Comments on: Breaking Characters, a Pro/Con List Review of “Breaking Dawn”

By: My "Breaking Dawn" | the list of now

My "Breaking Dawn" | the list of now — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 08:51:37 +0000

[...] I know, I know. I’m ridiculous. The sad thing is? Right now, I find myself hilarious. Even sadder? Even as I joyfully jest, I am reminded of how disappointing I found this book to be. [...]

By: kate

kate — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 20:46:22 +0000

barf on the name is right.
i think it just speaks to meyer dropping the ball on so much in the last book (although i did feel the final two weren’t nearly as captivating as the first two…and that the second was not nearly as captivating as the first). the character development was so weak: as in, me scratching my head as to why edward was even presented as a strong, sexy character in the first place. and that name. i mean, seriously? that is the absolute best meyer could come up with? you want to honor the “mother figures?” TRY MIDDLE NAMES. ugh, it bothered me so much.

and don’t get me started on that last “epic battle.”

By: lucy

lucy — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 16:52:19 +0000

Oh, don’t get me wrong. Your review was one of the most comprehensive I’ve read, and I think it was fair…more fair than I could have been (I refer to the aforementioned cultural lenses). I enjoyed reading it, and you made me remember some of the things that I liked about the series.

By: bonnie

bonnie — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 06:14:00 +0000

I figured if I was going to try to review it, I needed to flush out all the individual ideas and it turned out to be a lot. I agree with a lot of your points. I think we actually had much of the same reactions/experience from it. I just went whole hog on the ranty-list-review.

But honestly, when a book is this bad and disappointing (especially to wrap up a series that did have some great potential) I felt it deserved my full deconstruction work-up.

-b

By: lucy

lucy — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 04:07:48 +0000

Wow, girlfriend, that was a meal! Okay, now I know I’ve done my share of Twilight bashing, but the truth is that I really enjoyed Twilight and Full Moon. Bella drove me a little crazy, but I thought that she was sweet, and I thought the story was romantic. I cringed at the well-worn plot device of saving the girl from the out-of-control car, but some guys are sexy enough to pull it off (think Matthew McConaghy in the wedding planner). Edward was one of those guys. The Edward of Twilight, however, is nowhere to be found in Breaking Dawn.

I think what happened to me, pre-Eclipse, is that I read some interviews with Stephenie Meyer, and then I started to see everything through particular cultural lenses. For me, the sexual abstinence and anti-abortion politics of the novels became problematic. Which is worse, pre-marital sex or married and pregnant by 19? I think Meyer and I would disagree here. Which is worse, carrying a dangerous pregancy to term or protecting the life of the mother? Meyer does her adolescent audience a disservice by oversimplifying very, very complicated life choices.

Also, I was disgusted by the wolf Quil imprinting on the two-year-old girl. I don’t care if it was supposed to be a spiritual rather than physical connection. When a teenage boy sees a toddler as his future life partner, for me, it’s about a 10 on the vomitron. Ditto for Jacob and Renesemee. I finshed Breaking Dawn because I wanted to be able to say that I read the entire series, but it was an almost entirely unpleasant experience. And the Volturi…talk about inconsistencies! Why, exactly, is this group so threatening? They seemed fairly easily dispensed with.

I do, however, defer to your list of pros. I agree that there are some things that were unique and sweet in the whole series. In the end, however, there were some things I just couldn’t get past, including the less-than-talented writing.