Twilight update

I have finished the first book in the Twilight series. I actually quite enjoyed it. I can totally see why there are pre-pubescent girls the world over going absolutely gonzo for it. It's interesting that they're pushing Stephenie Meyer as the next JK Rowling. They're both great story tellers but neither are what you would call amazing writers. Some of the prose in Twilight is so clumsy it's almost painful ("my traitor tears, betraying me" caused me to wince and say "yeah, that's what traitors DO"). But then there were some sequences that were really great, like the "you're my brand of heroin" scene.

However, I am now on to New Moon, the second book in the series, and it's making me want to claw my face off. Bella Swan is a whiny little bitch and the first 150 pages of the book are self indulgent teenage moping at its worst. I found myself shouting "do you EVER fucking cheer up?" at the chapters. And when the moping and the hopeless teenage rebellion is delivered with Meyer's clunky prose and limited vocabulary, it makes it all the more grating. The sentence that mentions "the other unique vampire family" very nearly sent the book hurtling across the room. I wanted to email Meyer and say "Dear Ms Meyer. If something is unique then there cannot, by definition, be something else like it. Love and kisses, PCB". While my patience with the books are really being tested, I am determined to finish them. And with the backlash against the final book currently at full tilt, it looks like I have my work cut out for me.

And as for the upcoming movie? Well I hate to say it but I think it's gonna be a great big pile of suck. Many many internet forums have been overrun with ardent lovers of the book decrying pretty much every aspect of the film's production. Some of the casting is a little bit of a headscratcher (Carlisle in the book sounds absolutely nothing like Peter Facinelli that's for sure. Not least in the fact that he "is claiming to be 33, but can barely pass for 30." Facinelli is 35 and looks it.) But the two trailers that are currently online are just breathtakingly awful. The cutting is so lightning fast that it's pretty difficult to discern what is going on but they seem to have something from New Moon in there and have moved locations and changed costumes for no real reason. I have a feeling that the pre-release hysteria will look like nothing when the fans finally lay eyes on the finished film. If you want to watch the whole movie condensed into 90 seconds then please click here and watch the clips. It's staggering how much they give away. And how bad they look.