A Book Review for HPG

My neice and I both love to read, sleep, eat and laugh - preferably all in the same hour. Our ideal world would probably have a room with tons of books, comfy chairs, cozy pajamas, and decent food. Not much else is required to make us happy! We often recommend good books to one another and then talk about them after we've read them. I previously mentioned our reading of Jodie Picoult's books. This time HPG recommend (and couldn't stop talking about) a book called "Twilight" by Stephenie Meyer. She briefly outlined the story for me, and while I was intrigued I wasn't desperate to run out and find it. I'm a good Aunt. I did it anyway.

My first surprise was finding the book in the adult fiction (rather than young adult fiction) section of the library. Then when I read the blurb on the back, I seriously considered not reading it. I just don't "do" the whole vampire thing. I like my books to be set in the here and now, and if they're not going to be totally blow-your-mind thought-provoking, then they need to be mindless chick lit. However, a promise is a promise so I brought it home from the library. I intended to start reading it, find it boring, and then regrettably email HPG and tell her it sucked. So I brought it home, cracked it open (cup of tea and comfy jammies at the ready)....and then didn't put it down for 3 days.

She was right. The book rocks. I thoroughly enjoyed it, even though it really did move from being pleasant fiction into the whole vampire genre. It got seriously creepy towards the end there. However it was written with such grace and with such honesty that I found myself not thinking so much about the blood and guts as I was about the characters themselves. The only real problem I had was the fact that these WERE high schoolers. The emotion portrayed just seemed very, well, adult. Almost *too* adult. The exact same story could have been written outside of the high school arena, except that the setting allows the main characters to interact in a convenient fashion. Many of the conversations the main characters had just seemed well beyond the realm of a normal 17 year old. It just seemed a stretch that the main character totally accepts the fact that her boyfriend is a 100 year old vampire - even with the author emphasizing that she clearly is not a 'normal' 17 year old girl.

In short, it's a book well worth reading and I enjoyed being forced out of my usual genres of reading. It would seem from Amazon that this is only part one of a trilogy (?), so I might consider seeing if I can find the next one. Thanks, HPG, for the book recommendation - by the end of it I couldn't help finding myself somewhat grateful that you attend an all girls' school! Stay away from boys whose eye colour changes, okay? *grin*