Do you think the whole Twilight series would be better if...?

[Julia]

Yes. I think, in someone else's hands, they could've made the romance, the characters and the plot a lot more realistic and more gripping.

[Jessica]

Mochaspresso wrote: "This would normally be fair enough for me IF you appeared to hold all "quality" books to that same standard. Going by your shelves, it doesn't appear that you actually do. You gave Shiver 5 stars. I'll be honest and say that I haven't read it yet."

You're going to criticize me, call me a hypocrite on rating Shiver good when I didn't rate Twilight the same yet you 1. Have not read it. And 2. Are going to take the opinions of others and try to discredit me???



"If that rule truly does still exist, people would be criticizing every single zombie incarnation that is popular right now because none of them follow what a zombie was originally known to be."

"This "rule" that you have is clearly not being followed in the real world."

There are deviations of zombies and vampires, as I am not saying that she should've stuck to the original traditional lore of vampire. So the other things you've said can't apply because I'm not saying that it would've been preferred if she stuck to the olden descriptors of vampires, but at least actually put her own twist on them instead of creating them how she pleased without knowing anything about them.

" That came after they started hanging out. Plus, he was actually crushing on her far far more than she was crushing on him. (ie...the "stalking"?) "

....Wanting to kill her to you was him crushing on her??? O.o And yes, she was still just as obsessed. He's some random boy to her, yet he's already effected her so much that she drove home crying, just because he to her didn't like her and wanted to change classes.

" Why criticize Bella for a trait that Edward actually demonstrates to a much much higher degree? These types criticisms are full of double standards and are hypocritical."

Because right now Bella is the one that is in question, not Edward. Edward is a bad guy, no one and certainly not I am saying or implying otherwise. Putting Bella under a magnifying glass to show all the bad about her doesn't mean that I am ignoring everything that's wrong with Edward and pretending it doesn't exist.

"It doesn't need to be....but "never explained" is not actually true. The reasons why he decide to be with her instead of kill her is explained in Midnight Sun. I assume it's probably still available on SM's website or online somewhere."

And you know how I feel about MS. If it's not an official published book of the series, what's in it doesn't count to me and I feel shouldn't count to others when talking about this series seriously in discussions. Nevertheless, he says the same thing that I am saying, which is that he's intrigued by his inability to hear her thoughts and this is not explained at all. And I'm going to continue to stress that from an objective POV that Meyer not explaining this very crucial piece of information helps in making this series less of a quality series than it could have been. You don't think it needed to be explained, but it needed to.

"Again with the exaggerated language. Perhaps, it's me. I'm very sorry. That was colloquial and not meant to be taken quite so literally. She wasn't paralyzed or rendered completely immobile in the most literal sense. Large doses of morphine do affect mobility in the sense that you are impaired. (ie feels like it's more difficult to move than it truly is because of the drowsiness and sedation side effects.) "

If anyone is exaggerating, it was Bella as she said that the morphine had her pinned and gagged, that it had her paralyzed and you said that the morphine is why she wasn't screaming. No exaggeration is coming from my end. And Bella says the morphine's effects is irrelevant as the venom is more powerful and it's pain is still extremely potent, that the morphine is not weakening the pain of the venom in her veins. She states this because she's had morphine and venom in her at the same time before and the venom in her still took over, still made her scream in pain and writhe on the ground. Now, at both times the amount of morphine is not mentioned, not to my knowledge. Hypothetically more morphine in BD would give her greater effects, but she could have also overdosed on the unknown amount of morphine that she may or may not have been given to fight the pain of the c section. To top that off she's been given nearly triple the amount of venom than when James bit her, so the amount of morphine is irrelevant as she said because she has more venom than ever before in her to make sure that it's effective, that she turns instead of dies. The venom being from Edward instead of James doesn't make it different venom, or makes the effects soften because it's from her lover. The fact that she's completely silent and unmoving is completely discredited because of those things. This is why it is a plot hole.

"That's not an explanation of why it's objectively bad because the idea that this lack of explanation is ALWAYS bad is subjective and imo, proven to be inaccurate given the number of authors who have done it. "

It's not subjective. To reiterate, this is one of the most important things about Bella's character, yet it's never explained. She's immune to vampire powers, but there's no why. This is objectively bad. It's not that I didn't like that there was no explanation and subjectively feel that that's bad, it is objectively bad. Subjectively disagreeing because you feel that it didn't need to be explained, once again, doesn't mean that this isn't objectively bad.

"You're still giving objective arguments for a subjective opinion."

I am not. Rather, it is you who is giving subjective arguments for objective points I'm making, as I've said before.

"What I am trying to explain is that not everyone agrees that some of the qualities that you seem to be focused on necessarily prove that literature is "good" or "bad". "

And I get that loud and clear, you are the prime example of this. But your trying to argue with subjective opinions, are looking at it subjectively because you don't care to look at it objectively and feel that I'm trying to disguise my subjectivity with objectivity.

Books can be a work of art, but books still need guide lines and criteria to meet to be labeled as anything, especially whether it's a good quality book. This series doesn't meet the criteria, in my opinion. And you don't care to look at it that way but in a subjective way which obviously is clashing because once again, you can see that some things are bad but subjectively it didn't deter you from enjoying it. But objectively this points make it bad.

" However, the notion that moist and chewy is a definite requirement of a quality brownie is subjective. A person who prefers cake like brownies will disagree with that notion. "

Pastry chefs and the like with culinary degrees are the ones who can say objectively what is a quality brownie.

"First of all, not every thing that you have said was backed up with "facts from the series". I questioned many of your interpretations and statements about the series. "

And you did so subjectively. Everything I'm posting and making a argument on comes from the books, unlike you trying to use MS as qualifying evidence when it's an unofficial, unreleased, unfinished 12 chapters of Twilight rewritten from Edward's POV.

"...it's not a fact if you are misrepresenting or misinterpreting things from the books, though. "

And that is your opinion because of your subjective feelings for the series. I don't feel that I'm doing either.

[Mochaspresso]

Melodic_May wrote: "You're going to criticize me, call me a hypocrite on rating Shiver good when I didn't rate Twilight the same yet you 1. Have not read it. And 2. Are going to take the opinions of others and try to discredit me???

Actually, I'm not ONLY taking the opinions of others. I examine all sides and I actually read the kindle sample this morning and I will probably finish the book. I'm genuinely trying to understand. As of right now, it just seems like nitpicking to me because you clearly can tolerate some of the things that you claim were "bad" about Twilight in a book that you like. I'm sorry, but that seems extremely hypocritical and biased to me. I don't know whether Shiver is better, imo than Twilight or not (and notice how I say, imo. Not, "it's a proven fact"). I haven't finished the book, so I can't say. However, several similarities jumped right out at me from just the kindle sample.

You went on about the sandwich in Twilight. Why didn't the beef stew in Shiver bother you? MS did the same exact thing....had the main character interact with other characters while intermittently describing what she was doing in the background. She also went into FAR more detail with the stew than SM did with the sandwich. While we are on the stew, why was Bella criticized for cooking for her father when Grace cooks for her family? Bella is accused of not caring about her parents, Grace has already made snarky comments about hers and insinuated several times that her mother doesn't care about her and that her father is gone a lot. I think I understand her crush/obsession with the wolf because she believes that he saved her.....but she's turning down a getaway with her friends because she didn't want to miss opportunities to catch glimpses of the wolf that she knows watches her in the woods during winter. Wasn't Bella criticized for similar behavior? I won't go into the stalking accusation and comparison to stalking in Twilight because in my opinion, if you know someone is watching you and demonstrate that you don't mind, possibly even like it and actually do things to encourage it, then it isn't "stalking" anymore. I never agreed with the stalking accusation toward Twilight. In my opinion, it stopped being stalking the moment she started leaving her window open for Edward to come in. Plus, Shiver is full of purple prose, or at least the kindle sample is. Something that Twilight was criticized for. It's more intelligently written purple prose than Twilight, but it's still purple prose.

Maybe it will be more clear if I finish it and my opinion may change, but as of right now, it seems like you tolerate certain things in books that you do like and nitpick over those same exact things when they appear in books that you don't. That's hypocritical and biased and not very objective.

There are deviations of zombies and vampires, as I am not saying that she should've stuck to the original traditional lore of vampire. So the other things you've said can't apply because I'm not saying that it would've been preferred if she stuck to the olden descriptors of vampires, but at least actually put her own twist on them instead of creating them how she pleased without knowing anything about them.

I clearly don't see the same line between "putting a unique twist on them" and "creating them how she pleased" that you do. The fact that they drank blood was enough for me to accept the justification calling them vampires. Not that this is even still a requirement anymore since Blade (a half-breed vampire) didn't drink blood either and there are other examples of vampires in all forms of media that don't drink blood. Like I said, your notion of what a vampire is supposed to be is antiquated and extremely narrow.

....Wanting to kill her to you was him crushing on her??? O.o And yes, she was still just as obsessed. He's some random boy to her, yet he's already effected her so much that she drove home crying, just because he to her didn't like her and wanted to change classes.

Did she drive home crying? She was hurt by the apparent snub and the animosity that he showed toward her and had to fight back tears but I don't remember her actually crying. Secondly, do you mean "like" in the colloquial sense, as in a romantic crush? If so, I don't think that was the sole reason why she was upset. She didn't yet have a crush on him at that point. Sure, any moron can see that one was in the making for both of them....but it was more about the hostility and being treated like a leper when he didn't even know her than about being upset that he's not returning a crush.

This is what I mean by exaggerations and misrepresentations. You tend to exaggerate something that happened in the book to justify a misrepresentation of a character's actions or motivations. That doesn't demonstrate a "fact", not does it demonstrate "objectivity".


Because right now Bella is the one that is in question, not Edward. Edward is a bad guy, no one and certainly not I am saying or implying otherwise. Putting Bella under a magnifying glass to show all the bad about her doesn't mean that I am ignoring everything that's wrong with Edward and pretending it doesn't exist.

....and this is precisely the double standard that I was referring to. Why not put Edward under the same magnifying glass?


And you know how I feel about MS. If it's not an official published book of the series, what's in it doesn't count to me and I feel shouldn't count to others when talking about this series seriously in discussions. Nevertheless, he says the same thing that I am saying, which is that he's intrigued by his inability to hear her thoughts and this is not explained at all. And I'm going to continue to stress that from an objective POV that Meyer not explaining this very crucial piece of information helps in making this series less of a quality series than it could have been. You don't think it needed to be explained, but it needed to.

"it needed to be explained". Not, "I think it needed to be explained."

I'm going to do the same thing you clearly are doing. Why not? It's a fact that it didn't need to be explained as it was not crucial to the story. No one's powers in the story were explained or justified beyond the fact that they probably had that trait in their human lives. Therefore, Bella possessing the trait as a human is not only consistent with the canon that SM created for Twilight and not explaining it is also consistent as well since it is not explained for any of the other vampires either. How they got their powers are not the focus that the author wanted to emphasize in the series. The focus is the choices they make in HOW they use their powers. That is an excellent writing technique in regards to their powers and far more interesting and insightful to these characters than how they got the power in the first place. How they got it or why they have it is not important to the story.

If anyone is exaggerating, it was Bella as she said that the morphine had her pinned and gagged, that it had her paralyzed and you said that the morphine is why she wasn't screaming. No exaggeration is coming from my end. And Bella says the morphine's effects is irrelevant as the venom is more powerful and it's pain is still extremely potent, that the morphine is not weakening the pain of the venom in her veins. She states this because she's had morphine and venom in her at the same time before and the venom in her still took over, still made her scream in pain and writhe on the ground. Now, at both times the amount of morphine is not mentioned, not to my knowledge. Hypothetically more morphine in BD would give her greater effects, but she could have also overdosed on the unknown amount of morphine that she may or may not have been given to fight the pain of the c section. To top that off she's been given nearly triple the amount of venom than when James bit her, so the amount of morphine is irrelevant as she said because she has more venom than ever before in her to make sure that it's effective, that she turns instead of dies. The venom being from Edward instead of James doesn't make it different venom, or makes the effects soften because it's from her lover. The fact that she's completely silent and unmoving is completely discredited because of those things. This is why it is a plot hole.

You are making a lot of presumptions about the interactions of morphine and venom that the texts simply do not justify. Carlisle has experimented in the past with using morphine to lessen the effects of the transformation. Not only that....

A broken whisper. “She must be in agony.” (<---Edward)

“We don’t know that. She had so much morphine in her system. We don’t know the effect that will have on her experience.” (<--Carslisle)
(location 5574)

Bella later reveals that the morphine doesn't really lessen the agony of the transformation inside, just outwardly....and she chooses not to tell Carlisle this. This is not a plot hole like you claim. It's addressed.

It's not subjective. To reiterate, this is one of the most important things about Bella's character, yet it's never explained. She's immune to vampire powers, but there's no why. This is objectively bad. It's not that I didn't like that there was no explanation and subjectively feel that that's bad, it is objectively bad. Subjectively disagreeing because you feel that it didn't need to be explained, once again, doesn't mean that this isn't objectively bad.

How she ultimately uses the power at the end of the series is what is crucial to her character. Not how she got it in the first place. That is not objectively bad. It is objectively good because many highly regarded writers have done exactly the same thing in their work. Some of which I have specifically provided names and titles for as examples in previous posts.

Since you gave it 5 stars, I am going to assume that the author of Shiver is a book where you feel that all of the necessary explanations were given. Perhaps you can direct me to a page number where she explains something. Maybe then I would get a clearer picture of what you claim to mean.

Books can be a work of art, but books still need guide lines and criteria to meet to be labeled as anything, especially whether it's a good quality book. This series doesn't meet the criteria, in my opinion. And you don't care to look at it that way but in a subjective way which obviously is clashing because once again, you can see that some things are bad but subjectively it didn't deter you from enjoying it. But objectively this points make it bad.

It doesn't objectively make it bad. It's like someone putting to much spice on the chicken and someone else tasting the same chicken and saying that this much spice is not too much at all and is constant with cajun cooking. "Too much spice" is not objective even though the first person truly believes that it is.


Pastry chefs and the like with culinary degrees are the ones who can say objectively what is a quality brownie.

Oh, god. This sounds like those people who pay $2,000 for a wedding cake that tastes like dirt because the "expert" said it's "quality".

And you did so subjectively. Everything I'm posting and making a argument on comes from the books, unlike you trying to use MS as qualifying evidence when it's an unofficial, unreleased, unfinished 12 chapters of Twilight rewritten from Edward's POV.

It was written by her and released to the general public on her website just as the science info that you refer to was.

[Jessica]

Mochaspresso wrote: "You went on about the sandwich in Twilight. Why didn't the beef stew in Shiver bother you? MS did the same exact thing....had the main character interact with other characters while intermittently describing what she was doing in the background."

I don't remember the beef stew. And I don't feel that they're the same, because Meyer and Maggie didn't do the same thing. It's not like I'm criticizing this because she had Bella doing something while holding a conversation, it's the detail she put in a meaningless task while having a meaningless conversation of which both were unimportant and the story would've carried the same way without it.If I were criticizing Meyer for doing this then I've have to criticize all authors for making their characters essentially multitask. And that is stupid and is not the reason why I have a problem with this. I've explained it, and you've disagreed with it, there's no reason to dig further when you won't find a satisfactory answer.

"While we are on the stew, why was Bella criticized for cooking for her father when Grace cooks for her family?"

I don't actually criticize her for that. You'd have to ask someone who read both and doesn't like Twilight but likes Shiver.

"Bella is accused of not caring about her parents, Grace has already made snarky comments about hers and insinuated several times that her mother doesn't care about her and that her father is gone a lot."

Because that's an actual problem in the book while Bella has no reason to act like she's more mature than her parents and disregard what they say like she knows better, or that Edward knows better. These two are completely different in regards to their parents because her father actually is gone a lot and her mother isn't the most caring, or most understanding. Bella's parents are there for her, she just doesn't want them to be.

"I think I understand her crush/obsession with the wolf because she believes that he saved her.....but she's turning down a getaway with her friends because she didn't want to miss opportunities to catch glimpses of the wolf that she knows watches her in the woods during winter. Wasn't Bella criticized for similar behavior?"

It's not that she believes he saved her, he actually did. And I don't ever recall Bella being criticized for wanting to catch a glimpse of Edward. These two don't compare in my eyes.

"I won't go into the stalking accusation and comparison to stalking in Twilight because in my opinion, if you know someone is watching you and demonstrate that you don't mind, possibly even like it and actually do things to encourage it, then it isn't "stalking" anymore."

The problem is that he stalked her when she didn't know, and didn't stalk her anymore when he told her because he was already with her. He still stalked her, that's still creepy, especially when he broke into her house to watch her sleep.

"I never agreed with the stalking accusation toward Twilight. In my opinion, it stopped being stalking the moment she started leaving her window open for Edward to come in."

At that point it wasn't stalking, but he still stalked her in the first place, before they knew each other and before they got together. You can be fine with it, but it's still not okay.

"Plus, Shiver is full of purple prose, or at least the kindle sample is. Something that Twilight was criticized for. It's more intelligently written purple prose than Twilight, but it's still purple prose."

And this is not a valid opinion since you haven't actually read it in full. To me it's not.

"Maybe it will be more clear if I finish it and my opinion may change, but as of right now, it seems like you tolerate certain things in books that you do like and nitpick over those same exact things when they appear in books that you don't. That's hypocritical and biased and not very objective."

And none of what you said is a valid opinion that matters because you've yet to read it and most importantly and what counts is that the only reason you brought it up is because you don't like me being critical about this series and want to make me out to be a hypocrite over liking a book that's done what Twilight may or may not have but ten times better. NEWS FLASH! There's nothing wrong with liking a book that may have similarities with another book but the other book clearly did it better. It's the whole point of this thread! And obviously if you find they're the same but I've given Shiver a better rating is because it did what Twilight wished it could! There's nothing wrong nor hypocritical of that! It just seems very petulant to try to take the attention away from Twilight and make this out as me being a hypocrite for liking another book that did it better.

[Jessica]

Mochaspresso wrote: "I clearly don't see the same line between "putting a unique twist on them" and "creating them how she pleased" that you do. "

It's because you don't care and don't see it as a problem. You don't think it takes away from the books quality but objectively it does. I don't know how many more times I'll have to reiterate and rephrase this. You're going to get the same answer.

" Secondly, do you mean "like" in the colloquial sense, as in a romantic crush? If so, I don't think that was the sole reason why she was upset. She didn't yet have a crush on him at that point. Sure, any moron can see that one was in the making for both of them....but it was more about the hostility and being treated like a leper when he didn't even know her than about being upset that he's not returning a crush."

Yes I do and I feel that she shouldn't have cared what some stranger thought of her to the point where she's brought to tears unless she already liked him, which was evident.

"This is what I mean by exaggerations and misrepresentations. You tend to exaggerate something that happened in the book to justify a misrepresentation of a character's actions or motivations. That doesn't demonstrate a "fact", not does it demonstrate "objectivity"

What it does demonstrate is what you feel I am doing based on how you viewed it and how I viewed it, which we went over already. You can view it as me misrepresenting or exaggerating, but it is how I viewed what happened. And on certain things you are no more right with your interpretation of it than I am. and nor am I at this point trying to show something as as fact or show how it isn't objectively not good quality.

"....and this is precisely the double standard that I was referring to. Why not put Edward under the same magnifying glass? "

"Because right now Bella is the one that is in question, not Edward. Edward is a bad guy, no one and certainly not I am saying or implying otherwise. Putting Bella under a magnifying glass to show all the bad about her doesn't mean that I am ignoring everything that's wrong with Edward and pretending it doesn't exist. "

What part of this didn't you understand???? I'm genuinely confused. There is no double standard. Edward is not the topic right now, Bella is. There is no reason to talk about him right now unless you actually wanted to and not to use him as an example of how I'm being too critical, hypocritical, or anything of the like. Like???? I don't get it??? I thought I was clear???

"I'm going to do the same thing you clearly are doing. Why not? It's a fact that it didn't need to be explained as it was not crucial to the story."

I wouldn't know what you presume me to be doing other than what I tell you I am doing, which is right now repeating myself. It needed to because it was crucial to not only the story but to Bella's character.

" No one's powers in the story were explained or justified beyond the fact that they probably had that trait in their human lives. Therefore, Bella possessing the trait as a human is not only consistent with the canon that SM created for Twilight and not explaining it is also consistent as well since it is not explained for any of the other vampires either. "

What you just said was explanation enough for me to suspend my disbelief. However, with Bella having no explanation for having this power I cannot suspend my disbelief, as no one should.

"How they got their powers are not the focus that the author wanted to emphasize in the series. "

The magical candy in Harry Potter was not what Rowling wanted to emphasize in the series but she still gave plausible explanation for them, why give Meyer slack for not extrapolating on something that obviously is an important part of her main character? Besides of course you not finding it necessary and it didn't bother you. Any reason besides this?

[Jessica]

Mochaspresso wrote: "You are making a lot of presumptions about the interactions of morphine and venom that the texts simply do not justify. Carlisle has experimented in the past with using morphine to lessen the effects of the transformation.

Bella later reveals that the morphine doesn't really lessen the agony of the transformation inside, just outwardly....and she chooses not to tell Carlisle this. This is not a plot hole like you claim. It's addressed. "

You'd have to quote here, as I don't recall that and still find it to be a plot hole.

"How she ultimately uses the power at the end of the series is what is crucial to her character. Not how she got it in the first place. That is not objectively bad. It is objectively good because many highly regarded writers have done exactly the same thing in their work. Some of which I have specifically provided names and titles for as examples in previous posts."

The power itself is crucial to her character, and that means how she got it as well. Meyer took the time to explain all their powers and how they were their biggest trait as a human and transformed into their power as vampires, yet she doesn't explain why Bella has this power. That is bad. You subjectively finding it good doesn't make it objectively good.

"It doesn't objectively make it bad. "

Melodic_Mary wrote:"And you don't care to look at it that way but in a subjective way which obviously is clashing because once again, you can see that some things are bad but subjectively it didn't deter you from enjoying it. "

"It was written by her and released to the general public on her website just as the science info that you refer to was. "

It is an unofficial (because it's not officially published), unfinished, illicitly released (her friend posted it online, that's why it's unfinished), piece of work that shouldn't count. Just because it's posted on her site doesn't make it and her fail of an explanation the same.

At this point I feel it is better to save me time to just copy and paste my response to things you've said that warranted me to make that response in the first place. And to make it clear, there is no other reason behind this except to save me time and to not have to repeat or rephrase a response when I've said it already. As I said before, you're gonna get the same answer, no matter how you reword the prompt/question.

[[deleted user]]

I think the book would have been better if bella died in a hole and edward realized that he could do so much better.
I also noticed that a lot of people said that it would have been better if Stephanie Meyer was a better writer. I was thinking of saying that but that would have made me a hypocrite cause I loved the host so probably if Stephanie Meyer had written this series better than yeah definitely it would have been a better book.

[Mochaspresso]

Melodic_May wrote: "I don't remember the beef stew. And I don't feel that they're the same, because Meyer and Maggie didn't do the same thing. It's not like I'm criticizing this because she had Bella doing something while holding a conversation, it's the detail she put in a meaningless task while having a meaningless conversation of which both were unimportant and the story would've carried the same way without it.If I were criticizing Meyer for doing this then I've have to criticize all authors for making their characters essentially multitask. And that is stupid and is not the reason why I have a problem with this. I've explained it, and you've disagreed with it, there's no reason to dig further when you won't find a satisfactory answer.

I'm trying to understand why you think it's different. The two scenarios are exactly the same. I want to understand why this book does it 10x "better". You say that it's better, in fact you even go so far as to say that it is "objectively" so, yet you don't actually give reasons why. Grace was making dinner while she was talking with her friend on the phone and mixed in between the phone conversation dialogue was descriptions of how she was preparing the food. (She starts making dinner on p. 15/5%) Neither author did anything wrong by including it, imo. Yet you criticized SM for including it in Twilight. You said that it was "bad" for her to do this. If it is as bad as you claim, I'm just trying to understand how and why Shiver handles this "better" than Twilight does.

Above, you said it's the detail she put in a meaningless task while having a meaningless conversation of which both were unimportant and the story would've carried the same way without it. I'm up to chapter 19 now. I'm trying to understand how the fact that Grace prepares food is more meaningful to Shiver's story than Bella's doing so is to Twilight's and how Grace's phone conversation with her friend is more meaningful than Bella's conversation with Jacob. It doesn't appear that it is. How is the same scenario in Shiver "quality writing" yet "bad writing" when it's in Twilight?

Because that's an actual problem in the book while Bella has no reason to act like she's more mature than her parents and disregard what they say like she knows better, or that Edward knows better. These two are completely different in regards to their parents because her father actually is gone a lot and her mother isn't the most caring, or most understanding. Bella's parents are there for her, she just doesn't want them to be.

I don't know about that. The snarky comments that Grace always randomly tosses out about her parents are not always backed up with actions on their part. Meaning the reader is simply told this, but is not shown this about her parents. At least, not in the first 18 chapters. Her mother is an artist with a gallery opening coming up (Why didn't Grace go, btw? That was odd.) and her father works Grace says her father is gone a lot....yet Grace can look at a clock and pinpoint what time he's going to be home for dinner and he's home at the time that she expected. When her father announces "I got a raise and I'm getting your mother an art studio and you a better car!", she resents his work demands (which don't fully jive with the fact that he still manages to make it home in time for dinner) and says that she'll probably never see her parents again....BUT is very happy and giddy that his raise can get her a new car. These comments make Grace seem like a spoiled bratty teenager that rags on the fact that her mom is not "the apron wearing Betty Crocker type" (<-Grace's words...where are the anti-feminist rants for this horse-shit?!!) and her Dad works yet she is all too happy to accept the benefits of all that hard work that they do...like a cell phone and a new car.

Grace's random comments about her parents just seem like a contrived trope thrown into the book just because of it's intended audience. Plus, "absentee"/"bad" working parents ignoring and/or not spending enough time their teenaged kids conveniently allows them to have more free time to run around in the woods with wolves and sneak them into their bedrooms at night. It's a contrived and common trope that addresses the typical "Where were her parents while all of this was going on?" question. Twilight did the same thing. Same shit, different pile. There is no such thing as a "better" or "quality" pile of shit.

You accused Bella of not caring about her parents. Please explain how Grace shows that she does because I don't see it at this point. At least Bella is mature enough to understand that her Dad is a cop and works longer hours and she appreciated her crappy car. Grace resents her father's work demands, resents her crappy car and resents that her father hasn't had time to follow through on his promise to get her a new one. None of this is because she wants to actually spend more time with her father. She just wants the new car because the old one is crappy and a new car means "freedom". (<-her exact word) Her parents are supposedly never there and she does whatever she wants, yet she still doesn't have enough "freedom"?

You criticized Bella for foolhardily running into dangerous situations. How is Grace running into a woods that she knows is full of hunters to save the wolves any different? She didn't even stop to so much as snatch the guy's orange hat before she ran into the woods. She had no protective gear at all.

You accused Bella of being a terrible friend. Grace is growing more and more distant from her circle of friends. How is she a better friend than Bella? The circumstances surrounding the disconnect are different in Twilight because those people were not her lifelong friends. Bella just moved to Forks and met those people and was never truly that close to them. In Grace's case, these girls have been friends for years...yet when her friend wants Grace's opinion on the photographs that she's taken, all she cares and thinks about is the one where "her wolf" is in the background. I didn't blame her friend for getting pissed at her and later telling her that her obsession with the wolves is stupid and creepy.

Twilight is criticized for deviating from traditional vampire lore. Shiver has the wolves changing based on the temperature. That's a rather big deviation. I guess it's not a bigger deviation than sparkling vampires, though.

Twilight was criticized for featuring an insta-love at first sight relationship between Bella and Edward. How is that any different from Sam and Grace? At least Bella and Edward hang out and have a couple of conversations with each other first.

Bella was accused of being obsessed with Edward. This is true. She was obsessed with him. However, how is her obsession any different than the one that Grace has with "her wolf"?

Grace does a lot of that omniscience thing too. She has entire conversations in her own head just from looking into someone's eyes.

It's not that she believes he saved her, he actually did. And I don't ever recall Bella being criticized for wanting to catch a glimpse of Edward. These two don't compare in my eyes.

You criticized Bella for her obsession with Edward. Grace is equally obsessed with "her wolf" (that's actually what she refers to him as, "her wolf") and has been for years.

Bella was criticized for having no interests. I'm 19 chapters in....more than enough time to develop a character. What interests does Grace have? Besides her wolf?

I'm not trying to be a bitch about this, but when I read Shiver through the same "quality" lens that you claimed to read Twilight through, there is nothing about this book that is "quality" based on the criterion that you've mentioned. Shiver has many of the same elements that you claimed to not like about Twilight. Yes, I do question your "objectivity".

The problem is that he stalked her when she didn't know, and didn't stalk her anymore when he told her because he was already with her. He still stalked her, that's still creepy, especially when he broke into her house to watch her sleep.

The wolf watching her from the woods for years wasn't creepy? Really?

And this is not a valid opinion since you haven't actually read it in full. To me it's not.

Regarding the purple prose, I'm 19 chapters in now and so far, the book has consistently been full of purple prose.

I was not a wolf, but I wasn’t Sam yet, either. I was a leaking womb bulging with the promise of conscious thoughts: the frozen woods far behind me, the girl on the tire swing, the sound of fingers on metal strings. The future and the past, both the same, snow and then summer and then snow again. A shattered spider’s web of many colors, cracked in ice, immeasurably sad. “Sam,” the girl said. “Sam.” She was past present future. I wanted to answer, but I was broken. Read more at location 723


Sorry, but that is the Prince's "Purple Rain" of purple prose complete with Prince in his purple glitter renaissance pants suit and ruffle shirt in all of his purple glory.



And none of what you said is a valid opinion that matters because you've yet to read it and the only reason you brought it up is because you don't like me being critical about this series and want to make me out to be a hypocrite over liking a book that's done what Twilight may or may not have but ten times better. It just seems very petulant to try to take the attention away from Twilight and make this out as me being a hypocrite for liking another book that did it better

"did it better" how? That's what I'm trying to figure out. Please explain what's "better" and how you are proving that it is better objectively rather than subjectively.

It isn't that I don't like you being critical of Twilight at all. That's not the issue for me. I don't believe that your criticism is fair and objective and my issue is your insistence that your opinions are to the point of arrogance. You gave opinions of why you thought Twilight was not "quality" and called these opinions "objective facts" that can't be disputed. If those facts that you mentioned are truly objective for you....then there is absolutely no way that Shiver should have gotten 5 stars from you. If those criticisms are provable objective facts for what constitutes bad writing then other books that have those same elements should be bad as well. Yet you gave Shiver 5 stars. When I mention this.....your response is "it's 10x better". That does not sound very "objective" to me at all.

Not that you care, but I don't dislike Shiver. I don't think that I like it as much as Twilight, though. 1) The pace of the story is slower 2) I don't like Grace as a character. She's not as flat out annoying as Bella...but she's not very likable either, at least not to me. 3) I tolerate purple prose, but I don't particularly like it. 4) Character voice -- if it weren't for the chapter headings telling me the whose pov the chapter is being told from, I would not immediately be able to tell the difference between Sam and Grace. Their voices sound very similar. Stephanie Meyer is better at voicing her characters and ensuring that the things that they say and do and how they say and do them are consistent with those characters. I had the same voice issues with Beautiful Creatures. Ethan, a teenaged boy, sounded like a girl most of the time. 5) SM is also better at writing romance in general. I'm not really feeling the connection between Sam and Grace. Sure, the book tells me it's there...but I don't actually see it and feel it. 6) Twilight is actually a more entertaining and engaging story.

[Mochaspresso]

Melodic_May wrote: "It's because you don't care and don't see it as a problem. You don't think it takes away from the books quality but objectively it does. I don't know how many more times I'll have to reiterate and rephrase this. You're going to get the same answer.

If there are people in the world who don't care and don't see the lore deviation as a problem, then it is not an "objective" issue. It becomes subjective. Spelling and other editing errors are objective. Those are errors that can be proven. Some people can still enjoy a book with these types of errors. These types of errors are objective for proving "bad writing" from a technical perspective but become subjective in regards to a whether or not it is a "bad book". The popularity of Fifty Shades of Grey and many other books that have tons of errors in them is a testament to this. So was your Trader Joe's/Whole Foods analogy. You confused an "image" of quality with the "reality". You're doing the same exact thing with vampires. You have an antiquated notion of what a vampire must entail when the reality is that authors have been rewriting vampire lore since forever. I can respect an opinion if it were honest and fair. Just say that you didn't like her lore and state your reasons why. But why take the arrogance road and proclaim what vampires are supposed to be and not adhering to that is bad writing......then go on to read other books that do the same exact thing and give them 5 stars just because you liked them?

Whether or not lore deviation is bad is entirely a subjective concept. It's dependent on personal preferences. You declaring that it is an objective fact that it was wrong for her to deviate doesn't actually make it so and is the epitome of arrogance. That is entirely dependent on personal opinions and preferences....hence, it's subjective.

What it does demonstrate is what you feel I am doing based on how you viewed it and how I viewed it, which we went over already. You can view it as me misrepresenting or exaggerating, but it is how I viewed what happened. And on certain things you are no more right with your interpretation of it than I am. and nor am I at this point trying to show something as as fact or show how it isn't objectively not good quality.

Under normal circumstances, if two people can read the same words and see things differently, then it seems to me that the interpretations are highly subjective rather than objective. However, in this case, it is not normal circumstances. When someone exaggerates and in turn, misrepresents an event in the text, that goes beyond subjective opinion and enters into bias territory.

What part of this didn't you understand???? I'm genuinely confused. There is no double standard. Edward is not the topic right now, Bella is. There is no reason to talk about him right now unless you actually wanted to and not to use him as an example of how I'm being too critical, hypocritical, or anything of the like. Like???? I don't get it??? I thought I was clear???

Edward is rarely the topic. That's precisely what's hypocritical.

I wouldn't know what you presume me to be doing other than what I tell you I am doing, which is right now repeating myself. It needed to because it was crucial to not only the story but to Bella's character.

How she got her power was not crucial to the story. Just like all of the other vampires in Twilight's universe, how they used their power is what was crucial to the characters.

What you just said was explanation enough for me to suspend my disbelief. However, with Bella having no explanation for having this power I cannot suspend my disbelief, as no one should.

The magical candy in Harry Potter was not what Rowling wanted to emphasize in the series but she still gave plausible explanation for them, why give Meyer slack for not extrapolating on something that obviously is an important part of her main character? Besides of course you not finding it necessary and it didn't bother you. Any reason besides this?

The Harry Potter universe revolves around magic. The Twilight universe doesn't revolve around where the vamps get their powers or even why some vamps have powers while others do not. Their universe revolves around how the ones that have powers use them. If you really need to have an answer, I don't understand why heredity is not enough of an explanation. The books implied that Charlie also has a similar quality.

[Mochaspresso]

Olivia wrote: "Mochaspresso wrote: "Melodic_May wrote: "I don't remember the beef stew. And I don't feel that they're the same, because Meyer and Maggie didn't do the same thing. It's not like I'm criticizing th..."

eh. I don't know. I'm 20 chapters in and still waiting for something really exciting to happen in Shiver. I'm still waiting for Sam's character to be developed also. I don't know much about him other than he's a werewolf and has "emo" Beatles mop hair.

[Princess Lea]

I agree! I think Stephanie had a great idea/story, but she hadn't conveyed it well enough for us to give her a standing ovation. I don't think she wanted to be an author but since she had such unique and raw idea back in the day, that she had to work on it herself.
Unfortunately, because of her writing skills, I gave it 3 stars. If she had written it better, then I would have given 4.5 stars.:3

[Rel8tivity]

Mochaspresso wrote: "Damn SM for stupidly putting that lame ass scientific explanation out there!!! I understand what you are saying about SM breaking her own canon and not sticking to the rules of her world. I do see why that would be a problem for some people. Although, in her defense, she didn't just break it without addressing it. She did write it into the story that it was something that everyone believed to be impossible. I just don't see why it has to be considered bad when so many authors have done it."

LOL! Well, I think that's to be expected, since she didn't really think her world building completely through. All she can do now is retcon away. Even if she were to come out now, and say exactly what I suggested ("My vampires don't grow any more, or change, EXCEPT in their testicles.") it will be hollow because it's after all the criticism has come out.

For me, the characters not knowing that the hybrid is possible doesn't excuse the canon violation. They're just acting out the play as the author gives it to them. And since SM wasn't aware that she was breaking her own canon, then it only follows that she'll write her story that way. I can only speak for myself, that the canon violation is a big deal, because so much of the story hinges on it. Without RenFailmee, what happens? Edward and Bella return from their honeymoon in their own time, no stress. Edward eventually follows through with his promise to change Bella, and that raises the conflict with the wolves. The Bella/Jacob dynamic isn't resolved for them by imprinting, so they have to work out their differences and grow up like other exes do. The Volturi would have no excuse to condemn the Cullens, so would either have to come up with something else, or they wouldn't come at all. Basically, it would be a completely different story if the plot hole had not been introduced. (Have you read my Breaking Dawn re-write? I do exactly that. Not saying it's better than SM's, just that it makes sense.)

First, do the VAMPIRE cells actually need to be able to "change state" to release DNA? Second, if there is an inability to change state....how does the process of turning a human actually work then? .... I thought the "inability to change" had more to do with the aging process.

SM does use the term "state" when describing her vamps, and I do believe a "non-changing state" was what she was going for. Her vampires can't sleep, because whatever nerve center would normally shut down to allow that, can't "change state" to shut down. If these nerves cells can't change to allow the vampire to sleep, why should other cells change? Let's go back to her quotes:

"They sparkle because they have turned to substance that is somewhat like diamond. Their bodies have hardened, frozen into a kind of living stone. Each little cell in their skin has become a separate facet that reflects the light. These facets have a prism-like quality - they throw rainbows as they glitter."

"Vampires are frozen in the state at which they are transformed. They do not grow older, taller, or wider, or experience any other physical change, including unconsciousness (vampires never sleep). Their fingernails and hair do not grow."

By SM's "frozen" comment, she's not referring to cryogenic preservation, but that they are locked into the condition that they were in at the time of transformation. No more growth is possible, and cells cannot transmute. If they can't divide for new growth, how can they split themselves open to release DNA? Further, DNA is not expressed out of cells, like saliva or semen is, and I'm only going by SM's concept that vampire functions mimic those of the human source material. The saliva venom-analogue and semen venom-analogue would be produced without the cells dividing or rupturing themselves, so that's allowed. Cells also do not rupture to absorb nutrients, so that's allowed too.

We also have to understand that cells don't normally work this way - by bursting. Sperm cells don't simply break open, and spill their DNA contents into seminal fluid for it to be carried away. Body tissue doesn't do this either. So if we accept SM's idea that vampire things are going to function as they did in the human, then that meant the vampire cells wouldn't do it either.

SM is very specific in calling attention to her vampires not changing or growing, so I don't think I'm being overly selective. I think it would be overly selective to say they're unable to change or grow, EXCEPT for being animated, and producing venom, and consuming blood, and in producing reproductive cells, but in the male only because the reproductive cycle is absent in female vampires. I'm being a little silly here, but you see what I'm getting at. They have no growth or change, except in the areas that support the plot? That's awfully convenient, isn't it?

Re: Alice. As I said, this is debatable. How much intent is enough? What is the difference between intention and decision? In some cases, she makes perfectly clear visions based on simple intentions. Other times she says it's not clear. I think that we have enough intention from both Bella and James for a decent vision to be formed, regardless of small shifts moment to moment. All the little shifts and maneuverings still have the same intent: get Bella clear so she can go die. James wants her to go to the ballet studio, she wants to get there, and knows where he wants her to go. Look at the paragraph on page 436:

"And she hadn't seen me in the mirror room with James until I'd made the decision to meet him there. I tried not to think about what else she might have seen. I didn't want my panic to make Jasper more suspicious. They would be watching me twice as carefully now, anyway, after Alice's vision."

This is why I feel it's too author contrived. It says straight out that Alice sees she's gone to the studio and is there with James. As peremptory as they've been with her, THEY SHOULD JUST GRAB her and abort the plan.

Re: Newborns. I agree that Victoria has a purpose for the newborns, but by not sharing it with them, it's not THEIR purpose. They won't make an effective security force (as SM has purported) if they don't know what their purpose is. They play video games, they hunt, they fight each other, Bree sneaks off with Diego, and hides in back of Freaky Fred to read. But not anywhere do any of them stand guard around Victoria's cottage in the woods, keeping an eye out for threats to Victoria. That's why I'm saying it's a crap claim, that they were originally a security force converted to an army. They were a strike team from the get go, but it was a plot hole for Victoria to create them as such, because she didn't get the idea until Edward chased her through Maria's territory. That doesn't happen until after September, and Victoria was creating newborns back in March (if SM's timeline is to be believed).

[Mochaspresso]

I should probably post this in the "Shiver" board or on my own progress update....but I don't really like how this book vilifies working parents and plays up the stereotype of them being too busy and preoccupied to care about their kids. I think reliance on a cliched stereotype and trope (and repeatedly beating it to death in your book) to move your story is lazy writing, too. I would have been more impressed if the author had Grace find creative ways to keep her secret rather than the over-emphasis on a cliched stereotype. It's Beautiful Creatures all over again, except the overdone and way over the top cliche was the narrow-mindedness of the small southern town.

I'm an impatient reader. Enough already with the parents. I got it. Just focus and stick to the story about the wolves and get to the story about Grace and Sam. For this to be a paranormal romance, there isn't enough paranormal or romance for me.

....edited to add...there is actually another scene that involves detailed explanations of food preparation in this book. Isabel comes over to talk to Grace and Sam about her brother, Jack, being turned into a werewolf and Grace enlists their help to make quiche before they sit down and talk. They even laugh and dance to a Mariah Carey tune in the kitchen while making it!!! Several pages later, after the quiche is in the oven, that's when they sit down to have the conversation about Jack.

[Mochaspresso]

Rel8tivity wrote: "LOL! Well, I think that's to be expected, since she didn't really think her world building completely through. All she can do now is retcon away. Even if she were to come out now, and say exactly what I suggested ("My vampires don't grow any more, or change, EXCEPT in their testicles.") it will be hollow because it's after all the criticism has come out.

For me, the characters not knowing that the hybrid is possible doesn't excuse the canon violation. They're just acting out the play as the author gives it to them. And since SM wasn't aware that she was breaking her own canon, then it only follows that she'll write her story that way. I can only speak for myself, that the canon violation is a big deal, because so much of the story hinges on it. Without RenFailmee, what happens? Edward and Bella return from their honeymoon in their own time, no stress. Edward eventually follows through with his promise to change Bella, and that raises the conflict with the wolves. The Bella/Jacob dynamic isn't resolved for them by imprinting, so they have to work out their differences and grow up like other exes do. The Volturi would have no excuse to condemn the Cullens, so would either have to come up with something else, or they wouldn't come at all. Basically, it would be a completely different story if the plot hole had not been introduced. (Have you read my Breaking Dawn re-write? I do exactly that. Not saying it's better than SM's, just that it makes sense.)

You are right that it would have been a completely different story and that it would have made more sense. However, does this particular genre have the requirement that everything pertaining to the paranormal aspects must make sense? The definition of paranormal is ": very strange and not able to be explained by what scientists know about nature and the world"
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictio...

Re: Alice. As I said, this is debatable. How much intent is enough? What is the difference between intention and decision? In some cases, she makes perfectly clear visions based on simple intentions. Other times she says it's not clear. I think that we have enough intention from both Bella and James for a decent vision to be formed, regardless of small shifts moment to moment. All the little shifts and maneuverings still have the same intent: get Bella clear so she can go die. James wants her to go to the ballet studio, she wants to get there, and knows where he wants her to go. Look at the paragraph on page 436:

"And she hadn't seen me in the mirror room with James until I'd made the decision to meet him there. I tried not to think about what else she might have seen. I didn't want my panic to make Jasper more suspicious. They would be watching me twice as carefully now, anyway, after Alice's vision."

This is why I feel it's too author contrived. It says straight out that Alice sees she's gone to the studio and is there with James. As peremptory as they've been with her, THEY SHOULD JUST GRAB her and abort the plan.


They did do that, though. That is exactly what Alice and Jasper believed that they were doing by bringing Bella to the airport to meet Edward's plane.


Re: Newborns. I agree that Victoria has a purpose for the newborns, but by not sharing it with them, it's not THEIR purpose. They won't make an effective security force (as SM has purported) if they don't know what their purpose is. They play video games, they hunt, they fight each other, Bree sneaks off with Diego, and hides in back of Freaky Fred to read. But not anywhere do any of them stand guard around Victoria's cottage in the woods, keeping an eye out for threats to Victoria. That's why I'm saying it's a crap claim, that they were originally a security force converted to an army. They were a strike team from the get go, but it was a plot hole for Victoria to create them as such, because she didn't get the idea until Edward chased her through Maria's territory. That doesn't happen until after September, and Victoria was creating newborns back in March (if SM's timeline is to be believed).


First, I am not convinced that Victoria was in her right mind and thinking rationally. Second, her talent was escaping danger. Not, standing and fighting. For those reasons, I don't think she was capable of putting the careful planning and thought into creating the army. She was not as calculating as Jasper was. I also think that her escape danger instincts ruled in her decision to maintain some distance. She knew that what she was doing was wrong and could land her in trouble with the Volturi, too.

[Jessica]

Mochaspresso wrote: "It isn't that I don't like you being critical of Twilight at all. That's not the issue for me. I don't believe that your criticism is fair and objective and my issue is your insistence that your opinions are to the point of arrogance. You gave opinions of why you thought Twilight was not "quality" and called these opinions "objective facts" that can't be disputed. If those facts that you mentioned are truly objective for you....then there is absolutely no way that Shiver should have gotten 5 stars from you. If those criticisms are provable objective facts for what constitutes bad writing then other books that have those same elements should be bad as well. Yet you gave Shiver 5 stars. When I mention this.....your response is "it's 10x better". That does not sound very "objective" to me at all."

I'm supposed to remember a book that I read a while ago that I didn't finish the remaining books out of the trilogy and explain to you why Shiver is objectively and/or subjectively better to me than Twilight? That what I do remember of it was a much more pleasant read than Twilight, regardless if there are endless similarities (Not that I would know, seeing as I can't remember it)?

How about this, I'll reread it and let you know, if you genuinely want to know instead of are using to try to make me out as a hypocrite and how none of what I've said matters because apparently it's hypocritical to like the same thing from one book that was handled better in another book when that's what Twilight needed. That it had potential but Meyer failed to bring out its potential. And instead other books that may or may not have similarities did it better. somehow that's me being a hypocrite.

I'm allowed to like a book that may or may not have similarities with Twilight but I feel it did it better and thus deserve a higher rating, how dare you say I'm a hypocrite over not liking Twilight but liked Shiver?

But like I said, if you actually want to compare and contrast Twilight and Shiver based on the first books alone, I'll reread it and make a thread in Shiver and we'll have it out there, savvy?

[Jessica]

Mochaspresso wrote: "If there are people in the world who don't care and don't see the lore deviation as a problem, then it is not an "objective" issue. It becomes subjective"

And that isn't what I was saying was objectively bad. My subjective opinion is that her creating her own lore without researching is bad. What is objectively bad is that she did no research and what little she did she failed to utilize. This I feel is an obvious fact and one that you agreed on in parts when I explained how where and why her not researching or her fail!research was bad. You finding no problem in it is what is subjective.

"Under normal circumstances, if two people can read the same words and see things differently, then it seems to me that the interpretations are highly subjective rather than objective. However, in this case, it is not normal circumstances. When someone exaggerates and in turn, misrepresents an event in the text, that goes beyond subjective opinion and enters into bias territory."

And it is still a subjective opinion, whether you feel I am being biased or not. I can say I am unbiased till my fingers fall off, but you're hard pressed to believe otherwise.

"Edward is rarely the topic. That's precisely what's hypocritical."

That's not being hypocritical! That doesn't make ANY sense! Edward isn't the topic so I'm a hypocrite?? Even when I explicitly stated that I find him to not be a good guy at all, that he did wrong and I'm not pretending otherwise while I talk about Bella??? What did you drink that made you think this made sense???

"How she got her power was not crucial to the story. Just like all of the other vampires in Twilight's universe, how they used their power is what was crucial to the characters.
"

And that will be your opinion and one that you will hold so long as this is a topic. And because of that I have to say again that it is objectively bad that Bella has this power but no explanation for it. *shrugs* It's just what we'll be repeating so long as we don't drop this.

"The Harry Potter universe revolves around magic. The Twilight universe doesn't revolve around where the vamps get their powers or even why some vamps have powers while others do not. Their universe revolves around how the ones that have powers use them. If you really need to have an answer, I don't understand why heredity is not enough of an explanation. The books implied that Charlie also has a similar quality. "

The candy is not magical in and of itself, but that's irrelevant. What is relevant is that there's no explanation and you are fine with assuming that the power is hereditary and leave it at that when it's not implied that the power is hereditary and even then there's no explanation for it to make it objectively good. Because there's no explanation it is objectively bad. That you find it subjectively good and it doesn't bother you doesn't make it an objectively good thing about the series, it makes it a plot hole.

And I already spoke on Charlie and why it is possible that it's not hereditary, however readily you accepted it as hereditary. And because Meyer is such a sloppy author that she didn't even tie her bow on the story as neatly as she could, it's only implied to some that it is hereditary and they accept it because they didn't care. That's why it's subjectively okay to you. But the fact that she never explains it is why it's objectively bad, no matter how much you say otherwise.

"And again, it is never explained, only expected to be accepted. And this can also be explained as Edward not having a bond with Charlie. His powers are explained as him being able to hear people's thoughts the closer (emotionally, in this case) he is with them. "

[Alex]

IF maybe, Bella didn't exist, the book would have been good? OR maybe if she was strong? smart? clever? funny? not clumsy? God, I swear I only read the books because Charlie was pretty awesome.

[Mochaspresso]

Melodic_May wrote: "Mochaspresso wrote: "It isn't that I don't like you being critical of Twilight at all. That's not the issue for me. I don't believe that your criticism is fair and objective and my issue is your i..."

It's not necessary for you to re-read the book just for the sole purpose of arguing it's merits with me. Honestly, I don't even enjoy arguing about books that I don't really like in their forums. I'd much rather talk about books that I do like, even if I do find myself defending them on a regular basis.

The only reason that I asked was because your reasons for why Twilight was "objectively bad" beyond any shadow of doubt are very specific and you are extremely adamant that these opinions are facts and are elements that make literature bad. It didn't make sense that another book that has some of those same elements would be highly rated by you. But you said that you read it long ago and don't even remember it. Well, that makes sense and imo, is another reason why opinions on literature are in fact mostly subjective even when the person swears that they are objective. The passage of time also affects perceptions and perspectives. Nostalgia and the passage of time can favorably or unfavorably influence perceptions of quality, too.

[Jessica]

Mochaspresso wrote: "The only reason that I asked was because your reasons for why Twilight was "objectively bad" beyond any shadow of doubt are very specific and you are extremely adamant that these opinions are facts and are elements that make literature bad. It didn't make sense that another book that has some of those same elements would be highly rated by you. But you said that you read it long ago and don't even remember it."

Because authors can handle the same things differently and it could be bad from one author but good from another. It's their execution that determines if one will be good or not. And this still is based on what similarities you see between Shiver and Twilight of which you can't say I'm being hypocritical on because I don't remember Shiver, so continuing to prod at this would be pointless as it's based on the similarities you see between Shiver and Twilight and once again, I don't remember Shiver.

" Well, that makes sense and imo, is another reason why opinions on literature are in fact mostly subjective even when the person swears that they are objective. The passage of time also affects perceptions and perspectives. Nostalgia and the passage of time can favorably or unfavorably influence perceptions of quality, too. "

And I'm currently reading Twilight. Time does not make the heart grow fonder. The bad things are still bad, even though you say the passage of time can influence my perception.

And I don't understand why you'd say this anyway, as what I remember of Shiver was good and never outright admitted that there are similarities between Twilight and Shiver and that Shiver did it better. I personally didn't see any similarities, you do. And me not having seen any isn't helped by me not remembering Shiver. So yeah, it's all completely pointless to continue this way unless you actually want to compare and contrast these two, instead of having brought it up to prove a point that you can't prove because that point relies on my memory of the book. When I read the book it was good. The passage of time and/or nostalgia has nothing to do with this as right now I have no opinion of Shiver because it was that long ago that I read it. So there's no nostalgia or passed time that would favorably or unfavorably influence my perception of the book's quality.

[Natalie]

If Bella wasn't so damn whiny and helpless all the time. I thought the writing was pretty good. OH, OH! And if she didn't get PREGNANT! I mean what was that all about? It came out of nowhere. I feel like Stephenie Meyer wanted Bella to have a perfect happily ever after and she somehow got it into her head that she needed to have a baby to do that. Vampires can't have babies! They're dead!!

[Mochaspresso]

Melodic_May wrote: "And that isn't what I was saying was objectively bad. And that isn't what I was saying was objectively bad. My subjective opinion is that her creating her own lore without researching is bad. What is objectively bad is that she did no research and what little she did she failed to utilize. This I feel is an obvious fact and one that you agreed on in parts when I explained how where and why her not researching or her fail!research was bad. You finding no problem in it is what is subjective.

This would have saved pages and pages of debate.---> "My subjective opinion is that her creating her own lore without researching is bad."

I have never had qualms about admitting when my opinions may be subjective, not do I think anything is wrong with analyzing literature through an admittedly subjective lens....as long as you are open and honest with yourself and with others and are willing to acknowledge it.

And it is still a subjective opinion, whether you feel I am being biased or not. I can say I am unbiased till my fingers fall off, but you're hard pressed to believe otherwise.

Very true....however, I did not form that opinion just out of the blue.

"Edward is rarely the topic. That's precisely what's hypocritical."

That's not being hypocritical! That doesn't make ANY sense! Edward isn't the topic so I'm a hypocrite?? Even when I explicitly stated that I find him to not be a good guy at all, that he did wrong and I'm not pretending otherwise while I talk about Bella??? What did you drink that made you think this made sense???

Yes because there is consistently far more focus and discussion on Bella's supposed flaws than Edward's when they are both main characters in the story and exhibit many of the same character traits.

And that will be your opinion and one that you will hold so long as this is a topic. And because of that I have to say again that it is objectively bad that Bella has this power but no explanation for it. *shrugs* It's just what we'll be repeating so long as we don't drop this.

Did you actually even provide proof that this is objectively bad? Proof besides "...because I said so"? This notion that you have is 1) extremely antiquated in general and 2) is one that does not even apply to the paranormal genre. Plenty of successful and highly regarded authors do not adhere to this or many other supposed rules of "objective" quality.

http://www.salon.com/2014/01/19/the_j...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paranorm...
.....Some paranormal romances focus less on the specifics of their alternative worlds than do traditional science fiction or fantasy novels, keeping the attention strongly on the underlying romance.[8] Others develop the alternate reality meticulously, combining well-planned magical systems and inhuman cultures with contemporary reality.

This rule that you speak of is not necessarily always being adhered to in general and does not even exist within the paranormal romance genre. You clearly have a preference. Preferences are not "objective". They are subjective.


The candy is not magical in and of itself, but that's irrelevant. What is relevant is that there's no explanation and you are fine with assuming that the power is hereditary and leave it at that when it's not implied that the power is hereditary and even then there's no explanation for it to make it objectively good. Because there's no explanation it is objectively bad. That you find it subjectively good and it doesn't bother you doesn't make it an objectively good thing about the series, it makes it a plot hole.

And I already spoke on Charlie and why it is possible that it's not hereditary, however readily you accepted it as hereditary. And because Meyer is such a sloppy author that she didn't even tie her bow on the story as neatly as she could, it's only implied to some that it is hereditary and they accept it because they didn't care. That's why it's subjectively okay to you. But the fact that she never explains it is why it's objectively bad, no matter how much you say otherwise.

The implication is enough justification to make the inference. You obstinately refuse to make the necessary inference because it isn't explicitly in your face with a trail of breadcrumbs to follow. (...and that is not how making inferences in literature are supposed to work, btw. They aren't necessarily spelled out for you. If they were, it would no longer be an inference.) Your opinion is not objective because you have a clear preference and bias. In actuality, I think my view on this specific issue is probably more objective than yours because I don't have an established preference either way.

[Jessica]

Mochaspresso wrote: "This would have saved pages and pages of debate.--->"

don't exaggerate, you say this like we're in a 50 page thread and we're the reason for eleven of those pages.

"I have never had qualms about admitting when my opinions may be subjective, not do I think anything is wrong with analyzing literature through an admittedly subjective lens....as long as you are open and honest with yourself and with others and are willing to acknowledge it.
"

I don't either. That doesn't negate the fact that some of the things I've said makes Twilight objectively bad. It's not just that she did no research on vampires, my keeping a spot light on that did overtake my view that objectively Meyer having done very little research for her book is what makes it objectively bad.

"Yes because there is consistently far more focus and discussion on Bella's supposed flaws than Edward's when they are both main characters in the story and exhibit many of the same character traits. "

To save me time, I'll copy paste and just say this; Me talking about Bella because we made her the topic of the conversation doesn't mean that I am being hypocritical by not talking about Edward. That is it, that is final, because that is the only thing that makes sense about this part of our conversation. Because it doesn't make sense to say that I'm a hypocrite because I'm talking about Bella and not Edward when Edward isn't the topic and me talking about Bella does not mean that I'm exempting Edward from all the bad he's done.

Melodic_May wrote:"Because right now Bella is the one that is in question, not Edward. Edward is a bad guy, no one and certainly not I am saying or implying otherwise. Putting Bella under a magnifying glass to show all the bad about her doesn't mean that I am ignoring everything that's wrong with Edward and pretending it doesn't exist."

Melodic_May wrote:"There is no reason to talk about him right now unless you actually wanted to and not to use him as an example of how I'm being too critical, hypocritical, or anything of the like. "

"Did you actually even provide proof that this is objectively bad?"

What proof could I provide that would make you see that it is objectively bad that Bella not having any explanation at all for her power, the most crucial part about her, is objectively bad? What? I would dearly like an example of something I could say that would change your mind on this when so far you've proven that you won't change your mind or at least understand why.

"This rule that you speak of is not necessarily always being adhered to in general and does not even exist within the paranormal romance genre. "

So we're going with, "They jumped off the cliff, I want to too." To excuse Meyer's bad characterization and inability to explain things??

"The implication is enough justification to make the inference. "

"That's why it's subjectively okay to you. But the fact that she never explains it is why it's objectively bad, no matter how much you say otherwise. "

"You obstinately refuse to make the necessary inference because it isn't explicitly in your face with a trail of breadcrumbs to follow. "

It's not like I want Meyer to hold my hand through every thing like she's done before, but as I said, crucial part of her and there's not even attempt at explaining why.

""And again, it is never explained, only expected to be accepted. And this can also be explained as Edward not having a bond with Charlie. His powers are explained as him being able to hear people's thoughts the closer (emotionally, in this case) he is with them. " "

Denying this won't make me wrong or that I'm refusing to believe otherwise.

"Your opinion is not objective because you have a clear preference and bias. In actuality, I think my view on this specific issue is probably more objective than yours because I don't have an established preference either way. "

I'm biased because I prefer MCs to not have unexplained powers that go unexplained like it wasn't an important part of them? Yep, makes total sense. I mean, why would I prefer it to be explained, it's not like this is the very reason why they get together and he doesn't immediately kill her for her blood, or is why Bella's immune to practically all vampire powers. Nope, I'm supposed to settle for the vague implication that it's hereditary and not ask for a further explanation because that is supposed to square everything off and explained it in full. I'm totally biased because I want an answer and the lack thereof makes it bad.

You know what explanation I will settle for, since you say that I'm being biased by not excepting a vague paper thin excuse? that this whole series is wish fulfillment and that Bella is nothing more than a Mary Sue. I will settle for no less nor will I be convinced of anything else since I can't have an actual answer, because you said I'm not allowed one.

[Paige Duff]

Natalie wrote: "If Bella wasn't so damn whiny and helpless all the time. I thought the writing was pretty good. OH, OH! And if she didn't get PREGNANT! I mean what was that all about? It came out of nowhere. I fee..."

I can understand what you are saying, but this is not the only series that talk about Vampires having babies. The Black Dagger Brotherhood series also have children. But then again, they do not survive mainly on human blood, they need a vampire of the opposite sex to feed on, and one of the parents have to be a vampire to become on themselves and no one is made into a vampire, unless they have a vampire ancestor then maybe. I am getting off track though, it really does not matter though, I do not see what all the fuss is about, it is a book, fiction and I do not care what genre it is in, it's still fiction, which means anything can happen.......

[Mochaspresso]

Melodic_May wrote: "Because authors can handle the same things differently and it could be bad from one author but good from another. It's their execution that determines if one will be good or not. And this still is based on what similarities you see between Shiver and Twilight of which you can't say I'm being hypocritical on because I don't remember Shiver, so continuing to prod at this would be pointless as it's based on the similarities you see between Shiver and Twilight and once again, I don't remember Shiver.

This whole paragraph undermines your "objectivity" in assigning ratings, then. You assigned your rating on 11-13-13. That wasn't that long ago. Roughly 3 months. It is entirely possible that you read it long ago but if you truly don't remember it at all, how did you "objectively" apply the 5 star rating then? Not only that. You don't remember it, but you also definitely said that it didn't have any purple prose.

btw, do you feel that a heavy reliance on purple prose is objectively bad? I think of it in subjective terms because even though I don't particularly like it, I've read books where authors were able to make it work to their advantage for their story. Two that I automatically think of are Tolkien with LOTR and John Green's "The Fault in Our Stars".

And I'm currently reading Twilight. Time does not make the heart grow fonder. The bad things are still bad, even though you say the passage of time can influence my perception.

I actually said ".....favorably or unfavorably".

And I don't understand why you'd say this anyway, as what I remember of Shiver was good and never outright admitted that there are similarities between Twilight and Shiver and that Shiver did it better. I personally didn't see any similarities, you do. And me not having seen any isn't helped by me not remembering Shiver. So yeah, it's all completely pointless to continue this way unless you actually want to compare and contrast these two, instead of having brought it up to prove a point that you can't prove because that point relies on my memory of the book. When I read the book it was good. The passage of time and/or nostalgia has nothing to do with this as right now I have no opinion of Shiver because it was that long ago that I read it. So there's no nostalgia or passed time that would favorably or unfavorably influence my perception of the book's quality.


When I said that I see similarities, I was not speaking generically. I was specifically referring to exact criticisms that you had for Twilight. Such as including meaningless details about what a character is doing while having a conversation with another character. Including meaningless details that have nothing to do with the plot. A main character having an extremely unhealthy obsession with another character. Many of the criticisms that you posed for Twilight also occurred in Shiver. But since you don't remember it, I am more than willing to drop it as you suggested.

[Mochaspresso]

Melodic_May wrote: "You know what explanation I will settle for, since you say that I'm being biased by not excepting a vague paper thin excuse? that this whole series is wish fulfillment and that Bella is nothing more than a Mary Sue. I will settle for no less nor will I be convinced of anything else since I can't have an actual answer, because you said I'm not allowed one.



I totally agree with this and have said as much several times in several Twilight threads.

[Rel8tivity]

Mochaspresso wrote: "You are right that it would have been a completely different story and that it would have made more sense. However, does this particular genre have the requirement that everything pertaining to the paranormal aspects must make sense? The definition of paranormal is..."

Sorry, by making sense, I mean not contradicting itself. I put a lot of effort into making sure that I didn't contradict anything I wrote. There was a point I almost threw the whole thing away because I got something in canon wrong. I ended up re-writing 7 whole chapters to correct that one little aspect. If I could put this kind of effort into a silly little fic, SM sure as heck could do the same for a published work. As a genre agnostic, I don't really worry about the rules or what defines the classification of a story. I just want the story to work within itself.

They did do that, though. That is exactly what Alice and Jasper believed that they were doing by bringing Bella to the airport to meet Edward's plane.

I mean physically restrain her if necessary. She never leaves their sight. If she wants to go to the bathroom, Alice shadows her and stands outside the stall and waits. If a US Marshall can transport a fugitive, a vampire could do it with ease. During that whole scene in the airport, Alice is suspicious, but doesn't DO anything. She allows Bella to go off with only Jasper, so of course Bella ducks into the ladies room. Alice just had to insist on accompanying her, and since she was suspicious, it would have made sense.

I remember one comment that Bella made back at the house before they left. Esme asked her "May I?" before picking her up. Bella replied, "You're the first one to ask." That brought home to me the idea that they had been picking her up and whisking her around at will, without so much as a please. That imperious nature of theirs made me think they would be perfectly comfortable restraining her if necessary, for her own good. Look at Alice 'kidnapping' Bella to keep her from going to the Rez. It was a sleepover, but it was still against her will.

Anyway, that's why I'm saying it was too contrived. They had all the signs and warnings to be at Defcon 5 and keep her under control for her own safety. But because of author contrivances, she gets away. Maybe it's not at quite the level of a plot hole, but for me it's still too weak to say "yeah, that made sense." I think that's one of the drawbacks of having a clairvoyant character. You have to put very specific limits on their power or they'll ruin your continuity.

First, I am not convinced that Victoria was in her right mind and thinking rationally. Second, her talent was escaping danger. Not, standing and fighting. For those reasons, I don't think she was capable of putting the careful planning and thought into creating the army. She was not as calculating as Jasper was. I also think that her escape danger instincts ruled in her decision to maintain some distance. She knew that what she was doing was wrong and could land her in trouble with the Volturi, too.

Now that you mention the Volturi, that's the first time something has made sense about the newborns. If they don't know about her, they can't implicate her if the Volturi come to investigate. But even if Victoria is not the tactician that Jasper is, it doesn't require that much planning to build her army: make more troops, keep them from being discovered before she's ready to go, keep her name away from them in case one of them is captured. Deploying them is another story, of course. Still doesn't excuse SM's claim that they were there for protection, because Victoria was more than maintaining distance from them. She was actively hiding from them. What's she going to do if the Cullens show up? Suddenly run to where the newborns are hiding and try to explain to them that they need to protect her? They've never seen or heard of her before that. Even if Victoria were irrational with fear for her life, that still doesn't make sense.

[Rel8tivity]

Paige wrote: "I can understand what you are saying, but this is not the only series that talk about Vampires having babies. The Black Dagger Brotherhood series also have children. But then again, they do not survive mainly on human blood, they need a vampire of the opposite sex to feed on, and one of the parents have to be a vampire to become on themselves and no one is made into a vampire, unless they have a vampire ancestor then maybe. I am getting off track though, it really does not matter though, I do not see what all the fuss is about, it is a book, fiction and I do not care what genre it is in, it's still fiction, which means anything can happen....... "

Sure, anything can happen as long as the author builds it into their world. But once they've built it OUT, they have to follow that rule and keep it out. Doesn't matter what the Black Dagger Brotherhood does, because we're talking Twilight, which has it's own kind of vampires. The way SM created her vampires meant that no babies were possible, with vampires or humans, so it's a big deal when she puts a baby into the story with insufficient support as to why it's possible.

[Paige Duff]

Rel8tivity wrote: "Paige wrote: "I can understand what you are saying, but this is not the only series that talk about Vampires having babies. The Black Dagger Brotherhood series also have children. But then again, t..."

True, but they kept talking about the females badies not being able to change in order to have babies after the change. It never actually said anywhere before hand about the men not being able to father babies. and about BDB I only mentioned that because the other person said no vampires can have babies because they are dead, and in other series it is possible. SM never really talked about the whole child thing other than Rosalie's story in Eclipse and that is about it until Breaking dawn, therefore SM never really wrote out that the men couldn't father a child, just that the women's bodies couldn't change to have them. That was all I meant.

[Rel8tivity]

Paige wrote: "True, but they kept talking about the females badies not being able to change in order to have babies after the change. It never actually said anywhere before hand about the men not being able to father babies. "

True, she doesn't come right out and say that male vampires can't father children. But she doesn't have to. It's in the way she created her vampires, described their bodies and how they work, that made them unable to have children. The clues are there if you pick them up. Because you have to have sperm cells to make babies, and the way SM described her vampires, they can't make any more. Any existing sperm cells would be transformed and locked into their crystalline form, and unable to perform their original function. The thing SM said about women's body's not being able to change was a kind of smokescreen, to keep people from asking about male vampires. But it doesn't matter, because she still eliminated babies from her universe before that. I was merely answering your comment, that anything could happen if it was fiction.

[Labeebah]

Narrative tension and an editor. A really solid editor working with Meyer over the course of some months could have cleaned up some of the technical issues, although that's going really easy on the overall monotony of the writing style. However, the biggest issue that I found with the first novel was the lack of narrative tension. Boy meets girl isn't actually a plot and there was never really any true commitment to the idea that Bella would choose Jacob over Edward. Bella was never ambivalent enough about her affections. Overall, lack of narrative tension turned out to be a problem throughout the series, although the writing itself improved.

[Rachel]

1. Someone else write it
2. No love triangle
3. Make Bella less stupid/weak/idiotic/etc.
4. Vampires don't sparkle
5. Some actual action would be nice.
6. Less big long speeches from Bella
7. Too many adjectives!
8. Bella complains too much.
9. Maybe we could just take Bella out all together.
Ok, all we have left is a cover and some blank pages, and also a title.
I consider it much better.

[Grace]

I am not going to mention names but can everyone please stop arguing. Yes, it's a discussion, but its really annoying just seeing arguments. Everyone has their own separate opinion and its what they think. So you really dont have to get in the way. I personally hate Harry Potter and Dracula, but lots of people like them, but I don't go around arguing that they are absolutly horrible.

[Jessica]

Grace wrote: "I am not going to mention names but can everyone please stop arguing. Yes, it's a discussion, but its really annoying just seeing arguments. Everyone has their own separate opinion and its what the..."

The argument has stopped since Feb 23, just fyi.

[Rel8tivity]

Grace wrote: "I am not going to mention names but can everyone please stop arguing. Yes, it's a discussion, but its really annoying just seeing arguments. Everyone has their own separate opinion and its what the..."

Not to be insensitive, but what did you expect? Considering the subject of the discussion leans toward a negative opinion of Twilight, you know there's going to be people bagging on it. And I haven't seen anybody swearing at each other, so it can't be that bad. :-)

[Wendy]

Sorry not to have replied sooner, JesseBrooke. I haven't been on in a long time...
There's a big difference between "critiquing" and "criticizing". Read my comment again and you'll find that I'm referring to judgment and name calling, and in some cases, bullying, which is definitely not an open, enriching discussion of a book's merits or lack thereof. Read the other comment I made and you'll find an example of some of the concerns I had about the book, yet I was able to make a statement without calling the author names or attacking her or her work. Yes, we are all entitled to our opinions, and sharing them is a way to connect with others, see new perspectives, etc., but we are not as entitled as we think we are to sit safely behind a computer and throw daggers at other people.
My suggestion, JesseBrooke, is that if my comment bothered you so deeply, look inward and ask yourself why. My comment was not aimed at you or anyone else specifically, but a generalized comment about how people treat other people online--everywhere online, not just here--as part of my comment said. Your defensiveness at a general statement implies that the issue is yours, not mine.

JesseBrooke wrote: "Wendy wrote: "Curious to know how many of the commenters who bashed this woman's work have ever experienced creating, finishing, and publishing their own? Isn't it enough to say, "this isn't to my ..."

JesseBrooke wrote: "Wendy wrote: "Curious to know how many of the commenters who bashed this woman's work have ever experienced creating, finishing, and publishing their own? Isn't it enough to say, "this isn't to my ..."

Tristen wrote: "I'm kind of scared to comment on this, but here goes...

My biggest problem with the Twilight series was that Meyer, in my opinion, took way too many liberties with the whole vampire thing. I mean ..."

[Wendy]

That's a good question, Olivia. :)

Olivia wrote: "Wendy wrote: "Sorry not to have replied sooner, JesseBrooke. I haven't been on in a long time...
There's a big difference between "critiquing" and "criticizing". Read my comment again and you'll fi..."

[Jessica]

Wendy wrote: "Sorry not to have replied sooner, JesseBrooke. I haven't been on in a long time...
There's a big difference between "critiquing" and "criticizing". "

These are the same thing.

"Read my comment again and you'll find that I'm referring to judgment and name calling, and in some cases, bullying, which is definitely not an open, enriching discussion of a book's merits or lack thereof. Read the other comment I made and you'll find an example of some of the concerns I had about the book, yet I was able to make a statement without calling the author names or attacking her or her work."

Wendy, I don't even remember ever talking to you here, though I see that I have. This thread has been dead for months. Should I really revive the will to care about a ignorant statement you made months ago that you see is a problem of mine because it has supposedly bothered me so much?

"Yes, we are all entitled to our opinions, and sharing them is a way to connect with others, see new perspectives, etc., but we are not as entitled as we think we are to sit safely behind a computer and throw daggers at other people. "

Allow me to introduce you to a thing called anonymity. It is the very thing that gives us a sense of entitlement to 'throw daggers' at others.

"My comment was not aimed at you or anyone else specifically, but a generalized comment about how people treat other people online--everywhere online, not just here--as part of my comment said."

It is because it was a generalized comment is why it was wrong. You said this:

"Curious to know how many of the commenters who bashed this woman's work have ever experienced creating, finishing, and publishing their own? "

Which basically boils down to, "You've no right to say what you say because you haven't published anything like Meyer has."

It doesn't matter who the author is, if you try to invalidate someone's critique by saying they need to publish something first before trying to criticize them, that is wrong.

Now, my comment was made three months ago. You should take your own advice and look inward to figure out why it bothered you so much and made you come back to a dead thread and post a rebuttal to something you were wrong about.

[Wendy]

JesseBrooke, it didn't bother me. You took the time to reply to my comment and I thought, out of respect, it deserved a response, even if it was a while ago. I'm not here often, so I replied last night when I saw your comment. As most of this conversation is not really about Stephanie Meyer or the Twilight series, this will be my last reply. If you’d like to continue the conversation, you are welcomed to add me on Facebook for a private chat.

“These are the same thing.” (critiquing and criticizing)
Critiquing and criticizing are not the same thing. Here are the dictionary definitions of the two:

Critique-a detailed analysis and assessment of something, especially a literary, philosophical, or political theory.
Criticism-the expression of disapproval of someone or something based on perceived faults or mistakes.

One is based on critical thinking and reasoning, the other is based on judgment, most often negative, derived from emotion and personal experience and rarely, if ever, adds value to a conversation.

“Wendy, I don't even remember ever talking to you here, though I see that I have. This thread has been dead for months. Should I really revive the will to care about a ignorant statement you made months ago that you see is a problem of mine because it has supposedly bothered me so much?”

For future reference, here’s the definition for ignorant: lacking knowledge or awareness in general; uneducated or unsophisticated.
My statement was not ignorant. As for resurrecting a dead thread… If you’re not interested, don’t respond. Please see above definition for criticism vs. critiquing.

“Which basically boils down to, "You've no right to say what you say because you haven't published anything like Meyer has."

This is a very simplistic, and erroneous, interpretation of the intention behind my statement regarding creating and publishing one's own work, which can be illustrated by the phrase, “walking a mile in someone else’s shoes.” Of course you can critique someone's work without having written and published, but to criticize someone else without any knowledge of their intention isn't about critiquing, it's about denigrating them.
By the way, just because this thread focuses on Meyer’s work, don’t make the mistake of making my comments specifically about her. It’s really more about all people who’ve created something. Regardless of how much I like or loathe their work, I respect the courage they've shown by embracing vulnerability and sharing a part of themselves globally.

"It is because it was a generalized comment is why it was wrong."

Had I said, "Everyone is treating others badly," you would be correct in saying my statement was wrong,
but my use of “generalized” meant that it was not pointed at a particular person. Like the way I’ve avoided using the word “you” in this reply when not referring directly to you—so as not to accidentally imply that I’m talking about you-the individual on the other end of this conversation, rather than the generalized “you,” as in, “Hey, you guys…” But I assume, being the intelligent person you’ve shown yourself to be, you probably knew what I meant and chose the route that you thought you could argue anyway.

“Allow me to introduce you to a thing called anonymity. It is the very thing that gives us a sense of entitlement to 'throw daggers' at others.”

Okay, wow, that statement is very revealing.
The type of anonymity you're speaking of is synonymous with cowardice and an inability to effectively use anger. If someone would say something behind the safety of a computer that they would not say to someone directly, there's a problem. I would not walk up to someone on the street, tell them my opinion, then punch them in the face if they didn't agree. Would you? Yet people are doing the verbal equivalent of that in every corner of the internet. I’m sure you’ve heard the phrase, “just because you can, doesn’t mean you should.”
Don't agree with me on a topic? Great! Critique, but do not criticize, my opinion/work and I would be happy to have a respectful, reasonable conversation about it. You might change my mind for the better! But no one is entitled to attempt to validate themselves by purposely hurting others.

“Now, my comment was made three months ago. You should take your own advice and look inward to figure out why it bothered you so much and made you come back to a dead thread and post a rebuttal to something you were wrong about.”

So why did you respond? You are entitled to your opinion that I’m wrong. Just as I am entitled to my opinion that I am not.

Best of luck to you in the future.


JesseBrooke wrote: "Wendy wrote: "Sorry not to have replied sooner, JesseBrooke. I haven't been on in a long time...
There's a big difference between "critiquing" and "criticizing". "

These are the same thing.

"Read..."

[Jessica]

Wendy wrote: "JesseBrooke, it didn't bother me. You took the time to reply to my comment and I thought, out of respect, it deserved a response, even if it was a while ago. "

Then why do you think that I was bothered by your comment just because I replied to it?

"One is based on critical thinking and reasoning, the other is based on judgment, most often negative, derived from emotion and personal experience and rarely, if ever, adds value to a conversation. "

They mean the same thing. If you took the time to look past the first definition you got on google you'd see that they mean the same thing. To criticize someone/thing and to critique someone/thing is the same thing.

"My statement was not ignorant."

Yes it was. Telling me the definition of ignorant doesn't deter me or (back then) others from seeing it as a ignorant thing to say.

"This is a very simplistic, and erroneous, interpretation of the intention behind my statement regarding creating and publishing one's own work, which can be illustrated by the phrase, “walking a mile in someone else’s shoes.” Of course you can critique someone's work without having written and published, but to criticize someone else without any knowledge of their intention isn't about critiquing, it's about denigrating them. "

Then there's is no reason for you to say what you said. No one is bringing Meyer's intention to this, only you are which is very irrelevant and has nothing to do with this as there's no possible way to know of Meyer's intention. Everyone is entitled to criticize Meyer and her work, they don't need her intention because they're criticizing her work, not her and her intentions are irrelevant in this, as is her feelings.

"but my use of “generalized” meant that it was not pointed at a particular person."

That's what a general comment means. It doesn't lose it's meaning when you reiterate it.

"By the way, just because this thread focuses on Meyer’s work, don’t make the mistake of making my comments specifically about her. It’s really more about all people who’ve created something. Regardless of how much I like or loathe their work, I respect the courage they've shown by embracing vulnerability and sharing a part of themselves globally. "

Everyone is criticizing her work. Everyone had. But to say what you said is very ignorant, even if you're changing it today.

"So why did you respond?"

For the very reason that you've respond to a months old thread.

I still don't understand you hold the notion that only fellow author can properly criticize Meyer's work because even other authors, published or not, cannot possibly know of Meyers intentions. So how can someone criticize her based off her intentions? That if they don't take her intentions in consideration first before criticizing her then they're being denigrate. How can they know? That's a silly thing to change to from what you said before. And if this isn't what you mean then the whole thing is irrelevant, especially that middle paragraph. Meyer opened herself to criticism when she published her work. If she cannot take criticism (which she can't)then she should never have published her work. She doesn't need people to defend her with a piss poor and very wrong statement of, "If you haven't published anything then you don't have the right to criticize her." A lot of people have said this, with more people willing to say it. And it doesn't make this statement nor the people who say it to be right.

[Molly]

The books would be better if the fans weren't so annoying.. I know that seems stupid to say, but if the fans were the right age/reading comprehension (these books are written on like a 4th grade reading level and probably middle school to early high school maturity level) then I think the book could be taken more seriously. I started this series in 7th grade and then finished it as the other books were released, and I enjoyed it when I first read them. But after I grew up, I didn't care about them anymore because they are just not THAT good. It's not some deep or powerful book that sticks with you for the rest of your life. It's an average book that blew up for no reason other than who was cast in the movies..

[Dramapuppy]

I feel that the reason the books were so horrible was the lack of editing. They were just too long. I admit it- I thought the last hundred pages of Twilight were AMAZING. If only Twilight had been two hundred pages long...

[Katy]

if Edward asked to marry Bella and than Jacob five days later asked her to marry him and she couldn't decide so she married both but Jesus disagreed with this option and Jesus had to decide which one he should kill because he didn't Edward to go to hell and he didn't want Jacob to kill all his people in heaven whenever he got enraged so he killed both and Bella was so upset and she decided to date the other guy who she was in love with this whole time and she marries him and then Jesus was upset that she got married so easy and he killed her and then Jesus decided he was in love with Bella and he said if he didn't marry him he would send everyone she loved into hell and many more so she married him and they lived happier ever after!

[Evelyn]

It would've been better if it was not so obvious!!! I mean almost everything was predictable in the book and the ending was definitely NOT thrilling...

[Camille]

I have read all four books and I must say, I loved them.

But actually, I didn't plan on reading any book in the
series long ago. What only made me read it was my aunt giving it to me. And well...I couldn't resist a book. Even a controversial one.

That book was Eclipse. I hadn't even read the first book and I was already jumping into the third? Pretty idiotic. But what made me like it instantly was the way Stephenie Meyer wrote everything in such a way that "newcomers" in the series can quickly understand what had been going on in the first two books yet not have the original series readers think the reminders are too repetitive.

Most of all, I loved the way she made Bella's life sound so...ordinary yet filled with mystery and myth.

So trust me, I get why some people didn't like the series. "Lack of talent", they say. Probably more like "lack of other exciting events" or "too teenager-y".

If Stephenie Meyer could improve one thing in her writing style, it would probably be more imagination and more twists (not including sparkling vampires), and maybe even stronger protagonists (as some of you suggest).

However, these books weren't really meant for everyone to read, you see. Stephenie Meyer can decide for herself, whether she wants to hone her writing skills or not. Some people were never meant to read these books; that's why they don't like it. Hence, some people with the taste for Meyer's romance absolutely love the series.

Meyer can do better, absolutely. But in some ways, her stories now are what made a lot of people all over the world happy. If she has more books up her sleeves, then she could use all these tips and suggestions all of us are talking about.

As for the Twilight Saga, I think what's done is done, all the faults should be put aside, and let's just focus on what the books are really trying to say (regardless of the whiny and sparkling protagonists ;) ).