Chapters 22-Epilogue: Just d'awwwwful

Well, dear friends and esteemed onlookers, we're almost to the end. It's here, and it's queer (get that knot out of your knickers, it means 'odd'). Actually, odd isn't quite the right description; I was just going for the rhyme and light mockery of protest group chants. The last few chapters of this book are horribly, almost unethically, bland. Do pay attention, because I'm only going to revisit them this once...

Bella and co. hop a plane back to Forks, where Charlie finally starts acting the dad and blames Edward for everything bad that has ever happened in the world. Did I mention what a sympathetic character Charlie's suddenly shaping up to be?

When Bella wakes up from sleeping off her ordeal, Edward is there to explain that he never really wanted to leave and wouldn't have if he'd known how sad and stupid Bella would be about it, and how he 'can't live in a world where [she doesn't] exist'. He describes lying in the fetal position in meadows and generally poncing about in agony--apparently, he was sad and stupid about her, too. Don't mind that squelching sound, it's just my brain trying to escape again. Silly brain... you couldn't get away during the meadow scene, so you're certainly not going to manage it now. Settle down and let's get this over with.

Edward then vows that he'll never leave again, and that Victoria will die for trying to make Tender Vittles out of Bella. Unfortunately, there's only a chapter left for him to accomplish this in, so... he doesn't. I guess that's supposed to be the big hook for the next installment, but for now it's just further proof that Shmeyer can't write anything close to a critical scene without first dancing around in big, poorly-worded circles for several hundred pages.

In the last chapter. Bella calls a little pow-wow with the Cullen clan, concerning the Volturi's threat to check in and snarfle her if she's still human. The majority votes to turn her, but Edward throws a hissy until she agrees to wait until after her high school graduation. Later, Edward makes blackmail romantic by offering to turn Bella himself if she'll marry him.

My only note for the rest of the chapter reads 'together forever'. I can't remember specifically what that refers to, but my guess is that my brain wiped itself overnight to stave off life in a padded cell just a bit longer, and I'm not one to thank my own mind so shabbily as to read the chapter again. You're welcome, brain.

Finally, the epilogue-- Bella goes back to school, as do Edward and Alice. The Cullens somehow explain why they've abruptly moved back to where they abruptly left so recently, and it's waved off without much to-do. Bella is sickeningly happy with her re-instated loverboy--even if her father isn't--but she secretly keeps trying to get a hold of Jacob, who's also rather un-ecstatic about Edward's return. In fact, Jake is in such a snit that he drops off Bella's motorcycle for Charlie to find and subsequently have a cow over. Bella--with Eddie in tow as supporting wet-blanket--confronts Jacob in the woods, and he reminds Ed that the Sucky Mythical-Creature Treaty is broken if a human is bitten. With that damper put on Bella's tidy post-graduation plans, Jacob informs her that they can't be BFFs anymore before running off to continue not wearing a shirt.

The book ends with Bella friendless and grounded for life without parole, but she has Edward, and that seems to be enough for her.

BELLA'S TEAM: Eddie-kins 4 evah. Oh, joy.

OUR TEAM: Chuck that, the book is done! Over! Finished! Read to the end, thrown across the room, and then bricked up in a dark, damp corner where it can never hurt anyone ever again! Well, one copy at least. Stay tuned for closing thoughts...

Chapters 19-21: Eurotrip

Alice and Bella hop a plane to Italy, and as flights to Italy tend to be long, we're treated to the better part of a chapter's worth of talk. Most of it involves the Volturi, and we learn that they basically function as the grand high enforcers of vamp-culture, with the only rule being to keep the existence of vampires a secret. Aside from exposition, the chapter is conveniently full of Alice's handy-dandy visions, so we get to keep tabs on Edward whether we like it or not. According to Alice, Edward is going to ask the Volturi to kill him, they're going to tell him no, and he's going to have to resort to Plan 9 from Outer Sp-- I mean, Plan B, which is to royally piss them off.

While Bella is whinging and being put upon, Alice says she thinks that everyone's being ridiculous, and she might just turn Bella vampy herself to get it over with. This works as the proverbial carrot in front of the utter ass that we all know as Bella, who brings renewed enthusiasm to the rescue effort. She and Alice get off the plane, then steal a Porsche and drive to what is essentially the Volturi Vatican City (called 'Volterra'-- oh, Shmeyer, you're just too clever for us).

Because nothing in Bella's life can go down without the most minor of inconveniences, a festival slows the mission down in Volterra. Last we've heard from Alice's visions, Edward is planning to walk out into the sun at noon, thus exposing the existence of vampires (or at the very least, body glitter) and invoking the wrath of the Volturi. Bella arrives in the main square a few minutes before noon, spots Edward across the crowd, and in what is presumably the climax of the book she arduously slogs her way through a bunch of people to stop him from getting himself killed. Suffice it to say, I don't think I can properly communicate how non-climatically the whole effort reads.

Bella stops Edward just in time (surprise, surprise), but not before he attracts the attention of two of the Volturi guard, who proceed to make trouble until one of the actual Volturi shows up and drags everyone off through some sewer tunnels to an undisclosed location.

They end up in the Volturi court, where they meet Aro, an extremely old--and rather twee--vampire who takes a particular interest in Bella. Through a brief series of tests, it turns out that Bella is not only immune to Edward's psychic 'gift', but also to the gifts of all other vampires, further reminding us that she's the MOST damned special person in the whole wide Shmeyerverse.

After Aro and the other Volturi elders confer, they decide that really the only problem is Bella, who knows about vampires and therefore must be disposed of or else become a vampire herself. Edward is still quite angsty and conflicted about the whole thing, but Alice convinces Aro that she intends to turn Bella eventually, and they're all allowed to go free after all. However, Aro advises them that the Volturi will be checking in at some point to ensure that the deed is done, OR ELSE.

Wait... was THAT supposed to be the climax? It's so hard to tell.

Anyway, as they're leaving, they pass an incoming 'tour group' of people for the Volturi to snack on, and Bella is wildly traumatized.

MATTERS OF PROBABLE IMPORTANCE:

1. If you live in the Shmeyerverse and you're motivated by love, grand theft auto has no consequences.

2. Actual, physical fights don't happen in the Shmeyerverse. Neither do climactic events.

BELLA'S TEAM: Edward.

OUR TEAM: Team Trampled by Tourists, Team Interpol, Team Tying Up Loose Ends, Team Free Scenic Tours of Volterra for People Named Bella... take your pick.

Chapters 16-18: Things Are Looking Increasingly Sparkly

Right then, toasties. On with the awful.

Bella gets saved in the nick of time by Jacob, but she's disappointed to find that he isn't Edward. He takes her back to the house to recuperate, where she falls asleep on the couch and dreams of Romeo and Juliet, and Paris, that guy no one cared about in Romeo and Juliet. This gets her contemplating giving up on her bedazzled dreamboat and just settling for Jacob. When Jake drives her home, they have a brief, awkward moment in the car before he smells vampire, and Bella notices the Mr. Dr. Cullen-mobile in front of her house. She argues with him and assures him it's okay, but he just angrily tells her not to get killed and runs off into the forest.

Bella opens the door to find Alice, who came to find her after having a vision of the cliff-diving incident. She's surprised--and slightly annoyed--but relieved to find Bella alive. Bella quickly fills her in about the Victoria problem and how Jake's a werewolf, then after getting her sufficiently concerned, she begs Alice to stay and hyperventilates until she agrees.

The next day, Alice has to 'step out for a moment' when Jacob comes over to grill Bella about whether the Cullens are coming back. He calms down and almost kisses Bella, but they're interrupted by the phone ringing. Alice then comes in looking distraught and says 'Edward', causing Bella to faint. Once she's revived, it's disclosed that Edward thinks she's dead, and is now going to Italy to get himself killed by the Volturi, those afore-mentioned royal-ish vamps. Despite Jacob's protests, Alice and Bella run off on a rescue mission.

MATTERS OF PROBABLE IMPORTANCE:

Hmm... nope, that's about it.

BELLA'S TEAM: Team Save the Edward.

OUR TEAM: Team Violent, Drunken Football Hooligans. Alice and Bella are going to have to travel across Europe, and I'm willing to bet they don't know what the Manchester United song is...

Chapters 13-15: Spring Break Shark Attack!

... If only.

I'm tired of this book, and that really needs no introduction. Let's go.

Bella hurries over to La Push to warn Jacob that people are trying to kill him and his werewolf posse, and to ask him if he and his werewolf posse been killing people. Jacob assures her that vampires are the ones who have been killing people, and that the werewolves have only been killing vampires. Bella approves.

Jacob then calls a meeting of the gang, basically by using his feelings. The boys show up and aren't very happy about Bella being around (No Girls Allowed! It says it right on our clubhouse, dude!). One of them, a 'Paul', gets so huffy that he and Jacob throw down and have a wolf-fight right there, more for our benefit than anyone else's (... they're werewolves, did you notice? Did you?). Sam tells the others to take Bella to his fiancee Emily's house while he tries to break up the kerfuffle.

They head over to Emily's, and Sam, Jake, and Pissy Paul show up soon after. The gang quickly turns out to be one big happy family, all giving off that same vague likableness as Jacob, at least compared to every other character in this damned series. Jake explains that their now-arch-nemesis Victoria is after Bella, which earns our hated heroine a security detail.

Bella spends pretty much all of her spring break (which it conveniently is, at this point in the story) in La Push. Jacob and the gang are still off hunting Victoria most of the time, so the majority of Chapter 15 is devoted to Bella brooding about boys, and Jake's safety (but mostly boys). Jacob gets a day off and promises to finally take Bella cliff-diving, but they get a hot lead on Victoria, and he has to skive off to try to save the day. Bella decides to take herself cliff-diving, and the chapter ends with her starting to drown, then hallucinating about Edward, then continuing to drown.

Spoiler alert--She doesn't drown after all. What a tease.

MATTERS OF PROBABLE IMPORTANCE:

1. Jake's friend Quil may or may not turn into a werewolf, but there's been much discussion about it. MUCH discussion. In fact, if he doesn't have some sort of absolutely ridiculous crisis soon, it's going to be a real letdown.

2. Werewolves don't REALLY turn at the full moon, you historically- and mythologically-accurate nerds. They turn when they get angry or upset and can't calm themselves down... Hulk rules, basically, but with fur instead of verdancy.

3. Werewolves also have higher temperatures than normal people, so they don't like wearing shirts.

4. Bella spends a lot of time 'not being able to breathe'.

BELLA'S TEAM: Team Jacob, but then she went all Team Edward toward the end there.

OUR TEAM: Team Drown. Drown you poorly-conceived, chagrin-filled, soul-sucking wench! DROWN! Sigh... it's hopeless, isn't it?

Chapters 10-12: In Which Our Super-Sleuth Sockling Unravels a Not-So-Mysterious Mystery

Good news, toasties-- we've reached double-digit chapters. I think this also means we're halfway through, but I'm increasingly convinced that this book is interminable.

After making herself a complete bother results in no more information about Jacob's mystery {COUGH sputter hack} condition, Bella's back to the internet to find out what's wrong. This time, though, Shmeyer put off the moment of realization for later, so even her brilliant little Bella still can't figure it out. She leaves Jacob--and Billy--alone for a week, and we're treated to another abrupt spiral into pitiful, pining despair. Her ridiculousness just worsens when she finds out that Jake's all better but is out with friends other than her, which she takes as conclusive evidence that he just doesn't care anymore.

After more brooding than I ever care to remember, she decides to try to find the meadow herself, and wouldn't you know it, she succeeds. Upon realizing that the meadow is just one more disappointment, though, she assumes the fetal position and starts hyperventilating (NOTE: I've read ahead. Get used this reaction). Laurent, of all people--or rather, vampires--shows up, and after giving off overt serial-killer vibes throughout an over-long conversation, he tells Bella that Victoria sent him to find her. Victoria wants revenge for the Hunting and Subsequent Ripping-Up and Burning of James Affair from the first book, but Laurent informs Bella that he's rather thirsty, so he's going to eat her instead, Victoria's wrath be damned. Luckily and conveniently for Bella, a pack of giant wolves show up and chase Laurent off into the woods. Bella trips her way back home, tells Charlie that the bears everyone's been worried about aren't bears (oh yes, everyone's been worried about bears, did I mention?), and heads to bed, where she thinks about how Victoria's coming for her. Oh, by the way--that makes her hyperventilate again.

A few more days go by, and still no word from Jacob. Bella mopes increasingly. In one of her fits of sanctimonious victimhood, she tells herself (and therefore us, le sigh) that he's safer if she just stays away anyway. However, she suddenly remembers the Sam Uley gang and quickly decides that Sam and company have gotten a hold of Jacob, and that she's going to rescue him. She heads to La Push and finds Jacob, but sure enough, he's with his new posse--and quite hostile, to boot. After receiving a less-than-warm welcome, Bella argues with Jacob for a while, at which point he goes all sulky-sensitive and tells Bella he's not good enough to be her friend anymore, runs into his house, and pulls all the shades closed.

Later that night, while Bella's trying to sleep, she hears a-scratching at her window. Assuming it's Victoria coming to get her, Bella very nearly drops dead of her own terrified accord, but it turns out to be Jacob coming to apologize. They talk briefly about something being wrong with Jake, and Bella utterly fails to deduce what it could be. After Jake leaves, Bella has a dream in which he turns into one of the wolves who snuffed Laurent. Mystery solved. Who knew dreams could be so literal? Next person to have a dream about curing cancer wins at life.

Bella wakes up to the news that a reward is being offered for shooting giant wolves, which distresses her greatly for a page or two. We're then left with her pondering whether werewolves are bad people.

MATTERS OF PROBABLE IMPORTANCE:

...Jacob's a werewolf.

BELLA'S TEAM: Increasingly Jake-y.

OUR TEAM: Team Oxygen Deprivation. Too much hyperventilation is bad for you... and for your character development, incidentally.

Chapters 7-9: The Promise of Change is Just Another Aneurysm for the Reader

As of the end of Chapter 6, Bella was feeling just a touch more reasonable than we've ever seen her, and her life was fraught with the theme of New Beginnings. She was interacting with actual people, and her prospective boy-toy wasn't completely dreadful. Could it be? Is our soggy little sockling finally becoming-- dare I say it-- well-adjusted? Oh, of course not!

Very soon into Chapter 7, Bella goes a bit mental and poorly rationalizes her way over to the Cullen house. She spends several pages expounding on how dark and depressing it looks, and she laments not being able to hear Edward's voice just by looking at his dark, depressing house.

She's quickly back to Jacob, though, calling his company a 'fix' and acknowledging how much healthier she feels around him (wait... is he her personal brand of heroin now?). They spend most of their time together, as Jacob fixes up the bikes and Bella does what she does best (in other words, nothing). In an effort to hide her motorcycle-based reckless intent from her father (and to keep up those good-student appearances Shmeyer keeps telling us about) Bella and Jacob start doing their homework occasionally. Also, now that Bella has remembered yet again that she has school friends, Angela and Mike are being friendly... in Mike's case, very, very friendly.

Despite homework getting in the way, the motorcycles finally get fixed up, and it's time to tease us one again with the sort of mild peril that is certain to only damage Bella a teensy-weensy bit. Jacob takes Bella out toward the sea cliffs for a bike lesson, and on the way they observe some of the locals 'cliff diving'-- that is to say, diving off cliffs. Bella, increasingly eager to damage herself a teensy-weensy bit, insists that Jacob takes her cliff diving sometime. Instead of saying, 'No, Bella, you suck at life and all things related to basic functioning, and you will only get yourself thoroughly splatted,' Jacob launches into a lengthy, somewhat-related exposition about Sam Uley and his 'La Push gang'. It seems Sam and a few of his mates have set themselves up as a sort of 'peacekeeper' group and are even recognized by the reservation council as being stand-up dudes. They're generally respected around La Push, but Jacob thinks they're sketchy as can be.

The bike riding finally happens, and wouldn't you know it, Bella hurts herself. A lot. She doesn't mind a bit, though, because she keeps hearing Ed's voice again, telling her to stop being an idiot and getting herself injured--which, of course, makes her continue to be an idiot and get herself injured.

After several ER visits, the bike riding is put aside for awhile. Bella doesn't want Charlie getting wise to her wanton disregard for her physical limitations (which are, to be sure, extensive), but she mostly wants to hunt for that horrible meadow where so many pages of the first book were frittered away in oozy, author-indulgent bliss. Oh, joy.

In the meantime, Mike continues to be very friendly. Bella finally agrees to go to a movie with him, but quickly makes it a group event and invites several other friends, including Jacob. When movie night rolls around, everyone calls up sick expect Mike and Jacob, so Bella spends a fun-filled evening with the two vying for her affection in strange, cat-fighty ways that most boys outside the Shmeyerverse wouldn't bother with. Mike, however, ends up sick himself, and spends most of the movie in the loo, while Bella and Jacob have a lovely, long-winded conversation about how she likes him, but isn't 'in like' with him (for the record, though, he is SO her BFF, like, for realzies).

Jacob drops Bella off at home (they may or may not have taken care of Mike... I don't remember) and tells her that she can always count on him and a few other, similar things. Later that night they both end up getting sick, but Bella gets over her own little stomach flu fairly quickly and calls to check on Jacob. Billy answers the phone and informs her that Jacob has something other than the stomach flu, and that she absolutely should not come over to visit until they let her know he's all better. It's all very questionable. Now, let's pretend we all live under rocks and have never seen or heard anything that has to do with New Moon. It'll make it more special.

MATTERS OF PROBABLE IMPORTANCE:

1. Jacob mentions that his friend Embry has ditched him for the Sam Uley Bunch. He adds that guys around his age have been missing long periods of school, then upon showing up again are acting strangely and hanging around with Sam and the gang. That couldn't happen to anyone we know, though, right?

2. Jacob takes off his entire shirt to stanch one of Bella's biking boo-boos. As far as we know, he still hasn't put it back on.

BELLA'S TEAM: Jacob.

OUR TEAM: Motorcycles+trees. Honorable mentions go to Team Stomach Flu and Team Shirt. On the other hand, Team Live Under a Rock is sounding better all the time.

Chapters 4-6: And then there was one... one hideously angsty, compulsive idiot named Bella.

Well, I turned the last page of Chapter 3, and instead of Chapter 4, I saw a page with one word:

OCTOBER.

Oh dear. I turn the next three pages. Sure enough, each one has a single word.

NOVEMBER.

DECEMBER.

JANUARY.

Yep. It's simultaneously one of the most clever devices Shmeyer will probably ever use (hardly an accomplishment), and so unblinkingly, unabashedly melodramatic that it makes my intestines seize up in a blind panic to flee my body and get far, far away from this book. That being said, most of the chapters I've read thus far in the Twilight series are superfluous at best, so if only Shmeyer had thought to replace each useless chapter in with one month-page, we might still have a thriving rainforest... but alas, she's up to her old, poorly-worded hijinks after January.

Four months of sweet, sweet nothing are broken by Charlie's threats to send Bella to live with her mother in Jacksonville, on account of she's... well, doing absolutely nothing. Apparently, all we've missed the last four months is Bella moping to the degree that she's gone above and utterly beyond our expectations for her bland character profile, even reaching the elusive point of transcendence past the term 'damp sock'-- she is now as a god in the pantheon of dull laundry descriptors. Our Lady of the Soggy Socks 'n' Undies Load rebuts Charlie's assessment by goading old pal Jessica into going to a movie, but it backfires when she chooses the zombie flick and, in a rare flash of self-awareness, realizes she's more of a drag than the zombies. Later, when she and Jessica are walking down a sketchy street toward their dinner destination, she sees some seedy-looking men standing outside a bar and starts to approach them for no well-articulated reason. Jessica has an absolute cow, but no one really seems to care (including Shmeyer). Finally, Bella stops because she hears Edward's voice in her head, telling her to knock it off. Oh, good... here we thought he'd actually be gone for more than a chapter, but I suppose we should have known better.

Jessica's evening is thoroughly ruined to the point that she may never speak to Bella again, but Bella is much too excited about her little hallucEDnation (heh, see what I did there) to really notice. Later that night she muses to herself (and to us, unfortunately) that, though she knows he's gone, the fact that he exists is what keeps her going. She then resolves to do all sorts of nutty and reckless things so she can hear his voice telling her not to get herself killed. What a healthy outlook she's developing.

At some point before Bella reaches her decision to be dangerous and whatnot, there's a whole swarm of pages devoted to her agonizing over Edward. She's also been having a nightmare about searching the woods, then realizing there's nothing to search for... or something like that.

In her new spirit of danger-driven stupidity, Bella ends up with two broken-down motorcycles. She remembers that Jacob Black is a fair mechanic (and, y'know, exists), so she takes the bikes over to him. He's just glad to see her, so he agrees to fix the bikes up for free. Good student that Shmeyer keeps telling us she is, Bella insists on using her college fund to pay for any new parts needed, and the two set out on a magical motorcycle-building adventure.

Bella starts spending a lot of time with Jacob, watching him work on the bikes. Jacob is optimistic, friendly, and easy to talk to-- in other words, lots of nice, healthy things that Edward is not. Being around Jake cheers Bella up, and rather abruptly, given that we've just been treated to a nonstop three-chapter whinge about how Ed's gone and her life is over. At any rate, Chapter 6 ends with Bella in relatively high spirits.

MATTERS OF PROBABLE IMPORTANCE

1. Bella meets Jacob's two best friends. They're named Quil and Embry. They don't like their names. They'll probably come up a lot.

2. Bella stops having her little nightmare once she starts hanging out with Jacob, but a few nights later she has it again, this time with Sam Uley lurking around and seemingly changing shape in her peripheral vision.

3. Bella starts interacting with her school friends again.

4. People keep mentioning sightings of a big, bear-like creature in the woods... so many times, in fact, that I feel a bit as if Shmeyer has been beating me over the head with a big, bear-like creature while screaming, 'Notice me!'

GOOD NEWS: Um, well... we're six chapters further along than we were at the outset.

BAD NEWS: It's still New Moon--wait, why did I even bother to make Good News/Bad News a thing? We all know there's really no good news to be had in this situation. Let's try something else:

BELLA'S TEAM: Jacob.

OUR TEAM: February. March. April.

Chapters 1-3: Worse-Case Scenarios, and the Beginning of the Downhill Tumble

Here we go, toasties-- it's New Moon time. Brace yourselves, then let's jump in and allow the instant sarcasm wash over us like a tidal wave of crushed literary hopes and dreams.

The whole shebang starts with Bella having a dream (odds bodkins, this feels familiar), in which she is a crusty old bat, while Edward is still... well, Edward, the sparkling teenaged wanker who kisses her cheek and wishes her happy birthday. She awakes in a dither and remembers that it is in fact her birthday, and the dream quite expressed how she feels about turning old as dirt... or rather, 18. She spends the day in a special-occasion snit, being rude to everyone who mentions the 'black event' (her birthday, not the Million Man March) and only agreeing to go to the Cullen's for a party after much smoldering and vampy coercion courtesy of Edward and Alice. Bella manages to stave off the festivities til evening by insisting that she and Edward have to watch Romeo and Juliet for class first, which smacks loudly of foreshadowing.

Evening rolls around and everyone heads over to the Cullen house, which is very pinkly-decorated for the occasion. Bella, however, can't seem to go anywhere without manufacturing a crisis, ad she gets a bloody little boo-boo while opening a present. Jasper goes blood-crazy and slams into Edward, who has jumped protectively in front of Bella, who goes flying into the spread; the whole bit plays out rather like a perverse (and probably, quite entertaining) game of dirty croquet. Bella ends up a bleeding, glass-covered mess, so Jasper is quickly bundled out of the house, accompanied by the rest of the family, and Bella gets to cap off her fun-filled birthday evening with Mr. Dr. Cullen plucking glass out of her wounds and stitching her up sans anesthetic.

As we discovered in the first book, Edward and Bella each have their own strikingly poor ways of handling crises, and this chapter doesn't disappoint (or rather, it does... but that's hardly a surprise). The next day at school--and the days following-- Edward is aloof to the point that Bella agonizes over his behavior and even hyperventilates on her way to work one afternoon. She compulsively (conveniently, even) takes up her parents' birthday presents-- a camera and a scrapbook-- and starts obsessively documenting Forks, particularly the Edward-y parts. Soon after Bella starts her somewhat stalker-ish new hobby, though, Edward breaks the rather abrupt news that he and his family are leaving Forks to start over elsewhere, and Bella will never ever see him again. He makes her promise not to do anything reckless, plants a smooch on her forehead, and bolts away into the woods before Bella quite knows what's hit her. Always the stoic, she reacts by stumbling pitifully through the woods for hours in a blind bid to feel she's being productive, eventually slopping down against an unfamiliar tree, with nightfall and rain thrown in for extra oomph.

She's eventually found by a search party that includes Charlie, who takes her to a hitherto-unmentioned doctor (because for Bella, a doctor a day keeps the... hm, well, nevermind). While pretending to sleep after her checkup, she overhears the doctor and Charlie discussing the Cullen family's sudden disappearance, chalking it up to a very sudden job offer. They muse over the mystery of the whole thing without giving any more information at all, so Bella loses interest shortly after we do and stops narrating about it, thank heaven.

When Bella finally arrives back home, she finds that Edward has rooted through her room and removed all the pictures she took of him (not to mention the totally sweet mix-CD he made her) in an effort to remove all traces of himself from her life. Sigh... let the angst begin.

MATTERS OF PROBABLE IMPORTANCE

1. While watching Romeo and Juliet, Edward muses about vampire suicide, and how he was contemplating it during the Bella-damaging affairs of the first book. As I said... foreshadowing? Smackety smack.

2. Edward mentions the Volturi, whom he describes as being sort of like the vamp-version of the Royal family. They also happen to be the vampires Mr. Dr. Cullen stayed with in Italy all those years ago. I'm guessing they're important.

3. While stitching Bella up, the good Mr. Dr. tells her that Edward believes vampires have lost their souls, and therefore thinks that to turn Bella would be to snarfle her soul into oblivion.

4. As one of her birthday presents, the Cullens give Bella plane tickets to Jacksonville so she and Edward can visit Bella's mum. Now that Ed's gone and Bella's pouting, the fate of the plane tickets is unknown.

5. Of the search party that goes looking for Bella, several are men from the reservation. The one who actually finds her is named Sam Uley. He comes up later.

GOOD NEWS-- Edward's gone, and he's taken the dazzle with him.

BAD NEWS-- The book is from Bella's point of view.

Epilogue (or, Chapter Twenty-Five)

Apologies for the delay, toastyreaders, but seeing as I can no longer stave off the second Twilight book with wonderful excuses like, 'If I don't read the entire Harry Potter series again before the next movie, Molly Weasley might avada kedavra my sorry bum,' I can therefore no longer avoid commenting on the oozy, should-be-unnecessary blat of Shmeyerrhea that the author has gone and called an 'epilogue', presumably so it can squelch about happily in delusions of its own importance. And so, with no more ado... the final bits of Twilight.

NOT-QUITE-CHAPTER SUMMARY-- Edward shoves a thoroughly dolled-up Bella into the ol' silver Volvo, and she spends more than three pages figuring out what was painfully obvious within a few sentences (or within the first few chapters of the book, if you've been paying attention)-- Edward has duped her into going to the prom. Once she realizes what he's up to, she makes a grand fuss, but he quickly smolders her into submission. They arrive at the prom, and Edward quiets Bella's protests of supreme clumsiness by allowing her to stand on his feet while he shows off his 100-year-old dancing skills. Jacob Black shows up out of nowhere and cuts in, then explains with much embarrassment that Billy bribed him to come to the dance and ask Bella to 'please' dump Edward. He hesitantly adds, emphasizing the 'Godfather'-esque absurdity of the situation, that Billy also said to inform Bella 'we'll be watching'. They share an awkward laugh, then Smooth Eddie cuts back in and whisks Bella outside to gaze sappily into the moon. He explains that he's forced her to go to prom because he wants her to have a normal human life, even if she's with him. Normally, this would seem a touch sadistic, as he's basically telling her she deserves the same miserable high school experience everyone else gets to have, but remember that this is the Shmeyerverse-- everyone loves Bella and tries their best to make her life perfect, and anyone who doesn't has death or, at the very least, obscurity to look forward to. Bella confesses that she had initially hoped Edward had changed his mind and was going to turn her after all (because in the event of an excruciating three-day-long transformation, one should always look one's best), then in spite of Edward's protests, she insists that she really, really wants to be a vampire. Ed makes a great show of leaning in and heaving great stalker-breaths on her throat for a few seconds before he pulls back and coyly tells her 'no'. However, he recovers by saying some wildly smarmy things about 'love' and 'forever', then slobbers romantically on Bella's neck. The end.

And now, in the spirit of this monstros--ehem, book, it's time to talk about feelings.

THE IMP.TOAST OVERVIEW OF TWILIGHT--

I hate this book even more than I expected to, and with good reason-- nothing should be as poorly-worded, riddled with infuriating characters, and downright nauseating as this soggy little yarn. There are many dreadful things that can be said about Twilight, but many of them have already been said by bigger experts and better wordsmiths, so I'm simply going to express my opinion of the book, with a steaming pile of literary imagery:

Imagine being trapped at a summer camp where the climate is terrible, the weather is always the opposite of what you want it to be, and most enjoyable diversion available is getting so lost in the woods that you wander aimlessly for three or four days, fighting off the occasional rabid squirrel, before stumbling upon camp again. The camp counselors don't notice when you get back; they're all successful lobotomy patients who spend their time discussing sports that they're barely aware of. Your bunkmates are all wildly narcissistic, but simultaneously have low self-esteem to the point of being psychologically unstable. They spend every waking moment creating unnecessary drama out of thin air, and at least one of them cannot communicate without violent hyperbole. There is one toilet in camp, and it consists of a shallow hole in the ground that is invariably filled with strange and terrifying fluids that should never come out of a human body.

You and your bunkmates live in that toilet.

That toilet is Twilight.

Chapter Twenty-Four (In which things could have been wrapped up quickly, but then Shmeyer would've had to stop writing)

Well, toastyreaders, we've finally reached the last chapter. Don't get excited just yet, though-- a soggy epilogue is close on its heels.

CHAPTER SUMMARY-- Bella wakes up in the hospital to find Edward sitting in the corner, pretending to nap. He informs her, among other other things, that her mother is off getting coffee and will be back soon. When Bella asks how her vamp-related injuries were explained to her mother, he responds that they're saying she fell down two flights of stairs and out of a window (what's important to note is that Bella is so egregiously bad at basic physical functions that at this point, no one has a problem believing she's capable of such a tumble). The subject of James also comes up--finally--but gets brushed aside with the explanation that Emmett and Jasper 'took care of him'. Alice saw the tape of the incident, including James' long-winded exposition, and therefore knows all about her hitherto-mysterious past. At this point in the proceedings, Bella's mum returns and tells Bella that Phil (formerly known as the Not Very Good Ball Player) has been signed to a team after all, so now they get to settle down in Jacksonville, and Bella can come live with them in the heat and sunshine; however, Bella, much to the surprise of hardly anyone, insists that she's changed her mind and wants to stay in Forks, despite how much she previously raved otherwise. After a bit more fussing and whatnot, Mom takes off for some forgettable reason, and Edward tells Bella in a bit of a roundabout way that she should go live with her mother, 'somewhere he can't hurt her'. Bella, as per usual, goes completely nuts. Edward tries to call the nurse to sedate her, but Bella insists that he's just trying to leave her forever and makes him swear he'll stay. Once he's assured her he won't leave, Bella incites another argument about how he could have just let her turn into a vampire, and thus wouldn't have to worry about accidentally damaging her. The conversation gets Edward a bit huffy, especially when Bella guesses that the reason for Ed and Alice's tension--Alice has had a vision in which Bella is a vampire. Finally, Bella lets Edward order more sedatives and pain meds for her, after he's promised not to leave for the 87th time.

NOTABLE NOTES--

1. While Edward is pretending to nap, Bella's mum comments that he never leaves. We've noticed that, too. Bella shouldn't be so bleeding worried about him leaving-- if anything, she should tell him to once in a while.

2. To collaborate the story of Bella's two-staircases-and-a-window incident, it's mentioned that Alice very enthusiastically fabricated evidence at the hotel where it's supposed to have happened. I would much rather have read a chapter about that.

INTENSITY OF EDWARD'S STARE-- It's not going anywhere. It promises.

Chapter Twenty-Three (In which not many pages are spent giving not much information, and the book lets us down even harder than we thought it would)

We've finally found it-- the shortest chapter in the whole sodding book. That being said, it's not terribly informative, and it reads as if Shmeyer suddenly remembered she had a pint of ice cream waiting in the fridge and thus couldn't be bothered to properly tell us what happened in the mirror room.

CHAPTER SUMMARY-- The chapter kicks off with Bella assuring herself that she must be dead, because she hears an angel. The 'angel' turns out to be Edward--painfully obvious, since we're (unwillingly) in the Shmeyerverse, and thus Edward is the only being who could ever merit a word like 'angel', as he has so many times in this book already. Not only is the bit wildly unnecessary, it reads like the worst of pick-up lines. At any rate, as Bella comes to, she hears Edward flipping his sparkly lid as Mr. Dr. Cullen assesses her injuries-- a broken leg here, some cracked ribs there--and they finally notice she's been bitten on the hand. Bella whines about her burning boo-boo while Edward and Alice have a nice, angsty spat about what's to be done; Mr. Dr. Cullen interrupts and proposes that Edward try to suck the venom out, which sends Edward into a tizzy of angst and self-doubt. He wastes so much time commenting on his emotional tailspin that you can almost feel a noxious musical number about to happen, but he's yanked back into the thin line of the story by Mr. Dr. Cullen's insistence that he has to act quickly. Edward sucks it up (PUN) and sucks the the venom out of Bella's hand. The burning sensation recedes with it, and Bella passes out in Edward's arms.

NOTABLE NOTES--

1. Despite his importance leading into the chapter, James is entirely absent--it seems Shmeyer is so astoundingly unable to write a bit of action that she's unceremoniously stricken him from the story, in lieu of writing a coherent narrative. The only allusion to James' part in the whole messy business (presumably) is the passing mention of a faint gasoline smell.

INTENSITY OF EDWARD'S STARE-- In short, Edward sucks.

Chapter Twenty-Two (In which Bella actually does something)

Well, toastyreaders, here's another woefully lengthy chapter that demands an over-long summary. However, if you read the whole thing, you'll be rewarded, and someone will beat the flaming snot out of Bella.

CHAPTER SUMMARY-- Bella returns to the front room to find Alice mid-vision. Jasper, who's just returned from checking out of the hotel, asks what she saw, to which Alice dazedly replies 'Bella'. She then shakes it off and says it was nothing new, but Bella realizes the jig is up and Alice knows what she's going to do. There's a tense drive to the airport, wherein Alice and Bella make stunted conversation to cover the fact that Alice knows and Bella knows Alice knows (let's not forget that Jasper now knows, and can probably sense that Bella knows that they both know...). At any rate, when they get to the airport, Bella announces she's going to get 'breakfast' and takes Jasper with her instead of Alice so that she can pull the ol' Ladie's Bathroom Trick-- Jasper, a dude, has to wait outside the bathroom, so Bella leaves through the other exit and makes a run for it. Once again, Jasper and Alice have to sacrifice their established intelligence and act monumentally thick for a few moments so that Bella can have a cunning bit. Once Bella gets outside, she snatches a cab from a nice, 'tired' couple and throws some money and her mum's address at the driver, then spends the duration of the ride lost in a nauseatingly soggy daydream about Edward. Her reverie is broken (huzzah!) when the cabbie asks her to confirm the address, then dumps her at her mother's house. She follows James' directions and calls the number he's left next to the phone, at which point he tells her to go to the dance studio. You may be wondering about all this runaround when we--and practically every character in this book--have known for a while that Bella's going to end up at the dance studio, but realize that James doesn't know that we know and she knows and they know. Shmeyer, with her (alleged) degree in English literature, has invoked the idea of third-person omniscience in a first-person book and beaten us over the head with a Useful Fact to be Used Later so that even the dullest among us can feel prescient. Anyway, after some dreary and forgettable reminiscing about life, Bella trips her way to the dance studio and bursts through the doors, only to find that her mother's voice was just the VCR playing all along (you may recall that I mentioned the VCR wreaked of trap-iness a chapter or two ago... Shmeyer clearly didn't give my third-person omniscience its due credit). James then shows up to gloat about the fact that he was able to trap her with the clever use of a VCR (hell, that he was able to USE a VCR), and promptly begins monologuing--the cardinal sin of villains, yes, but he's doing it properly. Monologuing is a problem when you have a frayed bungee-cord loosely wrapped around Batman and you wax poetic about world domination with your back turned, but when you're staring down the world's clumsiest damp sock of a character and she has nowhere to go, nothing to do, and no backup, exposition has never been more fun. And at first, it is-- with his delightfully twisted politeness and friendly demeanor, James is probably the most interesting thing in this book so far. He's a top bloke, despite how he wants to eat Bella--scratch that, ESPECIALLY since he wants to eat Bella--until he goes a little too far with the exposition. At first, he's just setting up a camera to film dinner, saying how this was all too easy and he wants Edward to come after him to make things fun, but then he starts going on about his previous exploits and suddenly we've got Alice's entire mysterious back-story hurled at us from heaven-knows-where. It seems this has all happened before-- back in the 1920's, a vampire was in love with a girl who was institutionalized for having visions, and to save her from James, the vamp broke the girl out of the loony bin and turned her vampy, too. She was James' only target to have ever escaped, so in revenge he killed the vampire who turned her, and somehow Bella deduces that the girl was Alice. James then briefly dwells on the irony that he's taking Bella from the Cullens, but they still get the only prey he's ever lost. Finally, he decides to get on with things; he circles, Bella tries to run, and he kicks her into a few mirrors and breaks her leg before she realizes she's bleeding and hopes he can't toy with her much more before killing her--the best ending of any chapter so far? I think so.

NOTABLE NOTES--

1. James mentions that Bella's lack of self-preservational skills is interesting. If he'd had to read about every instance of her tripping, falling, dropping things, running into doors, and generally failing at life, I'm willing to bet he'd rethink that statement.

2. While going through Alice's backstory and whatnot, James mentions that she smelled even better than Bella. He then apologizes and assures Bella she has a very nice smell. What an oddly charming bastard.

3. After being little more than a topic of conversation the last few chapters, James is finally being interesting-- which means Shmeyer's going to kill him off very, very soon. Things that steal the spotlight from Bella aren't allowed to live (other characters' intelligence, for example).

INTENSITY OF EDWARD'S STARE-- Wonderfully absent this chapter. Wherever it is, though, God forbid it makes for a more enjoyable read-- then Shmeyer might have to blind Ed for the remainder of the series.

Chapter Twenty-One (or, Nothing Interesting Happens in a Hotel Room, Pt 2)

(Or, Please Oh Please Oh Please Someone Get Me Out of This Hotel Room)

CHAPTER SUMMARY-- Still confined to the hotel room, Bella wakes up early again and wanders into the front room for no real reason. There, Alice is sketching a new room from a new vision. Bella recognizes it as a room in her mother's house, prompting Alice to immediately call the good Mr. Dr. and company. Bella hyperventilates for a bit, resisting Jasper's attempts to calm her down-- he's had to so many times over the last three chapters, she seems to have built up a tolerance. Alice hangs up and tells Bella Edward is coming to get her so he can hide her elsewhere, throwing Bella into another rant about how her protection is putting everyone in danger, and that they can't possibly protect everyone she cares about forever (which is debatable, since she's only shown evidence of giving a flaming flip about maybe three people in this book). She storms off to her room and curls up in the fetal position for several hours--yes, the fetal position, for several hours. Shmeyer wrote that. I kid you not. Anyway, Alice's phone rings, and Bella wanders into the front room again because even she can sense that this book isn't going anywhere without its frail, newly-discovered plot. Alice informs her that Ed's plane is landing in a few hours, at which point the phone rings again and everyone acts very surprised. Upon answering, Alice hands Bella the phone, saying it's her mother calling back. Bella answers the phone, and her relief at hearing her mother's voice quickly turns to horror when James gets on and explains how Bella has to somehow get away from Alice and Jasper, go to her mother's house, and call the number he leaves by the phone-- provided that Bella doesn't want something dicey to happen to Mum. After hanging up, Bella sits on her bed, resigning herself to the idea that she has to die with a whirlwind monologue evocative of all the worst bits of angst-ridden high school poetry. She then realizes that she'll also never see Edward again, and the angst-ologue starts anew. Bella returns to the front room and asks Alice if she'll take a letter to Bella's mom's house for her; Alice agrees. Bella then writes a letter to Edward instead, in which her angst reiterates itself, then wallows in its own self-pity before beating itself to death with a sorrowful farewell.

NOTABLE NOTES--

1. They're still stuck in the hotel room, did I mention? I'm sure I did, but Shmeyer brings it up so VERY many times that I felt everyone should hear it again. By the way, they're still stuck in a hotel room.

2. After the previous chapter and now this one, I feel as if I'M stuck in a hotel room with Bella, and that's one of the very last places I ever want to be. I'd really like to kill her now. Team James, anyone?

INTENSITY OF EDWARD'S STARE-- not in the chapter once again, so let's modify this section:

INTENSITY OF MY BOREDOM WITH THIS CHAPTER-- aaaaaaaaaaaaauuuughhhhh... {as I claw madly at my own head in a desperate attempt to free my brain from Shmeyer's prose}

Chapter Twenty (In which nothing interesting happens in a hotel room)

In reading back over previous posts, I'm realizing that my summaries are slowly growing more embittered and snarky. It seems Twilight is hastening my metamorphosis into my true form... in five years or less, I may very well be a disaffected and dry-humored British food critic.

CHAPTER SUMMARY-- Bella wakes up in a hotel room. She's confused (surprise!), but then remembers the ride to Phoenix. Alice comes in and tells Bella she ordered food for her, so they go into the front room where Jasper is watching TV. For some reason that isn't well-articulated, Bella asks her vamp babysitters what's wrong. Alice assures her that nothing is wrong, they're just waiting for Mr. Dr. Cullen to call with news, but Bella doesn't believe her and starts freaking out about not hearing from the others. Jasper uses his happy-hoodoo powers to calm her down yet again, prompting me to wonder why he hasn't just set himself to 'calm Bella down' mode for the last three chapters. Later in the afternoon, Bella tries and fails to take a nap, so she ends up talking to Alice about the mechanics of vampire transformation. Alice points out that Edward will be very angry if she tells Bella, but she shares the theory anyway-- it seems vampires are venomous, so if their incapacitated prey isn't killed, the venom spreads and turns the victim vampy. I find it amusing that she keeps saying they're unsure about the 'theory'--they know that's how it happens. It seems pretty straightforward. Anyway, Alice suddenly jumps up, saying something's changed. Jasper sits her back down and interrogates her; she describes a mysterious, long room with a wood floor and walls covered in mirrors, and a gold bar of some sort running across the mirrors (y'know, like a dance studio... EXACTLY like a dance studio). She says it's too dark to see where it is (maybe it's a DANCE STUDIO), but James is there, and somewhere in a dark room there's a VCR playing. Now, I can't speak for everyone, but in my mind, this sounds rather like a trap. However, Alice, Jasper, and Bella continue to be confused about the whole mess, but before their mystical musing can get much further, the phone rings and Mr. Dr. Cullen tells them what they already know about James not being not in the mystery room anymore (if that sentence confused you, God help you if you ever try to read this book). Edward gets on the phone to talk to Bella, and some pancreas-destroying saccharine dialogue is exchanged. After the phone call, the hotel group goes back to being bored and sitting around. Alice starts sketching out the room from her vision, and ultimately it takes Bella to identify it as a dance studio. I'm not sure if I've properly communicated how dumb Alice and Jasper have seemed in this chapter, but it's a testament to Shmeyer's writing and the absolute damp-sock-ishness of Bella's character that, to have Bella do or say anything intelligent, everyone else in the scene has to behave in a staggeringly stupid manner. At any rate, Bella says the studio looks like the one where she took ballet lessons as a child (yet no humorous, accident-laden flashback-- suppressing some memories there, Shmeyer?). The studio is only a few blocks from her mother's place, and suddenly everyone realizes that this is a potential problem. Bella calls her mom's house and leaves a voicemail, begging her to call back as soon as she gets the message. Then, the excitement is over, and they all go back to sitting around the hotel room.

NOTABLE NOTES--

1. Bella wakes up at 3 AM, then spends the rest of the chapter complaining about what a long day it is.

INTENSITY OF EDWARD'S STARE-- Ed's only appearance in this chapter is over the phone, so we can only assume that his eyes glisten with the smarm of 1000 Kodak moments.

Chapter Nineteen (In which the entire Universe changes course to revolve around Bella)

In this chapter, helpless, hopeless, whiny-pining Bella has a plan that actually works. Any credibility or consistency this book has had is quickly leaking out of the holes in the plot.

CHAPTER SUMMARY-- The Cullens take Bella to her house, where Bella puts her plan into effect by storming around her house flailing and pretending to be mad at Edward. She tells Charlie she can't stay in Forks another minute, packs a bag, and storms out, giving her dad the same line that her mother apparently gave when she left. It has the desired effect, and Charlie stays behind, looking dejected. Bella gets in her truck, where Edward is waiting, and they speed off toward the Cullen's house. Edward confirms that Tracker James is following them away from Charlie's and explains to Bella that the Cullen's attempts to protect her make her a more exciting target (since she hasn't already complained about their protection enough). Emmett and Alice show up, and once the truck gets to the Cullen's, Emmett grabs Bella and runs her into the house 'like a football', presumably so that Shmeyer can remind us once again that she's heard of sports. Inside, the family is waiting with Laurent (remember Laurent?), who goes on for a while about how strong, powerful, and relentless (and sexy, and dreamy, and perfect) James is. Laurent bears the Cullens no ill will, but he doesn't want to fight, so he leaves, warning the Cullens not to underestimate the sparkling studliness that is James. The Cullens quickly work out a plan to sneak Bella out of the house-- Esme switches clothes with Bella to confuse her scent (after Rosalie refuses), then she leaves with Rosalie, along with a hunting party of Mr. Dr. Cullen, Emmett, and Edward. Alice and Jasper hang back and wait to sneak Bella to Phoenix. While they wait, Jasper uses his magical power of feelings and tells Bella that no matter how inadequate she feels, she's worth protecting. Aww.

NOTABLE NOTES--

1. During her 'I Can't Stay in Forks Another Minute' rant, Bella says that she doesn't want to get stuck in Forks, so she can't put down any more roots. Not only does Bella hate plants, she's now afraid of becoming one.

2. Edward tells Bella that the way to kill a vampire is to tear it to shreds and burn the pieces. Come to think of it, I'm pretty sure that's an effect way to kill pretty much everything.

INTENSITY OF EDWARD'S STARE-- more in tents than the entirety of the Regional Boy Scout Jamboree at 3 AM.

Chapter Eighteen (In which a plot may be trying to claw its way back from the void Shmeyer has banished it to)

Chapter eighteen--three-quarters of the way through Twilight, at last. I warn you in advance, toastyreaders, this chapter will disappoint you. True, we start to get the faintest inkling of a plot that doesn't involve Ed and Bella's snogging schedule, but we're also teased with the carrot of Bella being in mortal peril. Remember, though, that carrot is nothing but a pointy orange stick of empty promises-- not only does Bella survive the chapter, she survives three more books.

CHAPTER SUMMARY-- The Cullen crew casually (suspiciously casually?) stops playing ball just when the not-so-surprise vampire visitors arrive. There are three of them, and one steps forward and introduces himself to Mr. Dr. Cullen as Laurent, adding that the others are James and Victoria (two guys and a girl, in case Laurie LeFrenchpants confused you). I mention names and whatnot because these three will probably be important soon enough, and given the rate at which the story has been failing to move along, let's cross our fingers and hope they make some fast trouble. Anyhoo, Mr. Dr. Cullen and Laurent chat a bit, Laurent expresses interest in the Cullens' ability to keep a permanent residence (it would seem vampers are notoriously bad tenants), and Mr. Dr. Cullen invites the newcomers back to the house, after politely asking them not to hunt nearby for fear of blowing their cover. Just as everyone is about to head back to Chateau Cullen, a convenient breeze carries Bella's scent to James, who perks up and starts talking about snacks. Edward gets rather huffy about this, and the boys assume hostile positions and show their teeth in a somewhat-effective display of aggression. Mr. Dr Cullen insists that Bella is with their family (as does big n' beefy Emmett) and Laurent calls James off, recalling that they agreed not to hunt on the Cullens' turf. A few more lines of tension are thrown in for dramatic effect, but everyone still gets to head to the Cullen house. Alice, Emmett, and Edward announce that they're taking Bella back in the Jeep; once they all strap in, though, Bella finds out that they're actually planning to kidnap her and take her far, far away. James is apparently a 'tracker', and through Edward's handy mind-reading shtick, they've determined that he is now going to hunt Bella relentlessly (hoorah!) unless they can take her somewhere he'll never find her (booo). Bella, however, doesn't want to go anywhere. She throws a fit and demands they stop risking their cover for her (which they're really not) and that she can take care of it herself (which she absolutely can't, especially when there are twigs for her to trip over and stairs for her to fall down). When it's mentioned that James is tracking her smell, she realizes that he'll probably start at Charlie's house, where he'll probably kill Charlie. Edward and Alice argue over which of their mostly non-existent plans they should go with, when Bella pipes up with a plan of her own-- she'll go to her house, tell Charlie she's moving back to Phoenix, then leave, leading James awry. No one can come up with anything better, so they decide to go with Bella's plan, after which Alice and Jasper will take her into hiding in Phoenix while Edward and Emmett stay and try to distract James. They change course for Bella's house, while Bella contemplates whether it'd be worse to be taken away from Edward for a few days or be snacked on.

NOTABLE NOTES--

1. Instead of gold eyes like the Cullens', the newcomers' eyes are burgundy. Snacking on people is apparently the cheap and easy vamp equivalent of buying colored contacts.

2. There's some sort of weird tension through the whole book between Edward and Alice. It's not very well-defined--or written, for that matter--but Shmeyer keeps bringing it up, and in this chapter it causes them to argue a lot. Really, a lot, as in several pages of an uninterrupted Edward-and-Alice bicker-fest.

3. While Bella is describing a particularly sneaky part of her plan, Emmett laughs and calls her 'diabolical'. Bella is clearly a projection of Shmeyer, which means Shmeyer most likely sees herself as being diabolical. I'm starting to suspect--just a bit--that she's doing this to the world on purpose, the fiend.

Chapter Seventeen (in which baseball is more or less played)

Alright, kids... it's time for some vampire baseball. Are you ready? I'm not.

CHAPTER SUMMARY--Edward drives Bella home, but when they arrive at her house, Jacob and Billy Black are waiting on the porch. So, Edward dashes off, leaving Bella to deal with the unexpected guests. She lets Jacob and Billy in, over-emphasizing the fact that Charlie will be home much later in the hopes that they'll leave. However, Billy sends Jacob out to the car on some useless errand, then promptly confronts Bella about her relationship with Edward. In a surprising show of abrasiveness, Bella curtly insists that it's her business, and it's her business whether Charlie knows about her business. Billy reluctantly admits defeat, then comes up with whatever excuse to leave and does so. When Charlie gets home, Bella does eventually get around to telling him she has a date with Edward Cullen, at which point Charlie stages a clearly-affected display of fatherly stuffiness. But, when Edward comes to pick Bella up, he introduces himself and quickly charms the sensibility out of Charlie, as he has with practically every other person in the bleeding book. As soon as Eddie n' Chuck start to get along, though, Bella begins acting as flabbergasted as possible, presumably because the two people whose lives are supposed to revolve around her are having their own conversation. She finally herds Edward out the door, but has second thoughts about the outing when Ed directs her to the 'monster' Jeep he's borrowed from Emmett, and she has third and possibly fourth thoughts when he straps her into the off-roading harness. All that equipment, and they still end up piggy-backing most of the way to a clearing, where the rest of the Cullens are waiting and marking bases a bit too far apart (if you'll recall, they're setting up to play baseball... try to contain your excitement). Bella, who is not a vampire and has spent a good portion of the book so far reminding us that she's too clumsy to have survived to 17, hangs back to watch. She ends up talking to Esme (Ed's 'mom'), who tells her that she's glad Edward has found her, in spite of the fact that she's human. Thunder starts, and so does the game. For anyone who has either lived in hermitage for the past ten years (if you exist, I can hardly blame you) or is otherwise unaware of 'vampire baseball', I'll explain-- vampires hit baseballs so hard that it sounds like thunder (but apparently not hard enough to break the bats and balls) and they have to put the bases very far apart because they hit it so far. Whether or not they play with special heavy-duty equipment isn't addressed; in fact, Shmeyer has so much obvious disdain for all things athletic that she can't seem to write an adequate baseball scene. Luckily for her, the game is quickly interrupted by Alice's sensing of the vampires she foresaw visiting (remember them?). Edward uses his handy mind-reading ability and adds that they heard the game and want to join. After debating whether it's too dangerous to stick around with Bella and whether they could leave before the others show up, they decide to keep casually playing and waiting for the mystery guests.

NOTABLE NOTES--

1. After the piggy-back ride, Bella lets go off Edward and plops onto her bum, getting a bit of dirt and a few twigs on her pants. Since these things are plant-related (and we know how Bella feels about plants), she freaks out, causing Edward to laugh. Bella responds by becoming irrationally angry and trying to storm off in the opposite direction, which would get her lost in the woods. In other words, she does everything wrong here.

2. While the Cullens are preparing for the game, Edward runs up to Bella and Esme, 'sparkling with excitement'. Edward seems to have harnessed the power of the sun.

INTENSITY OF EDWARD'S STARE-- He has harnessed the power of mighty Helios! Feel the awesome power of his smolder!

Chapter Sixteen (which begins in the 1600's, and ends in despair)

So, remember how I said this chapter might be interesting? It was... for about half a page. See below for the (blessedly) abridged version.

CHAPTER SUMMARY-- The chapter begins with Edward telling Bella Mr. Dr. Cullen's backstory: the good Mr. Dr. was born in the 1600's, to an overzealous creature-hunting priest of a father. When his father pressed him into carrying on the business, the future Mr. Dr.'s compassion made him more discerning than his dad, who was a bit of an equal-opportunity prick. He eventually found a real coven of vamps, who in turn attacked him. To save himself from the rest of the hunting party, he hid himself for several days, until he discovered he'd turned vampy himself. Deeply distressed by his condition, he tried to kill himself and eventually tried to starve himself, until in his weakened state he attacked some deer and thereby discovered he could survive without killing humans. He integrated back into society and started studying constantly, finding his penance in the world of medicine. He stayed in Italy for a while with some nice, 'cultured' vampires, but they differed over food sources, so he left for the New World. There he grew rather lonely; during the Spanish influenza outbreak, he found Edward and decided to try to save him by turning him. And, of course, the chapter gets very Ed-centric from here on out. It seems Edward became rebellious at some point and left to try people-eating-- only bad people, he assures Bella-- but soon returned to Mr. Dr. Cullen (and now, Esme) and his 'vegetarian' lifestyle. Back to the present-- Edward trails off with his history lesson and tugs Bella through the house to his room, where he shows her his classy decorating and obscenely extensive music collection. While they're snuggling as usual, Alice pokes her head in and says there's a thunderstorm coming, so Emmett wants to play ball. She insists that Edward and Bella both come along, and that presumably brings us to the infamous vampire baseball chapter. Oh, joy.

NOTABLE NOTES--

1. To conceal himself from the rest of the vampire-hunting party after being attacked, Mr. Dr. Cullen apparently hid himself in a pile of rotting potatoes for three days. Really, Shmeyer? 1600's London didn't have any better hidey-holes?

2. Edward likes 50's music, hates music from the 60's and 70's, and calls the 80's 'tolerable'. Not only does this make me like him even less, it makes me wonder what he looked like when he was trying to blend in with the 'new wave' crowd.

3. According to the parameters laid out in #2, when asked whether he prefers the Beatles or the Rolling Stones, Edward's answer would be 'NO'. See? Now you hate him, too.

INTENSITY OF EDWARD'S STARE-- Second only to the intensity of his totally choice 'Flock of Seagulls' haircut.

Chapter Fifteen (which I would refer to as 'Family Matters', but then people might expect humor)

It should be pointed out that, since the meadowy frolics, Edward can't keep his hands off Bella (not to mention his sniffer). Luckily, this is the chapter where he takes her home to meet he fam, so he keeps his hands to himself... mostly.

CHAPTER SUMMARY-- Bella wakes up and is ecstatic to find that Edward stayed the whole night--it seems he spent most of the night sitting in the corner, watching her sleep. If I woke up to a guy sitting in my room staring at me, I'm pretty sure my immediate reaction wouldn't be elation, but I must admit I've never been in such a situation and will therefore reserve my judgement. Anyhoo, Edward then shows his sensitivity to Bella's human condition by reminding her to eat breakfast (hear that, twi-tards? Edward likes a lady wif some brekkie in her. Eat some damn cereal!), at which point he asks if she'd like to spend the day meeting his family. She agrees, then spends a good while fussing over her outfit. They finally make it out the door and drive through the woods to his house, which is a very nice house with a very nice outside and some very nice trees and a nice big glass wall. There, Edward introduces Bella to his parents, Carlisle (Mr. Dr. Cullen) and Esme, who are also very nice. Alice (remember Alice?) comes running in and greets Bella enthusiastically. Bella also meets Jasper, whose special vampire power is basically charisma. The other two members of the Cullen crew, Emmett and Rosalie, are noticeably absent--as Edward explains to Bella, Rosalie is paranoid about anyone outside the family knowing the truth, not to mention a bit jealous that Bella is human. He also warns her that he might be overprotective (really? noooooo...) during the next week or two, since Alice forsees other vampires visiting Forks soon (Alice, it might as well be pointed out, can see the future). At some point, Mr. Dr. Cullen's backstory comes up, and is apparently the focus of the next chapter. It actually sounds kind of interesting-- at least, compared to the drivel that is the entirety of the book so far-- so, fingers crossed.

NOTABLE NOTES--

1. Edward is ratted out by his mum as being very musical. She makes him play piano for Bella, at which point we learn that vampy speed and agility lets one duet with oneself.

2. While assuring her that she looks wonderful in the umpteenth outfit she's tried on, Edward kisses Bella. She faints. Wow.

3. Alice greets Bella with a hug and kiss on the cheek, then adds that 'she does smell nice'. Apparently, when Edward was describing his new girlfriend to the family, 'smells good' was toward the top of the list.

INTENSITY OF EDWARD'S STARE-- threat level sparkle.

Chapter Fourteen (in which a 108-year-old guy stalks a 17-year-old girl, yet nothing seems amiss)

I tried rugby last night, and it was a lot of fun. Then I read Chapter Fourteen, and it was no fun at all. Today, I'm suffering for both. Oh, well... at least the sore muscles will go away eventually.

CHAPTER SUMMARY-- On the ride home from the meadowy frolics of Chapter Thirteen, Edward listens to some 50's music, prompting Bella to ask how old he really is. He admits that he was born in 1901 and was turned vampy in 1918 in lieu of dying from Spanish influenza. He goes on to explain how and when each of his 'family' members were turned, and we get some back story on the Cullen clan that I quite frankly don't care enough about to regurgitate here (if it's important, it'll come up later). When they get to Bella's house, Edward asks to come in-- polite, until he whips out the hidey-key that he shouldn't know about and unlocks the door himself. Bella is understandably a bit shocked and asks if Edward has been spying on her. Yes, of course, he was 'curious' about her before and wanted to observe her, but upon further questioning Edward admits that he comes to the house every night and watches her sleep. Bella is then understandably appalled, especially when Edward tells her she's interesting to watch because she talks in her sleep. He quickly assures her that she's never said anything embarrassing, but their conversation is cut short by Charlie getting home. Edward slips away, but when Bella heads up to her room, he's waiting on her bed, clearly liberated by the admission that he's there every night anyway. Bella is through having understandable reactions at this point, so she snuggles up with him, and they talk about a few more pointless things before she drifts off to sleep.

NOTABLE NOTES--

1. In Edward's exposition on his family back story, we find out that his sister Alice woke up alone with no memory of her previous life or who turned her, along with the standard vampiric enhancement of strength/agility/etc and some funky premonitions... Resident Evil 2, anyone?

2. Edward admits that he was always extremely jealous when Mike and co. were flirting with Bella, going so far as to call Mike 'odious'. You know a man's really jealous when he starts breaking out the five-dollar words.

3. Do you listening to any music from the 50's or 60's? My lord, you must be old. Like, 100 at least.

4. Edward tells Bella she smells like a tasty, tasty flower.

5. According to Edward's account of what Bella talks about in her sleep, even her subconscious hates plants.

INTENSITY OF EDWARD'S STARE-- currently set to 'gorgon'.