It's time to talk about twilight. I will be the first to admit that I am a big fan and the thought of a new book for the 10th anniversary was very exciting. However, not as exciting as it would have been if it had been the long awaited Midnight Sun coming out!
For those of you who haven't read Twilight by Stephenie Meyer, here is a quick recap. Bella Swan is moving to Forks, one of the rainiest towns of the USA, to live with her Dad. She is prepared to hate it and suffer through two years before she can break away and go to university. Everything changes when she meets Edward Cullen, the most handsome boy she has ever laid eyes on. Predictably, they fall in love, but instead of normal teenage obstacles like disapproving parents etc, at the root of their problems is the fact that he is a vampire and has been seventeen years old for nearly a hundred years. In this book we briefly meet Jacob Black, a member of the Quileute tribe, who will become Bella's best friend as the series goes on. The Quileutes are traditionally suspicious of the Cullens and it is Jake who first tells reveals to Bella that Edward may be a vampire, though at the time he does not believe the tribe legends. As the plot advances Bella and Edward struggle through and beat the odds, that's how you know it's true love! And that is as much as I can say without spoiling the story too much... (If you want to me to review the other books and talk more about the Bella-Edward-Jacob love triangle in another post let me know in the comments below)
I was equal parts excited and nervous to read Life and Death. There has long been a certain stigma around Twilight because Bella is portrayed as weak and in need of being rescued by Edward as a big strong man. The author denies Bella's status as a perpetual damsel in distress and argues that she is only weak because she is a human in a world full of supernatural, excessively strong characters, mostly male by the way. To prove this point Meyer re-wrote Twilight as Life and Death.
Life and Death follows Edythe and Beau through the same story as Edward and Bella, but with a massive twist! Almost all the character's genders in the story have been changed, pretty much the only exceptions to this were Charlie and Renee (Bella/Beau's parents). At first I was a bit sceptical, especially with some of the names which sound comical after the original ones, but then I forgot all about Bella and Edward. I fell completely in love with this book all over again! I was not expecting to enjoy it as much as I did. Reading it from Beau's point of view was a very interesting experience, being a guy he responded differently to Bella when put in the same situations and I found the strong female character of Edythe to be quite refreshing. I grew to love these characters in their own right and found the added Taylor and the prom drama hilarious. Without giving too much away, be prepared for a big twist in the ending! I feel that even if the ending had been the same, the characters themselves would have made this book it's own entity, however, the altered ending gave it a very "what if" feel and only added to the magic of an already thrilling love story. A definite page turner!
Have any of you guys read it? What did you think? Let me know in the comments below :-)
xoxo
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