The Host - Stephenie Meyer

Goodreads Summary: Melanie Stryder refuses to fade away. Our world has been invaded by an unseen enemy. Humans become hosts for these invaders, their minds taken over while their bodies remain intact and continue their lives apparently unchanged. Most of humanity has succumbed.

When Melanie, one of the few remaining "wild" humans, is captured, she is certain it is her end. Wanderer, the invading "soul" who has been given Melanie's body, was warned about the challenges of living inside a human: the overwhelming emotions, the glut of senses, the too-vivid memories. But there was one difficulty Wanderer didn't expect: the former tenant of her body refusing to relinquish possession of her mind.

Wanderer probes Melanie's thoughts, hoping to discover the whereabouts of the remaining human resistance. Instead, Melanie fills Wanderer's mind with visions of the man Melanie loves - Jared, a human who still lives in hiding. Unable to separate herself from her body's desires, Wanderer begins to yearn for a man she has been tasked with exposing. When outside forces make Wanderer and Melanie unwilling allies, they set off on a dangerous and uncertain search for the man they both love.
Why I Read This Book: I don't remember when or where I first heard of this book, but I thought it sounded interesting, so I got it from the library.

Review: I really liked this book. It was exciting, and captivating, and overall a great book. The story is unlike anything I have ever read so far (not to claim there isn't others like it, I just haven't read them) so it was great to read something different to me and really enjoy it. I loved the relationships in the book, and found myself having a lot of the same feelings as many characters. I was conflicted when they were, stressed when they were, and happy/scared/worried/etc when they were to. It was well written, and I thought it was fantastic. I have read the Twilight books as well by Meyer, and although I enjoyed them, this book is so much better. I know that they are filming a movie about this, and I can't wait to see it. I have heard rumors about there being a sequel to this book too, which I'm not sure about my opinion on. I think this book could easily stand on its own, but it is always nice to know what the author decides to do with the characters. Either way, this book is great, I recommend you go read it!

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The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner by Stephenie Meyer

Goodreads Summary: Fans of The Twilight Saga will be enthralled by this riveting story of Bree Tanner, a character first introduced in "Eclipse," and the darker side of the newborn vampire world she inhabits. In another irresistible combination of danger, mystery, and romance, Stephenie Meyer tells the devastating story of Bree and the newborn army as they prepare to close in on Bella Swan and the Cullens, following their encounter to its unforgettable conclusion.


Why I Read This Book: I am neither a huge lover or hater of Twilight, I took them for what they were, liked them, and moved on with my life. I liked them enough that I thought this book was worth a read based on how short it is. I also had read Midnight Sun prior to this, and thought I might be as pleasantly surprised by this as I was by that.


Review: Being pleasantly surprised did not happen. I did not enjoy this book very much at all. The only part of it I liked was the re-telling of the meadow fight from Bree's point of view. I think I didn't like it because I just didn't care about Bree. For some reason Meyer took a liking to this character, and wanted to develop her further, but I did not. I hardly remember her from the Eclipse book, really just the brief scene from the movie, and I still think she only stands out there because she reminds me of actress from The Vampire Diaries who plays Anna... Anyway, the book just lacked an interesting story, I didn't care for any of the characters, and Meyer isn't a such a fantastic writer that it doesn't matter (like, say, J.K. Rowling). The draw of the Twilight series for me was the Cullens, and Bree just doesn't matter.

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Midnight Sun - Stephenie Meyer

I'm not going to do a book review in my normal format for this book, because I don't think it really fits. If you haven't heard of Midnight Sun (which I hadn't until about a month ago) it is a retelling of the Twilight book from Edward's perspective. However, it is not a complete book. Apparently, this is something Meyer had been working on, and this is the rough draft of it that got leaked on to the internet. Disheartened by that, she elected to not complete the book, however to post it on her website for people to read for free if they so desired.

If you read my Top Ten this week, I said that I had been in the mood for a reread of the Twilight books, especially with Breaking Dawn just around the corner, and dreary Forks being comparable to the dreary St. John's, Newfoundland weather I am living in right now. I'm not a huge re-reader, as I think its sort of a waste when you could be reading a new book for the first time, so I thought I would download Midnight Sun to my Kobo.

I liked this book. I actually enjoyed Edward's point of view more than Bella's because there was more information about the other character's, because Edward heard their thought's. The one place this book was seriously lacking was this would have been an excellent way to insert a lot of information about the other Cullen's into the story. Since the book is an unfinished draft, perhaps Meyer did have intentions to do this, as it would have been nice. A lot of the reviews on Goodreads have people expressing how creepy they think Edward is, because of his behaviour towards Bella. If Edward was a normal, human 17 year old boy, definitely it would have been creepy, but I think it's important to remember that Edward is used to slinking around, always trying to fly under the radar, and go unnoticed, so after about 100 years of living like this, it would begin to feel normal to you. If anyone is creepy, it's Bella because she doesn't seem to mind! But maybe that is the lure of the vampire, who knows.

I would have really liked to have this story be finished, I'd love to read how Edward feels and thinks about Jacob when his and Bella's friendship begins to grow stronger. Overall, it was a decent read, kind of a re-read without being one. Has lots of room for improvements, but if it went through some good editing, beefed up some of the Cullen information, she has the making of a really good book here. It's too bad it got leaked.