Wednesday, July 30, 2008

THE HOST

What the heck is my problem? I think maybe I'm just a sucker for a love story. Seriously. And this one was weird and kinda disturbing...but I liked it.

Stephenie Meyer is not a very great author, but she's got an amazing imagination. She lures you in with an exotic plot line and then hits you with a love story. And it's all so corny and hokey, yet I find myself enthralled. I read the Host and laughed through the ridiculous parts, gasped in all the right places, and I even got a little emotional.

Here's the problem: she doesn't write very well. The dialog is interrupted with silly narration about what she was thinking, what he was doing, how he looked while he said this...blah blah blah. I've grown accustomed to not having to be spoon fed and I rather like it. It leaves my imagination free to decide what he or she was doing or looking like or thinking. And then the narration itself is completely destroyed by her overuse of punctuation. Now, I'm the first person to admit that I have a tendency to be a little elaborate with punctuation. But my goodness! Every sentence is interrupted by a clause! It drives me nuts! And, like I said, she spoon-feeds the story to her readers. I don't know if she thinks we're too dumb to figure things out or follow a plot-line, but she needs to just write a freakin' story without repeating herself over and over and over and over and over...you get the idea.

And still, for some reason, I find myself liking the Host and re-reading the Twilight series. I blame it on the story. I just really like the stories, the adventure, the sickening romance, and the creativity behind the plot. Like I said, I must be a sucker.

3 comments:

Caitlinp said...

You know, you might be a sucker. But I guess that would make millions of other people suckers too. I haven't read The Host yet, but I'm sure I will. And I certainly will be buying a certain other book of hers within the next week or so. I'll most likely enjoy it, too. Maybe everyone likes it so much because they think "Hey, maybe I could write something like that." It's probably the same reason people read Jack Weyland. Anyway, I agree. She's not a fabulous writer, but she's pretty good story teller.

Travis and Celena said...

Me too! I am waiting to read this book, but I have read all of the twilight books and I thought they got worse as each book was written. I hope that I can get through The Host with all that you have said. I am not a very good reader in the sense that I won't finish a book if it starts to get boring, annoying or anything else that doesn't please me. Guess we will see what happens when I do read it. Wish me luck. :0)

pandaswat.sarah said...

No worries, Celena. It's not that the Host is boring. Well, you do need to stick out the first few chapters. But just not well written. You'll like the story, though. Like I said, she's got a great imagination.

And Caitlin, I'm totally ready to read Breaking Dawn. I'll be getting it tomorrow and devouring it too quickly, I'm sure... haha