Final Grade: F.
I want to be absolutely clear about one thing: the first ten chapters of the book were enjoyable to read. In fact, with the exception of chapters 13 (the idiotic confusion-filled chapter where Bella confronts Jacob) and 15 (when Bella jumps) the first 17 chapters were solidly in passing-score territory. I want to emphasize that, three "A" chapters. Four "B" chapters. There were flaws, to be sure, but ultimately I found myself immersed in reading rather than scribbling rage-fueled notes, and that's a dramatic improvement over Book 1. The second chapter, where Carlisle has a great moment of conversation, and most of the following few chapters of Bella "waking up" were particularly good. The entire romantic arc with Jacob was satisfying, crafted with obvious skill and an eye for detail. Sadly, from the Funeral onward it's just a horror-show.
Bella's rise from depression and the non-romance give her numerous moments to grow as a character. The scene in school with her friends and the motorcycle project are fertile fields of insight and Meyer truly shines at certain points. I want especially to highlight Bella noticing that her friends hair has changed after her depressed stupor back in chapter 4. Realizing she missed the new style for months gives Bella and the reader a tangible grasp of just how unaware Bella has been and makes the ensuing wake-up a shared experience that Meyer even uses to flesh out secondary characters! Sadly, the drug-addict, crazy as a box of squirrels side is given the spotlight and Bella's friends (except for Mike) bow out shortly after. Summoning a vision of your ex-boyfriend to abusively berate you while you do increasingly dangerous acts probably needs a professional psychologist to evaluate, but I can't imagine it's any healthier than it seems to a causal reader. This shift from subtle story to "BELLA IS CRAZY" is frustrating and annoying. Worse, as soon as Laurent/Victoria enter the picture she reverts to Damsel In Distress mode and stays there for the remainder of the book. She's again useless baggage and even the climactic scene of Bella running across the courtyard can barely muster up an ounce of tension and for the umpteenth time, Bella is denied even the tiniest spark of ability. Will she reach him in time? HOW? She's just a boring mortal! Maybe if she used her atrophied brain to figure out a solution! Prove herself to be useful and resourceful and ... no, she just ran fast and got there in the nick of time. Whew, that was sort of close. Good thing the super-powerful Alice got her to one side of the square fast enough.
Last thought on Bella: Bella's immunity from vampire powers starts as her being immune to just Edward. It's clear she exists in Alice's crystal ball and Rosalie pulls some level of dazzle on her in the first book, so you'd think it was just Edward. Now we're told the uber-powerful Volturi and their minions are also impotent. Aro even makes a huge deal about her being a vamp-void and how useful (?) that would be to the Volturi. I've complained already that Bella being special only because of some author-applied magic is cheating and actually robs Bella as a protagonist, but now it's not even applied universally! Is she immune to vampire powers or not? Why can Rosalie dazzle her and Alice see her in visions but Jane can't swing her mental pain-hammer?
Jacob is badly used and the "brother" label is a death-knell for any romantic options. Why? This magical super-love that Bella feels for Edward is paper-thin and only exists because Meyer insists it has to, over and over. I don't expect that Bella will jump into Jacob's arms immediately or ever, but after the woods-dumping, why is she so insistent that new love can never happen? I'd accept that it's just Bella overreacting to a breakup, moaning that she'll never find love, never have anyone as good as Edward (despite... nevermind) but she's all but put on a nun's habit and checked out of the universe. Although I've covered it, the Jacob and Bella arc is good reading, even if Bella gets most of the characterization depth. Once Jacob turns into a werewolf the conflict is played all over the map, sometimes quiet anguish that feels right but it often goes slightly off. It's never as bad as the wahmpires, though, and if Jacob had any chance of being a main character it'd be a breath of fresh air in this book. Worst of all is the bypassed chance to add real conflict: Bella giving in to her urge to actually kiss Jacob. No, it's all pure and innocent and pointless.
The werewolves get the same problems as the vampires. Their super-powers effectively sideline Bella and they're only in danger when around other super-powered creatures (allegedly). Just like Vampires they're potentially physically dangerous to Bella when around her, although at least we don't get the tiresome false-sexual tension. This raises another complaint, this book is essentially following the exact same track as the first after the break-up. Bella is having troubles with school and friends. Bella is connecting to a boy as an escape. Cue troubled romance. Cue dark secret. Cue resolution. Cue sudden dangerous situation that takes Bella out of Forks. Cue set up for the next book. Ugh. Still, the pack is more interesting than the Cullens and lacks the moronic "everybody gets a unique look and superpower" that makes the wahmpires look like a comic-book superhero team rather than a threat.
FHS: is all but forgotten after the joyous waking-up section. Bye-bye everybody!
Edward becomes.... ugh. OK, I'm not going to rant, but let me just point this out. It is clearly the author's intent that we feel happy that Edward and Bella are together. We're supposed to feel sad when they're apart and we should feel something in the middle when she's with Jacob. Personally, I feel nearly the opposite. I enjoyed her time with Jacob. It was pleasant to read and there was real character interaction and a true relationship. I wasn't thrilled with her time alone, but it had some great moments. When Bella and Edward are together, however, she's in a drug stupor and acts like a moron. You know why I liked the bulk of this book? Because EDWARD WASN'T IN IT. That's not an endorsement for your second-most-important character! That's not a sign that your romantic-interest is working! That's a serious, fatal flaw! The protagonist's love-of-her-life is a horrible drain on the story! The worst of it was the reunion and "make-up" in the 23rd chapter, though. For the reunion of lovers just after the climax of the story to be the most horrible piece of drek in the entire book is damning in ways I can barely fathom. If Edward had started to actually physically abuse her in that scene it would barely have made it harder to tolerate. Meyer is going to have to work really hard to do anything more horrifying in this series.
The Wahmpires are largely absent. Carlisle is good. Alice finally gets some life. Her moments with Jasper are good and her time with Bella isn't awful. Odd note: Alice can't see Werewolves. I'll accept this as some Werewolf defense mechanism (not going to waste time figuring it out) but Alice is surprised? Aro is telepathic on some level, so this is clearly a known Vampire skill, how would they not know that Werewolves, their apparently sworn/natural enemy, are invisible by now? Wouldn't this be sort-of common knowledge among Vampire Precogs/Telepaths? I might be over-analyzing this, maybe Vampires don't share survival notes like that. Anyway, the rest of the Cullen clan is essentially invisible except for Rosalie. My hopes that she'd actually becomes some sort of antagonist are dying and now she looks like she'll never amount to more than a giant annoyance.
The Vampries were a bit of a mixed bag. Laurent was excellent, up until he died off camera with no difficulty. Great job, there. Victoria might as well not have existed for all the impact she had on the book. Why not use Laurent AND Victoria? Then you could have had a good death-scene where the Werewolves kill one and Victoria escapes injured. Then she'd have a real reason to hate Bella and some actual presence in the book. Aro was fun. The Volturi were a tad cliche, but we only get a taste, so I'm holding out hope that they evolve into something. There really is lots of potential. Even the guards (or whatever they're called) were a nice bunch. Meyer insists on making them all striking looking and unique, but I'll let it slide, it's not that big of a deal.
The Romeo and Juliet allegory is tiresome long before Meyer starts to explicitly connect the dots. I don't care if she's going to write Romeo and Juliet and Vampires and Werewolves, but once you abandon the possibility for a tragic ending stop trying to link to the play every time some there's the thinnest of similarities. Nobody is going to write a teen romance novel that stands up critically to Shakespeare, force a comparison and you're going to look awful.
SumUp of SumUps
If you'd asked me what I thought of the book prior to the scene in the square, I'd have told you a very different story than I'm telling today. At that point I wasn't overjoyed with the book, but I'd had a pleasant time reading it and there were large sections I truly liked. My complaints weren't all minor, but in the grand scheme it was a fluffy sort of novel that hadn't caused too many angry note-taking sessions. It was even, dare I say, better written, better paced and deeper than the first book, especially when it came to the one person we're stuck with on every page: Bella.
The problems really begin in the confusion/misunderstanding in the funeral phone call. The source of those problems? Edward. And that's the key to understanding why I despise this book. Edward. Bella is horrible throughout the first book and has similar problems between these covers, but she finds some sunlight to grow when he leaves. The second he comes back into the picture, Meyer takes us into a dark, horrible world that she bizarrely describes as "true love". If you could strip Edward out of this book, regardless of the romantic success of Jacob, it would be worlds better. The fact that Edward is bound to the very foundations of Twilight, the fact that he's on the cover of the paperback and is almost certainly going nowhere is a cancer on the soul of this story.
I'm also sick to death of Meyer's inability to maintain and resolve tension. Every problem simply disappears. Every time we're told something will be incredibly hard, it isn't. We're told someone is dangerous and powerful, except they aren't. In fact, the most threatening character in this book was Laurent! Half a chapter later he's on the run and then dies offscreen. As for Victoria, she's off-camera for the entire book. She never makes an appearance and essentially gets chased around so the werewolves can report back to Bella about how dangerous it all is! Wow, she must be dangerous, all the werewolves keep telling us. Climaxes aren't exciting because Meyer consistently removes all the threat and tension. It's infuriating to see opportunity after opportunity pass while we trudge forward to the eventual reunion. You know who had the best reunion in this book? Bella and Angela. Do you even remember? At the end of chapter SIX? Every romantic reunion involves people staring at each other while Meyer TELLS us explicitly how much love is radiating. Bella and Edward. Sam and Emily. Alice and Jasper.
I joked in the last book's summary that I was dreading reading the next (this) book. I wasn't happy at the end of Book 1, but I'd seen good times and bad and just expected more of the same. Here, however, I am miserable at the thought of subjecting myself to the next book. There'll be no romance novel separation between Bella and Edward this time. Oh, they might be apart, but they'll be mooning for each other and whatever dangers appear (I assume Victoria and the Volturi, somehow) will only threaten to keep them apart or force Edward's hand. Today I was convicted but I won't find out my sentence until I force myself into Eclipse.
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