Then why are you frightened?’ he asked, confused. He might feel the tenor of my emotions, but he couldn’t read the reasons behind them.” Which clearly makes him inferior to Edward, who can read minds. Also, thanks for the explanation, there, chief. I was worried I’d missed it, somewhere between the question he asked, indicating confusion, the adjective you used, telling us he was confused, and the way he stated your feelings though presumably you had not informed him of your feelings, and yet still asked the fucking question that began this belaboring debacle.

“‘Our family is strong.’” THANKS, FOR REITERATING THAT, SCOOBY. THAT’S WHY FREDWARD WENT AHEAD AND SAID ‘LET’S SPLIT UP GANG!’ IN THE SHITTY BEGINNING TO THIS SHITTY, PASTED-TOGETHER PLOT. I was correct. I weary of the characters bringing up flaws in their own plots.

The rest of this page was stolen by an oversized coconut crab. Or might as well have been. Bella escapes Jasper so she panic in peace, intending to waste time by sleeping, then seems unhappy about panicking so much she can’t sleep. Giant coconut crab. Snipped it right off. Put it in a sock slung over its back. Scuttled off.
“So the doctors came, on the evening train
with their flasks and their caskets and vials
Mass psychosis was the diagnosis
so we all cashed our checks and went wild…”

Page 195

I… shit… “‘I will always tell you the truth,’ [Alice's] voice was earnest.” Shit shit shit. The rest of the chapter is going to be information about whatever ridiculous bullshit Bella wants to know. Like the previous chapter was a poor summation of the plan thus far. And the previous 160 pages involved large swaths of repetitive descriptions revolving around little clusters of inexplicably forthcoming people laying information out like there was some kind of flea market featuring their gaudy bits of life.

Vampire have “Mostly superfluous…” venom, I kid you not, to incapacitate victims. The venom, in addition to incapacitating the victim, causes shit-tons of pain, and goes through the body, “changing, healing”, until the person is left a vampire some days later. The vampire, in turn, goes through a feeding frenzy, usually, and therefore doesn’t stop feeding, leaving the victim unable to have the poison in the body long enough to change. Somehow, the venom is injected in by the bite, travels mostly via the blood, and all gets sucked out when the vampire feeds. that last part, pretty much makes sense, provided the poison stays in the blood. How the venom is injected, and spreads to blood while the feeding is actually going, not getting sucked out with the blood while the feeding occurs? This, I do not know. I’m only explaining for the sake of explaining. There really isn’t that much to do, seeing as how nothing happens in this chapter. Everyone in it died from the ‘Dumb’ in spite of the coconut crabs.

“‘…I remember nothing of being human.’ Her voice was wistful.” I freaking -called- that one.

Immediately after the above, Alice goes into another future-seeing sit-down. This time, she is back to being Useless McGee, except for there being a dance studio (that’s my guess as to what a room with hardwood floors, mirrors all around, and a ‘gold stripe’ across the mirrors would be). Perhaps a coconut crab took her future seeing abilities? They are stealers, those coconut crabs.

Page 197

“‘whatever made him get on that plane…’” What plane? Who got on a plane? Is the Tracker on a plane? I literally don’t know. This may very well by a sentence from entirely another book.

Coconut crabs have stolen the phone conversation with Edward, in which they apparently lost the Tracker, somewhere in the mountains, because he got on a plane, or something. I do not know why they do these things. Perhaps it is merely to feed their starving, abnormally sized families. Have pity upon the poor coconut crabs.

By the by, the Tracker is apparently smart enough to know how far Edward’s thought-reading rang is, and to stay well out of it. How does he know this? I don’t know! Maybe there was a reason in there, somewhere. I hear coconut crabs like reason.

Page 198

It is a dance studio, just exactly like the one Bella used to go, only of course it couldn’t be the exact same one really, in spite of details like “…the door, set in exactly the same place as the one I remembered.” I just didn’t want you to get nervous about it.

“‘Here in Phoenix?’” Actually, Bella’s mother flew her to Calgary for dance lessons every week.

Page 199

For some reason, it is now urgent to call her mother and leave a message on her home phone in Phoenix. It’s a good thing we’ve established that the dance studio the tracker goes to isn’t the exact same one that just around the corner from your childhood house where your mother lives! Wow am I glad these two events will be utterly unrelated!

And then… nothing happens. More descriptions of stone people and timelessness. TV watching. Bella falls back asleep on the couch.

A coconut crab emerges from the darkness, and tucks her into bed. Then steals her wallet. Because those coconut crabs? Thieves.

Don’t leave out your socks.

Chapter 19: Which Is So Shoddy, It Is Hard to Find Single Shoddy Themes to Mention, and We Find Out Where You Can Park Your Invisible Jet.

Sorry about another delay- this time you may blame Julia, who I will pretend not to be in order to alleviate embarrassment for all relevant parties.   I don’t want to give to much away, but now we shall cobble together for you in an amusing way the continuance of a nonsensical plotline into another series of nigh-unrelated events that shall persist in belaboring already acknowledged facts and end up with self-inconsistent characters eventually going no where, but far apart.  Oh no!  I hope I have not already spoiled it for you!   Damn!

At any rate, a Happy Halloween to you!

Chapter 19:

The Summary, in which the countries are low, but not lowest, the vampires strongest, but not stronger-er-est, and the jets invisible but still done in white lines so you can see them, because hey we didn’t really think out the whole ‘invisible jet’ idea before we used it.

19. Goodbyes.  Alas, we still have 50 pages before we can say our goodbyes to this book.

Bella: Charlie was waiting for me.  What an over-involved parent.  God, loser!

Emmett: We’ll take care of things quickly.  Leaving your dad in a sham trip to Phoenix should be done like ripping off a bandaid.

Bella: I’M SO SAD TO LEAVE YOU TONIGHT!

Edward: Get going, wench, and make it snappy.

Bella: I’ll always love you, Edward!

Edward: Ok.  Fast, remember?

Bella: I kiss you!

Charlie: Sup?

Bella: I hate you, Edward!  Shut up, dad!  I’m going to run upstairs and grab my convenient wad o’ cash!  I call it my Deus Ex Cashina.

Charlie: WTF, Bella?

Bella: “‘I’m going HOME!,’” I shouted, my voice breaking in the perfect spot.”  Nailed it, Bella, I thought.  Playin’ Dad like a fiddle.

Charlie:  Hold on a tick, why are you leaving?  Did Edward break up with you?

Bella: No way, no one breaks up with me.  I broke up with HIM.  That’s why I’m so mad!

Charlie: Huh?

Bella: Curses!  My brilliant plan to confuse Charlie into letting me leave has failed!  Time for the nuclear option.  ”I don’t want to stay were and wind up with a loser like Mom did.”

Charlie: O_o

Seriously, Bella, DAMN.  Low.  Lower than a Death Valley well.  Lower than the Countries that we now call Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, and parts of France and Germany!

Charlie: You can’t leave now, it’s nighttime.

A fair point.

Bella: I’m going to stand here and say what Mom said when she dumped your ass, k?

-runs away-

Bella: “I’ll call you tomorrow!” Smooches!

So it turns out that The Tracker is running behind the truck now.  I don’t know why Emmett, Edward, and Alice couldn’t stop him.

Edward: We suck!

Emmett: Hi!

Bella: Scream!

Edward: Don’t scream, that tracker following us behind the truck would know that you were in the truck!  And that was quite the performance you gave.

Bella: It was mean.

Edward: Whatevs.  He’ll get over it.  It’s going to be alright.

Bella: “But it won’t be alright when I’m not with you.”

WHAT.

I was starting to feel the tiniest little bit of sympathy for Bella, because she showed a little feeling for her dad (granted, it was while she was saying the worst thing possible to him).  But not anymore. Fuck you, Bella.  I hate your character, and you’re shittily written.

Bella: “Why did this happen?”  ”Why me?”

Because you’re a special twat-unicorn, dearie.  Because… well, there’s NO reason this stuff happened to you except you apparently have magic blood.  Even Bella can’t come up with a reason that she should logically be in this story.  She is a victim of a horrible excuse for a plot.

Edward: It happened because you smell so good.  And because he’s a tracker.  He tracks things.  He has no other dimensions to his character.

-they get to the house, which has an “invisible drive”.  Apparently they bought property from Wonder Woman.  You know who wrote for Wonder Woman?  The Super Friends writers.-

“The lights inside [the house] were bright, but they did little to alleviate the blackness of the encroaching forest.”

First: the lights are clearly racist, to continue the long-running theme.

Second: Do you “alleviate” blackness?  I think this might be a thesaurus at work.

Third: The forest is encroaching?  OH SHIT IT’S BIRNAM WOOD! Malcolm is not in the middle, but headed for the Cullen’s castle!  Macbeth, you are right hosed now.

Emmett tucks Bella “like a football into his vast chest”.  Bella doesn’t really do much, it turns out.  She gets carried around a lot, and she says bitchy things.  She’s sort of like an awful doll.  I’m so glad this is the role model we’re getting for girls these days.  Nancy Drew?  Screw that detective bitch.  We want a girl who says terrible things while being shuttled from place to place inactively.

Edward: The tracker.  He’s… he’s… “‘He’s tracking us,’ Edward announced, glaring balefully at Laurent.” Edwards eyes have cotton and/or hay in them.

Shocking, I say.  Poor form on a tracker’s part to be tracking.

So it turns out Laurent is a coward too.  He decides to fuck off to Alaska.  I’m still unsure why these seven vampires are so scared of one vampire.  The consensus seems to be “Because the tracker is AWESOME.”  Of course, we’ve been hearing that Edward is the best at everything of all time since the start of the book.

I just realize I almost don’t noticed the adverbs anymore.  They’re chaff, ensuring that everything takes ten times too long in this book.

Esme: I’ll shut the metal shades.  Turn this motha’ into the Fortress of Solitude (also, Superman: Super Friends writers).

I’m sure the metal shades will slow down ol’ Scary McTrackerson.

Meanwhile, Edward is keeping track (is there some sort of verb form of that?  I can’t recall…) of the Tracker by reading his damn mind. You’d think that’d mean we’re A-OK.

Esme: I’ll carry you up the stairs and switch clothes with you!  Yay slumber party!

I don’t think Bella’s walked since she fell in with these guys.

Esme and Alice: Now we’ll carry you downstairs!

Carlisle: Here, Esme.  Take a cell phone.  You know how our telepathic signal is… only like one bar out here.  Two IF YOU’RE LUCKY.  If it weren’t for that two-year-contract….

Carlisle: What are the tracker and his woman going to do, Alice?

Alice: Gives a response not involving the weather, and thus certain to be wrong.

Besides, couldn’t they just ask THE MIND READER what they were going to do?

Edward: I pick you up and kiss you.  Then I set you down.

Jasper: “I can feel what you’re feeling now.” Thanks, Super Dork. “You’re worth it.” Alright, Counselor Troi, we gotcha.  You exist to make other people feel better about their worthless-ass selves.  Cause Bella: not worth it.

Alice: May I pick you up and carry you out the door?

Bella: At least you asked first.

Alice: I don’t really care what you say, I was just asking.

The Commentary, which shall use Milton again, because he would weep a better book out of his blind eyes, if he’d been so unfortunate as to read this one.

Chapter 19: Goodbyes  Let’s see what wonderfully sensitive technique Bella uses to inform her father that she’s splitting, like, right now.  Whatever emotional damage she may do (if the author is capable of writing in emotional damage that’s not abusive psychosis) will surely be excusable thanks to Necessity.  What was that Milton?  Tyrant’s plea?  Sorry, William Pitt was saying something about the creed of slaves and argument of tyrants.

Page 185

“I tried to think of a way to make him let me go.” Get the instep!  Elbow to the solar plexus!  Wait… we’re not talking about Edward.  Or the maybe not thugs from many chapters ago.  Or a golden retriever.  This is actually kind of sad, except the phrasing is pretty aggressive from Bella.  You’ve got to accent it right, or it comes out pretty…er… ambiguous in tone.  Kind of like shouting ‘don’t worry, you’ll get what you deserve!’  Just mess with the inflection on that sucker for a while.  Endless amusement.

“‘He’s not here,’ Edward said tensely.” But was he tense?  Is this a tense situations?  Perhaps he’s worried?  What, you mean something life-threatening could be going on right now?  How could I know if you didn’t use -adverbs-.  Also, I completely misread this as about Charlie, which made ensuing comments a lot funnier.

“I barely knew [Emmett] and yet somehow, not knowing when I would see him again after tonight was anguishing.” Perhaps because he’s second on your vampire-bones jumping list if ol’ Ed kicks it.  At this point, that is looking likely, as Edwards plans seem to consist of running away and biting his lip and running away.  Mind you, he also ran away from Bella at the beginning, so really, Edward’s plans are always ‘then I will run away,’ even if it’s just a teenage girl.  I will grant that he is apparently -better at running than everyone, even other vampires-, though now it seems to stem from doing it very often, and not just because operating his own legs is his ’second nature’.  Vampirism is like, his third nature.  Then ‘Baseball’.  Then probably ’squirrel-killing and tree-felling’, though to be perfectly honest, that’s just a work out for ’spousal abuse’, which is high up on the list.

There is a one-kiss make-out scene on the porch.  By the by, if I were Charlie, the battery-sabotaging, night-peeping, yet strangely lax parent, I would’ve been watching from a window.  But this is Charlie, the strangely lax parent, so he is not.  Porch make-out, secret-divulging, plot-ruining ensues.

“… the knotted old sock that contained my secret cash hoard.” Where does Bella get money again?  Is she one of the fabled people in the flashy ads that words from home to earn thousands of dollars on the internet?  Perhaps she is, and perhaps you could be, too!  Sign up now!

Page 186

“Though he was still bewildered, his grip was firm.” Showing that confusion, and allowing your teenage daughter to run away, do not necessarily need to be simultaneous events.

Wow, Bella uses the incredibly emotionally powerful words of her mother as she was leaving her father in order to drive her father into letting her drive off in to the night.  This is pretty good, and promises the emotional damage necessary to make the plot point believable.  Unfortunately, the final part of Bella’s mothers nuptially fatal message was apparently, “I really really hate Forks!” Surely, it was an emotionally trying time, but much like the sentence in the preface (for those of you not taking notes and thereby preserving sanity: “I knew that if I had never gone to Forks, I wouldn’t be facing death right now,”) the word ‘forks’ doesn’t really work with dramatic tension well.

“I ran wildly for the truck, visualizing a dark shadow behind me.” Uh, it may just be me, but I was still kind of focused on Charlie getting left behind standing in the doorway of his own house while his teenage daughter reenacted his divorce from her mother for him, in technicolor, 3-D, hi-def, surround sound Failure, so this one caught me again, as about Charlie.  I lamented Bella’s stumpy emotional capacity, but that easily explained away discomfort.  There may be an issue with ‘topic changes’ and ambiguity in this chapter, that I’m not equipped to-SQUIRREL!  (By the by, the squirrel rage, the insta-love, the hiding under the porch, the bumbling inability to most anything but ’smell’… this novel is actually about the dogs from “Up”.  So what if the chronology isn’t right?  It certainly doesn’t matter here, anyway.)

Page 187

“…his long hands…” bother me.  Seriously.  If they could just have had sex by now, we wouldn’t have this stupid description still cropping up to try futilely to describe his penis size.

“‘But it won’t be alright when I’m not with you.’” Who will run in terror at every setback, minor or major, if Edward isn’t there?

“‘It was the best idea — of course it was mine.’” Who is this person pretending to be Bella, and why did they step in to say a single sentence and then leave us alone with Bella and Edward talking?  The doppelganger got smooshed under the plot-train’s wheels… perhaps this is… a TWIN CLONE SOMETHING.  *soap opera music*

“The rage in his voice was directed internally.” ‘I wear my sunglasses at night, so I can, so I can, keep track of the visions in my eyes,’ from cornea damage due to repeated blows to the head.  I fall downstairs a lot.  (http://www.anysonglyrics.com/lyrics/c/corey-heart/sunglasses-at-night.htm)

Page 188  Informational Page!  Because you’ve forgotten what’s been going on for the past 10 pages already!

It is Bella’s fault.  No seriously.  We’re going to let Edward explain, “‘It is partially your fault… If you didn’t smell so appallingly luscious, he might not have bothered.  But then I defended you…’”
So it’s Bella’s fault because she’s just so appealing… but supposedly an attraction like yours is fairly unique right?  So it’s not really that she’s so interesting,
“‘If you had appealed to the tracker — or to any of them — the same way you appeal to me, it would’ve meant a fight right there.”
So…so…it’s just that he got interested, and you counter-played, then huh?  You cock-blocked him, so it led to conflict?
“‘…well, that made it a lot worse.’   …’But if I had stood by he would’ve killed you right then.’”
Right, right, ‘necessity’, tyrants, slaves, etcetera.  So, wait, can you reiterate that problem with the plot we had earlier?  You were running away, despite you having…
“‘…a large clan of strong fighters all bent on protecting the one vulnerable element.’”
The ‘element’ being dear Bella, here.  Right.  Thanks.  Just wanted that clear.  Oh, hey wait, I’ve already forgotten what I think you told me a few chapter ago,
“‘How can you kill a vampire?’” That was the question, thanks Bella! “‘…tear him to shreds, and then burn the pieces.’”
Oh, yeah, and what was the conclusion we came to a while back, as well, when we decided to run away?  Weren’t there no other options, really, but we decided on this plan because it was the best…
“‘I don’t think I have any choice but to kill him now.’”
Wait, uhm, didn’t Emmett give us the go-ahead on that one?  Why are we here again?
“‘Carlisle won’t like it.’”
Ah.  Okay.  Got it.  Nonsensical twit.

Page 189

“They flew up the stairs together.” Alright, a little mid-desperate-flight coitus for Alice and Jasper.  Okay.

“Roaslie watched them, and then moved quickly to Emmett’s side.” I suppose they’ll all rotate then.  Alright, good Cullen family policy: nobody dies a virgin, and we double check!  Except for that one time for Edward.  Sorry buddy, bad luck.

Laurent is not the leader, oh ho!  James is now not only deadly, but -the deadliest-!  Oh-ho-ho!  The Cullens have hurricane windows installed made of steel for one side of their glass house!  Oh-ho-ho-ho!  It is either Christmas or a bad night in the red light district around here, what with all the ‘ho’s getting dropped!

Rosalie says, Fuck Off!  Wise like Frankie, only much less friendly: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ORhT5YTZTjU&feature=related

Page 190

Bella is still vampire luggage.  Like a crocodile bag.  Or a lunch box.  However you want to see it.

“…Emmett carrying a heavy looking backpack over his shoulder.” Let it be guns.  Or weapons of any sort.  Or food.  It is probably face cream and twinkies, but I can hold out that one character will make sensible choices, can’t I?  Rosalie just did.

Apparently, Alice can just hold still and take a glimpse into the future.  And that is how the dramatic tension is punched in the kidneys this time.  Alice, “…closed her eyes and became incredibly still.” then came out with, “‘He’ll track you [being Edward and Carlisle, for whatever-the-fuck reason].  The woman will follow the truck.  We should be able to leave after that.’” What is the point of this bullshit?  Why is she so useless most of the time?  Why the hell are we suddenly relying on/ listening to/ taking advantage of Alice and her ticker-tape fortune cookie mouth?  “Her voice was certain.” Last time we heard a similar phrase, it yielded no result and everyone ignored her anyway.  Similar actions —> different results = no concept of continuity or development.

“His eyes went blank, curiously dead…” No.  Really quite explicably dead.  Seeing as how, he’s dead.

Page 191

“Alice’s phone seemed to be at her ear before it buzzed.” HA HA, BECAUSE SHE CAN TELL THE FUTURE DO YOU GET IT HA HA ITS LIKE THIS WHOLE THING IS A GODDAMN JOKE.

“‘You’re wrong… I can feel what you’re feeling now — and you are worth it.’” Ugh.  Oh, god she has to drive to Phoenix with this man.  I understand the reassurance, but let’s not be instantaneously creepy about our feelings.  Let’s work up to that.  (Actually, thinking upon it, pretty much everyone is right-out-there-instantaneous creepy, so let’s not be to hard on ol’ Jasper here.  After all, this may be his very first line.  Maybe second.  Good ol’ chips and dip.  We just can’t stay mad you, our own little cooler-of-beer).

“‘You’re the first one to ask permission.’” heeheehee, except it’s totally true, and likely will be true for always.

“…shielding me protectively.” This sort of ridiculous phrasing occurs all the time.  I just thought I hadn’t mentioned it in a while.  Don’t worry.  It’s still there.

I knew you were worried.  I could feel it.

And you’re wrong.  Wrongly wrong.  Now let’s have pie.