This book had me change to Team Jacob ( )

not as good as the first one but omfg. pretty damn good. #teamedward ( )

I had hopes that this would be “better” than the first book—“good” lit can be overrated, but then, this is TWILIGHT, right—since at the end of book one Bella almost dies and seemingly exhausts some of her non-self-preservation instincts, at least around dying an ordinary human death, you know. But for better or worse, it seems to read very similar to the first book—although Steffs does need to catch the reader up while not losing her core group, so I guess this is “inevitable”. Still, it is quite a cozy book, especially for non-realism, you know. And I guess maybe it’s Slightly!, less shallow, (laughs). Like we can ask a scientist to look at it under a microscope, get a blood sample, really do subtle analysis to find out the truth…. 😸

…. It’s kinda like “The Personal History of Dora Spenlow: An Unexpected Journey”, you know.

That being said, I mean, I won’t repeat it all; I guess the reason why most literary stuff aren’t in series is because sequels tend to be very similar thematically, like seasons of a TV show….

But it is not too poorly written if it’s taken ironically, you know…. Bella’s like, an antihero, you know—a really feminine antihero.

If you were to take it the other way, well…. (chuckles darkly)….

Although it is sad, as well. People can be quite suicidal, really, when they hate themselves. I guess if you’re a guy and you’re like that you put a bullet in your brain, very anti-agency like, you know. If you’re the classic girl, you just…. Turn off your self-preservation drive, you know. Almost as deadly, and even more, you know…. Bad.

As though you were some sort of robot that was due for decommissioning, some kind of…. Thing.

…. This is actually kinda cool; it’s like Bella can’t figure out whether she’s a feminine antihero or a masculine one. Unintentional gender-bender, right.

…. And the thing about Bella is, even as this failed romantic who’s good at math but is on the road to ruin, she’s not the worst person in the world. And I don’t like it when my friends try to cling to me. I don’t; I don’t like it. But the worst thing really, is calm hatred; I don’t see how there can be any hope for that. Even Richard Dawkins (I call him Downfall Dawkins because of the way he talks), isn’t Quite as bad as that. I mean, there are calm people I like better than Mister Downfall—people who are atheists, real honest-to-God robots in human form atheists—but when it turns to calm hatred that’s when you’ve farthest from hope, you know. A vicious hatred might exhaust itself, but a calm hatred is, so…. devilish, you know. Like, there’s even someone I have in mind, individually, although like many people in a lot of ways he’s a type: say you’re a professor of linguistics, which I guess is the art and science that has nothing to do with how anybody talks, and he probably only speaks English, anyway—and his own damn type of English; if he met someone who spoke in dialect, any dialect…. Yeah. Mr Perfect no like you sonnie. Going to hell soon, man?—but anyway, and then part of that, somehow, I guess just being alone with your mind for too many hours in a day, makes you sell your soul to calm hatred, and your own cause, which I guess is the cause of personal and collective unhappiness; nobody’s ever happy who reads those books, you know, not his strain of them, his type, and trying to improve the world like Obama or somebody would massively frustrate him, you know: one be like me; two be unhappy—that’s who I am!

But anyway, about this old Victorian radical who probably never was a teenager, right, and is probably more proud of that even than that he knows things that other people don’t because they’re not like him, you know—no compassion, not really. All fake. Compassion for the useful furniture that entitles him to hate the world, right. Let one of those wonderful people suffer less, let alone be happy, or even get blown up by the wrong people. I guess robots don’t have compassion, right—they have calm anger. And then they teach stupid people about life, and we’re puzzled why they only learn math or something. I mean, it’s possible to like math and also like movies, and maybe not even be a headhunter about it. But if you’re into calm anger, you’re very careful about that danger, and very careful never to change, which I guess is the ultimate danger—one has to be as old at eighty or whatever that one was at seventeen, a kid too afraid, and too calm and angry, to be young, or even—alive, really.

And you know that people like that, his type, see nothing in any pop romance but the sort of intentionally stupid “real”-Southern romance that this arguably isn’t, you know.

But why give a fuck, right. Nobody else does, even when they assume that they’re wrong not to! Let the callous freaks govern us from the Olympus of pain, the Robot Olympus, right.

I don’t have to live there.

…. (smiles) I talk SO much, right.

Anyway, Bells doesn’t really get attached to Jake that quickly, because she’s such a mourner; however, although it was easy to dismiss the whole Red Indian connection in “Twilight”, it’s much more attractive and conspicuous in “New Moon”.

…. It’s amazing how similar the three of them are. None of them like themselves.

…. “Did this mean that every impossible fairy tale was grounded somewhere in absolute truth? Was there anything sane and normal at all, or was everything just magic and ghost stories?”

…. Of course, it can obviously be read as the classic starry-eyes defense of European American monsters (lol—they’re so good! They’re the good monsters!), but then Bella doesn’t really ever present herself as the objective witness, you know.

…. It’s the kind of book that’s plotted very well, unlike many characterization-and-theme books, although it is about character in a way—a simple way, obviously. And obvs Bella is an antihero and a girl, which goes together too well, you know: but a lot of people, a lot of teenagers, especially, are like that—just not all there yet, you know. Some people grow up quickly and others, not so much. And male Bella-type antiheroes are problematic too, because then people say, Men are in danger!; and bitches be like, Oh noes you be tripping….!

The solution: only care about the good people.

For all our sakes.

It’s also not beneath a good allusion, you know.

“It’s the movement of the immensely small minority on behalf of—well, most people.”

That wasn’t the allusion, lol. That was the, ILLUSION.

Oh my god. I did it. Good thing I’m not a dad, that’s almost dad-joke quality there, LOL.

…. To be honest, the repetition and endless variations on a theme (“bad” lit) have charms that meeting characters watching them do all unique things and then losing them forever (“good” lit) does not, you know.

…. —What should I buy? ‘Louise Hay’s Emergency Positive Power Thoughts Intensive’. Hmm, no, that’s not science…. ‘Wine-flavored cake’ (awe) How do they do that? 😋

~ Although, I don’t know. The climax is good, but—it’s so sudden, I guess, Edward-wise. I suppose that’s inevitable. It’s not terrible, (the way it would be if you were like these people lolz), but…. Maybe more cinnamon…. Less grapes…. Lol.

…. I started to think that the Italy adventure was a decently executed end-plot, except that after it was over I’d assumed that the two of them would be more different, somehow, you know. (shrugs) So I’m not sure how I feel about it. Of course, I’d never been planning on reading Celestial Event Three ~immediately; maybe I’ll make Divergent my next library borrow. I actually bought that book once upon a time, so I don’t mind stiffing Veronica the money, and anyway, they made a movie out of it.

…. Redefine success:

1. Don’t be Bella (male or female)
2. Be immortal, supernatural, etc.
3. Play up the part you’re better at.

…. “I don’t trust myself to be…. enough.”

…. Twilight is Twilight, of course; however, it is funny: some people can spend a lifetime running from such deep feelings, such great emotion…. And other people feel that they’re ready by the time their bodies have matured, you know—even if they haven’t finished all their trigonometry lessons….

Who’s closer to the truth?

…. Ah, but these violent delights have violent ends, like the vampire settlers who burn out the red-brown men, and as they promise marriage, say that, like their lives, it will never end….

Lol.

yeah, okay. Whatever. ( )

Esta segunda parte recuerdo que me gustó bastante, super bajón en su momento. Me gustó en general. ( )