** spoiler alert ** I understand why this book is popular and why it was made into a movie. What I don't understand is why it won so many prizes. I don't intend to sound petulant because I admire any person who has finished writing a novel and sold it to a publisher, period. But as a writer myself, I have to ask the questions about the industry that I don't understand.

This book was OK. It is basically a romance for teens who like vampires. I enjoyed it for the most part, but I was bored after the first few chapters. The middle third of the book doesn't move from crisis to the next crisis. I think a YA reader would be bored, too. YA readers are smart and need challenging reading.

The basic idea is pretty cool for YA, but the characters are underdeveloped so their motivations are unclear and they seem to act for reasons of forwarding plot and not to help you understand them as characters better.

The main character, Bella, is bland. That really made the book hard for me to enjoy. My sister is a YA author and she suggested that perhaps Meyer made Bella bland on purpose so that YA readers (teenage girls) could insert their own personalities into Bella and thereby really get into the romance of it.

On the other hand, the atmosphere of the town Bella moves to, Forks, is tangible and well rendered. It is almost another character in the book. It is dark, sunless, wet, and outrageously lush and green. You can find metaphor pretty easily in its description, which relates directly to the concept of "twilight." Bella went to Forks to get away from her life, and maybe find a new life, but everything is dark and cold and remote. Yet that seems to suit Bella just fine. She is kind of dead herself, or maybe just asleep. I would have liked to have a strong sense of what drove her.

WARNING: There are SPOILERS throughout the next part of this review.

Bella's relationships to the people in Forks, including her father, Charlie, are almost non-existent. This creates a feeling of alienation, which is good for the atmosphere of the book, but doesn't help in terms of character development. Instead, we get 2-dimensional characters (or 1-dimensional if that is possible) whose lack of motivation leaves too many questions unanswered. For example, why Charlie does leave Bella to fend for herself immediately upon her arrival? He doesn't even try to spend time with her when she has moved so far to live with him. This is convenient to the plot so that Bella can get totally sucked in (sorry, couldn't help it) to a relationship with a vampire. A real father would have been much more concerned or have interesting reasons why he isn't concerned. We don't get any interesting reasons. We know he is married to his job because we are told he is, but we don't see him react to his daughter's presence until towards the end of the book, and then it is halfhearted.

It is also convenient that all the people at school who want to be her friend fall back and take a back seat when Edward makes his move.

The character of Edward is more interesting than Bella's. However, because we don't get his point of view, we can only learn about him through Bella's eyes. She never tires of describing his attractiveness and beauty, but in the same basic words every time. The book does not explain why Edward acts like a teenager in the first part of the book and then transitions into a full-grown man by the end. It gets creepy then because it is obvious hie is too "old" for Bella in many ways. She is so immature. It doesn't fit the "noble vampire" profile to make advances to an under-raged girl.

I would have been happier with the Edward character if Meyers had resolved some issues about his motivations. At first, when he was acting like a teenager, he is impulsive in his decision to reveal all to Bella and make her his girlfriend. He is "being bad" in his own words. He said the other vampires were not happy with his decision, but then they totally except Bella and are even happy about it (with one exception, which is never really explained). As we keep reading, we are given several reasons why Edward should not be with Bella, but no compelling reasons why they should be together. He could easily kill her himself if he is not careful, or bring other vampires around. We read that Edward has finally found the love of his life, which has taken 100 years, and yet, because his love is human, he will be alone again in less than another 100 years.

The only reason for Edward to take such a risk is that he is in love with Bella. But, I was never convinced that Edward really could be that attracted to her She just wasn't that interesting a human. Again, this does make it easier to insert yourself in there and say, "I would be so much more interesting." I would like to see better motivation, though, in an award-winning YA novel.

Bella does finally become a little more independent towards the end, albeit in a very unwise way. That's when the book came alive for me - the last eighth of the almost 500 pages. She finally takes charge of her life again (the last time was before the first chapter when she decides to move to Forks in the first place).

I recommend this book if you like YA romances. Or, if you just LOVE vampires regardless. I will be reading the second book, which I heard is better (but some reviewers on Goodreads do not think so...) If the 2nd book is indeed better, than I might make a stronger recommendation for this book as part of a series for YA readers.