Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Review BREAKING DAWN by Stephenie Meyer


BREAKING DAWN
by Stephenie Meyer
Published August 2nd 2008 by Little, Brown and Company
Hardcover, 754 Pages

Placement in the Pile: Top Picks

Summary:
To be irrevocably in love with a vampire is both fantasy and nightmare woven into a dangerously heightened reality for Bella Swan. Pulled in one direction by her intense passion for Edward Cullen, and in another by her profound connection to werewolf Jacob Black, a tumultuous year of temptation, loss, and strife have led her to the ultimate turning point. Her imminent choice to either join the dark but seductive world of immortals or to pursue a fully human life has become the thread from which the fates of two tribes hangs.

Now that Bella has made her decision, a startling chain of unprecedented events is about to unfold with potentially devastating, and unfathomable, consequences. Just when the frayed strands of Bella's life—first discovered in Twilight, then scattered and torn in New Moon and Eclipse—seem ready to heal and knit together, could they be destroyed... forever?

Review:
By far the best of the series. I cried for joy, I cried for sadness, I cried just because! I laughed so hard I cried. I have never been happier with a book and they way it tied up all the loose ends. Unfortunately, it also was a bit anti-climactic in that the fight scene at the end. It could have shown Bella's power and been a bit more epic.

SM did a WONDERFUL job of ending Bella and Edward's story. From her interviews about this novel, I totally agreed that there just isn't much more to tell. However after watching the interview on Oprah (the questions online that weren't on the air, linked in my intro post last week) I now am itching to know what happens in the future with them, the Volturi and Nessie and Jacob (Okay I must add here that I HATE that kid's that name with a passion).

Alright, so you may have noticed my rating and praise for this book is very high. The thing I think is so interesting is this is a very polarizing book. Lots of people loved it, but criticize it's YA rating, lots of people didn't like how things just worked out perfectly. But I loved seeing Bella and Edward finally having the marriage and relationship they were destined for. As an adult that was my favorite part.

Now, I will say I am all for parents and schools limiting the age of children who have access to this book. It may be YA but it is certainly gor an older YA audience.

What do you think?

Oh and there is no definite info out there on if this one will be made into a movie, but Summit has bought the rights to it, and it seems likely that with the Twilight films being so popular it will be made.

I own this book and was not compensated for a review.

5 comments:

Carolyn V. said...

I keep wondering how they are going to do this movie. Two movies? One? Hum...
I agree with you, this book isn't one for the pre-teens, it was more older YA. =)

Guinevere said...

Hmmm, while I liked this book, I didn't LOVE it like I'd hoped to. Eclipse remains my favorite, or maybe even Twilight. I didn't love some of the content (and yes it is DEFINITELY not a young YA book), and I didn't love the ending either. There's all this build up and tension and then la la la, happy little ending with a nice little bow. I love happy endings, and I'm glad they got one, but I think something more should have happened, instead of Alice dancing in with the "other one" and the volturi just going, Oh. Okay. Cool, have a nice life then! It was anti-climactic. But I suppose that's better than a totally depressing, everyone dies ending. :-)

I should reread this one, and plan to soon, just to see how I feel now that I've had some distance from the whole series and the emotion of the first read-through with all of the expectations I had going in to it.

Overall, this was a great series, a great escape, and a great story for Stephenie Meyer: a stay-at-home mom who wrote down a dream and created an international phenomenom.

Aubrey said...

I agree the fight scene could have been more tense after all that build up, but remember that isn't the very end of the book. The very end is a scene between Bella and Edward where they can finally have an amazing moment, to be together forever. Sigh...love that scene!

Carrie said...

I saw the ending coming with the whole battle thing. In Eclipse, Bella says that the next time they are in the field, she would protect all of them. All in all I felt like SM watched Bravehart a few times before she wrote it down. I was let down from that part. I didn't like the Jacob part, it really grossed me out. I did love the whole Bella and Edward story line though. I think I may have to read this one again too.

Australian Bookshop said...

great review! I too enjoyed this book the most of the four in the series. I am also curious how they are going to do a movie on this one. maybe 2 movies as has been said recently.