Daybust!: Breaking Dawn by Stephanie Meyer
I've been grumpy all day as I waited (unsuccessfully) for Amazon to deliver my preordered copy of Breaking Dawn (The Twilight Saga, Book 4),
Except for a few over-the-top fans who report that they l-o-o-o-ved the book, most of the fan reviews have been dreadful. As I write, the book stands at two-and-one-half stars on Amazon, with only 29 five-star ratings and 59 one-star votes. From the tone of many of those comments, a negative star category would have been appropriate for this one.
Most writers lament the lack of character development in Bella, who apparently has Paris Hilton beat in the shallowness department right through to the end. Then there is the problem of internal consistency with the previous books: authors are free to break the bounds of reality in a fantasy series, but readers have a right to expect that they will keep to the parameters they establish for the fantasy world they create. Apparently, Meyers allowed Bella to become pregnant despite the fact that early on she declared it impossible for vampires to give birth. The final issue that many early commenters shared was the downright creepy resolution of Bella's conflicted affection for Jacob (the werewolf) by having him imprint (i.e, bond as eternal lovers) upon Edward's and Bella's infant girl, improbably named Nessie.
I'm really sorry that the book has been disappointing. Heaven knows, the book business needs a blockbuster just now. Although I found the second and third books a bit tedious, I had hopes that Meyers would take Bella's choice--to chose immortality with Edward or to choose her human soul with its attendant mortality--and deal with it seriously. Bella's conflicted feelings at the end of Book 3 foreshadowed such a direction for the final book.
It looks like Stephanie Meyers was willing to break all her own rules to get to that happy ending. Too bad Romeo and Juliet had that fusty old bard writing their last scene!
Note: FYI: A YouTube video review link in the top five of a Google search triggered my security software, which closed and blocked it immediately.
posted by GTC at
8:58 PM
3 Comments:
Thank you for this. My husband and I bought two TWO copies one for each of our daughters and stood in line at midnight to get them.
I'm an avid reader. My kids were devouring the series and we used it as a great opportunity to spark dialogues about Bella and her unhealthy relationships.
But Breaking Dawn is the worst in the series. It was a great opportunity to bring closure to the story, instead it started and dropped threads, continued the same condescending attitude towards minorities, and while I was not bothered by all Bella's inevitable addiction to sex, WHY would Stephenie Meyer's introduce elements of wife swapping (when Edward begs Jacob to give Bella a replacement baby) and pedaphilia (Quil and Jacob fall in love with babies).
And Nessie was less pitiful than the baby's real name "Renesme Carlie" Proof that Bella should not have been allowed to marry let alone breed.
This could have been a story about love, sacrifice and redemption. Instead, it's beyond description.
Reading this was a waste of a weekend. I finally skimmed the last 360 pages (act 3) to see if it would get any better. It didn't. I'm going to read something else to get the rancid feeling of this book out of my head.
By
Anonymous, at 8:24 PM
Did anybody out there like this book?
I feel a bit bad for Stephanie Meyer. She must be googling for career change counselors about now.
By
Anonymous, at 8:32 PM
I'm the type of person who reads the last page of a book first, so I hunted down the spoilers a couple of days before the book was released. I was SO disappointed by what I read. Especially the baby's name--it was just so stupid!
Now that I'm half way through the book, I find to my surprise that I rather like it (not the name, though--that is STILL stupid).
It's different from the other books, but it fits given the structure of the book and point of view of the narrators.
I've seen quite a few of the criticisms of the book (most in scathing, hateful terminology), but I don't agree with most of them. I find parts of the book fascinating, parts of it frustrating, but overall an entertaining book.
--Cathy
By
Anonymous, at 12:28 PM
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