The Procrastinators Book Club discussion

Welcome to the Twilight Buddy Read Discussion thread! This thread officially opens on October 1st and anyone can join at any time. Please keep in mind that spoilers are allowed in this thread but only up to the group's current reading place. Do not spoil the book if you've read further than the group.

Each week we will be reading 6 chapters. The Buddy Read discussion schedule is as follows:

[WEEK OF 10/1]
-10/1 Preface + Chapter One: First Sight
-10/2 Chapter Two: Open Book
-10/3 Chapter Three: Phenomenon
-10/4 Chapter Four: Invitations
-10/5 Chapter Five: Blood Type
-10/6 Chapter Six: Scary Stories

[WEEK OF 10/7]
-10/7 Chapter Seven: Nightmare
-10/8 Chapter Eight: Port Angeles
-10/9 Chapter Nine: Theory
-10/10 Chapter Ten: Interrogations
-10/11 Chapter Eleven: Complications
-10/12 Chapter Twelve: Balancing

[WEEK OF 10/14]
-10/14 Chapter Thirteen: Confessions
-10/15 Chapter Fourteen: Mind Over Matter
-10/16 Chapter Fifteen: The Cullens
-10/17 Chapter Sixteen: Carlisle
-10/18 Chapter Seventeen: The Game
-10/19 Chapter Eighteen: The Hunt

[WEEK OF 10/21]
-10/21 Chapter Nineteen: Goodbyes
-10/22 Chapter Twenty: Impatience
-10/23 Chapter Twenty-One: Phone Call
-10/23 Chapter Twenty-Two: Hide-and-Seek
-10/24 Chapter Twenty-Three: The Angel
-10/25 Chapter Twenty-Four: An Impasse
-10/26 Epilogue: An Occasion

Happy October! Time to start the Preface + Chapter One discussion.

I'm a night owl, so I started the book a few minutes ago. Feel free to discuss anything you'd like up to Chapter One today. :)

This isn’t my first reading of Twilight. I believe I’ve read it once, maybe twice. The first time I read it, I was thirteen and entering high school. I lived in Oregon, which has a very similar climate to Washington (and is where the movie was filmed).

Now I’m twenty-four and living in Phoenix, Arizona. It feels as if I’ve literally swapped locations with Bella, since she is originally from Phoenix. I can envision the few descriptions she gives of the “valley of the sun.” Bella makes a joke about being pale while living in Phoenix, and let me give you some insight on that.

If you live in Phoenix, unless you’re crazy, you don’t go outside. Especially in the summer. There are health advisories every single day not to go outside because between April-October, it’s 110+ degrees outside. Hikers/Joggers get stranded so often in the mountains from dehydration that if a helicopter has to come and save you, you’ll personally be paying for it.

Reading the descriptions of the fog and rain is so lovely/painful to hear in contrast. I miss the dreary weather so much, even if it does make you look sallow. Maybe one day I can move back to the Pacific Northwest and enjoy the depressing weather again.

So I stated the book a day early. Because I thought it was already October the first...oops, lol! I haven’t read this book since I was like 11-12 years old and now I’m 15 and I literally don’t know what I was thinking when I read it the first few times 😂. I was obsessed with this series and read it four times back to back when I was younger. This series is what got me into reading but now it’s hot garbage lmao. I am still forever grateful for it though. After I finished reading chapter one I decided to keep a count of how many times she says staring/glancing and also references to paleness throughout the whole book. Boy do I have a lot of thoughts. She says these words so many times it’s not even funny anymore and I haven’t even finished the book. It feels like a fan fic made by a twelve year old with a poorly developed vocabulary lol. I have other points but I’m gonna look back at my annotations to be a little more specific.

I'm on page 24 and the book still hasn't clarified what Bella looks like yet. So far she's only described herself as pale/sallow looking skin, skinny but not athletic. And she has hair. I don't know how long or what color, but she has it.

Yeah! And when she does describe herself she says that she will never fit in anywhere. It’s like girl you are literally the average white woman in America you will fit in just fine😵

HAHAHA.

And being pale in Phoenix isn't abnormal cause everyone stays indoors at all times because of the heat.

Kairia wrote: "Happy October! Time to start the Preface + Chapter One discussion.

I'm a night owl, so I started the book a few minutes ago. Feel free to discuss anything you'd like up to Chapter One today. :)

..."

I didn't know that about Phoenix! That's so crazy!

& right! all we really know is she doesn't have blue eyes or red hair. so i'm guessing brown eyes, brunette but who knows. i think stephanie meyer said somewhere that she purposely did that so the reader would put themseleves in bella's place/picture bella looking like them but idk where the link to that interview is. also i have blue eyes so it didn't work for me haha

I feel like if you're going to make a blank character so the audience can put themselves in the character's shoes, that really only works with video games where you can create/customize your character. It comes off as hollow in this book.

ALSO

I just finished Chapter One and I have a huge gripe with Edward's reaction to Bella in the school's office. When Bella enters the office, he doesn't notice her until (view spoiler)[another student enters the office and the wind blows Bella's scent further into the room. Edward should have been able to smell Bella as soon as she opened the door, maybe even before that depending on how airtight the school office doors are (hide spoiler)].

While I was reading these chapters I feel like these two just like don’t have personalities. Cause Bella is basically the plane Jane trophe while Edward is just some arm candy. Both of them have like the weirdest mood swings and just when you think you understand who Bella or Edward is and the stuff they will do, both of them will do a complete 180 and become like someone else. There just is no consistency with the characters and it makes it hard to connect with the characters or take them seriously.

A lot of romance novels suffer from what you're describing. It isn't something only Twilight suffers from. It's why I've been hesitant on attempting to read romance but I'm focusing on that genre in particular at the moment to try and find some noteworthy romance titles.

I haven't had a chance to pick it up yet (I'll probably get to it tomorrow) but I'd like to first start by saying that I tried to read this once when I was 15 (I'm almost 20 now) and found it so stupid I DNF'd it, but since I absolutely love the movies (my favorite guilty pleasure! I just finished a marathon of them all yesterday lol They're all on Amazon Prime at the moment if you guys want to binge it like I did). I'm planning on going into this with humor in mind, not profoundness.

I'm from Washington, I've lived here my whole life, and one of my favorite places to visit is Forks, actually. When I was reading the book years ago, the descriptions of the landscape were my favorite because I'd actually been to those places and loved them. La Push is awesome, by the way. Rocky and loggy and foggy and it does feel mystical a little. I suggest visiting sometime if you ever get the chance.

Is it true Forks didn't used to appear on the Weather Channel map in Washington until after Twilight made it famous?

Kairia wrote: "Is it true Forks didn't used to appear on the Weather Channel map in Washington until after Twilight made it famous?"

That I don't know about. I was only like 5 when the book came out, but Twilight did help the tourism business a lot. They have one of those big weather thermometers but instead of the temperature, its a scale from vampire danger zone to no vampires depending on how cold and cloudy it is and its pretty funny.

That so cool! I can totally relate because the twilight movies are great to binge watch sometimes. The books can be aggravating at times as well but it is kinda just fun to laugh at and just try to enjoy the cliché moments lmao 😂

@Faith

HAHAHA. I want to see this thermometer.

Chapter Two discussion starts today!

I just started "Open Book" and I feel like I'm missing something. Bella is disturbed that Edward isn't in school and becomes more and more distressed as time goes on. I don't understand why she cares even a smidge about whether Edward's present or not.

At this point, Edward gave her some weird/angry glares during class and Bella caught him trying to transfer from Biology. Why would she even remotely care that he's missing the following school day? It doesn't feel like she should even be thinking about him except in Biology class.

Lol I guess I'm ahead now or something. I just read all the way up to the end of chapter 3. My comments on the first two chapters are that I feel like Bella gets a lot of crap for being emotionless and blank but honestly she's pretty normal to me. I feel like I actually kind of relate to her lol. Edward's unnecessarily jerky and gaslighty. And she's like what, 16? Makes sense to me why she'd be preoccupied by someone who only ever acts super strangely around her. I remember thinking about one off comment for months from a guy I didn't even like. Nothing about this is really all that unrealistic to me tbh

Oh wait no it's the 3rd lol. So, my comments on chapter 3 are pretty much the same. I feel like the atmosphere of the setting isn't really conveyed though. It's a little hard to imagine what things look like.

I don't find it unrealistic per se. It just feels like she's hyper-focused on him with little reason to. Overall, I don't find her character disagreeable. I'm a bit jealous that a 16 year old had enough money saved up to purchase her own vehicle. I didn't own a car until I was 20.

The big gripe I have about Chapter 3 (which may be amended by the next chapter) is that there is some very questionable evidence left by Edward's body in the car accident. I feel like even a minor investigation by the police/car insurance would uncover the odd damage to Tyler's car and the lack thereof to Bella's truck. I wonder if this will ever be acknowledged or not in the book.

Just finished chapter 4 and oh man is Edward flighty and annoying to the extreme. I've always hated that "you shouldn't be near me" *proceeds to stalk her* thing. It's just so illogical. Pretty funny though lol

@Kairia yeah that's definitely a plot hole

Yeah. Edward is being super wishy-washy and can’t seem to make up his mind. Brings to mind that Hot n Cold song by Katy Perry.

I also find amusing that Bella has this sort of guilt about lying for Edward to protect him. If she actually told the truth, absolutely no one would believe that Edward just appeared beside her anyway.

Sooo I got carried away and now I'm way ahead of the schedule (I'm on chapter 15 now) but general thoughts are that I'm genuinely enjoying this way more than I thought I would, though I do admit that once the romance really kicks off, it's very cringey, but in the best way.

Hahaha. You're allowed to read ahead. The books are a rather simple read and I'm finishing the chapters very quickly. I don't want to read ahead in case I forget something I'd like to talk about with a specific chapter, otherwise I'd do the same.

Hey, so I finished it! Here's my review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

I ended up speed reading through this as well 🙈 it was kind of addictively entertaining though? Which I think explains why I was so obsessed with it when it first came out haha

Hahaha. I feel a little like that too but I'm reading like six other books, so that's helping me out a bit.

I was too! But I got sucked in and totally forgot about the other ones haha

Are you all planning on re-watching the movie as well? Or reading the rest of the series?

I've already watched the movies again recently, and I just started New Moon today. I'm planning on finishing the series

I’d like to reread the whole series as well

Since I own the series, I'll also be re-reading them. I foresee getting rid of them afterwards at this point as they're no longer a favorite of mine.