Twilight FAQ

Is there a sequel to Twilight? Yes, there is a sequel! For more information on the sequel, click here.  RRRRRGGGHHHH ARRRRRRRGGGHHHHHHH RAGE DEATH KILL MURDER MAIM... https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-BYlLdK1fW0s/VG7LNj6EAYI/AAAAAAAAD9A/MlSmVnRiYHI/s400/pink%2Bwizard%2Brat.jpg Thanks a lot. Sigh, back to the salt mines. Are they going to make a Twilight movie? Yes! Click here to read about the latest movie news.  I would rather eat broken glass. That might at least be good for a laugh. Can you get me an audition for a part in the movie? Nope. If, for any reason, I do come into possession of knowledge concerning open auditions for any of the parts, I will post that information on the movie page.  Thank God there's no chance of THAT happening. I mean, we couldn't have just any old untalented amateur inflicting themselves on the mov... https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-LBccRZBLlyc/VZjzk9tbawI/AAAAAAAAKuE/aJ519g07h2A/s400/Stephenie%2Bmeyer%2Bcameo%2Btwilight.png https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-p4GqjAh2fIo/VZj2tSvp88I/AAAAAAAAKuU/V6rUmnUhG_w/s400/meyer%2Bbreaking%2Bdawn%2Bcameo.jpg Oh. My bad. Apparently they WILL let any idiot onto their set AND reference them by name AND stop the characters just so the camera can watch the author grin like a goon. Did Edward bite Bella at the end of the book? There seems to be a lot of confusion about the last line of Twilight. For that, I apologize. In my defense, I can only say that sometimes a writer loses a small battle here and there with her editor, and it wasn't entirely my idea to leave the ending so ambiguous.  Either blame your damn editor or don't. Stop being so fucking precious about it.</li> <li>Honestly, I suspect that this is just Smeyer covering her ass here. She's got so many unintentional howlers in her book that I think she just didn't realize how people would interpret it.</li> <li>Also, given that Edward has to be dragged kicking and screaming into doing ANYTHING Bella wants, usually by his family siding against him, I just didn't expect him to do a 180 over the course of TEN MINUTES.</li> </ol> But let me assure you that it is only Edward's lips that are pressed into Bella's throat at that particular point in time. </b> Definitely not his penis either! At the beginning of book two, Bella is still very human and Edward is still very stubbornly determined to keep her that way. </b> He completely opposed her transformation into a cyborg fembot! Will Bella and Edward's story be a trilogy, or a longer series? I have no intention of quitting at three. </b> I plan to do four books, toss out a novella about a character people barely remember, and have a hissy fit because someone leaked a rough draft on the web. Then I'll fade into well-deserved obscurity. Firstly, Bella and Edward would never forgive me. </b> Yo, LKH, Smeyer is stealing your crazy lady-who-hears-voices shtick. https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-qGfKzFEz8oU/VG70i5yFXEI/AAAAAAAAISQ/e4xF-SN27SQ/s400/motiv%2B-%2Bsmeyer%2Bthe%2Bmormon%2Bversion%2Bof%2BLKH.jpg Secondly, the next two books would have to be 1000+ pages apiece to get the story to any place that felt like a true resolution. </b> Well, since NONE of the books end someplace that feels like a true resolution, I can only assume that she's got another 4000 pages yet to write. Ugh. Thirdly, there are other stories to tell here, and, though the narrator might change, the story will continue. I just have way too much fun living in Forks (in my head) to stop anytime soon. </b> Yes, because if you had unlimited money and resources, it would totally make sense to hang around some small logging town in the butt-end of nowhere. No offense to any actual Forkians out there; I've lived in the butt-end of nowhere too. Oh, and now she's declared that she is totally not interested in writing more stories because people pissed all over her crappy stories. What's with the apple? The apple on the cover of Twilight represents "forbidden fruit." </b> Can this be... I used the scripture from Genesis (located just after the table of contents) because I loved the phrase "the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil." </b> Excuse me, I have to laugh myself until I pee from that description. She actually tells people that Genesis - and that quote in particular - is RIGHT AFTER THE TABLE OF CONTENTS? I honestly can't tell if she is JUST THAT DUMB... https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-pXbv77XrJ_U/VG70Dsd11oI/AAAAAAAAIFo/dOxssU72Ceg/s400/motiv%2B-%2Bbible.jpg ... oh wait, she is. Okay, I can't tell if she is just that dumb, or just that dumb AND talking down to her readers. Isn't this exactly what Bella ends up with? A working knowledge of what good is, and what evil is. </b> ... NO. A thousand times in a thousand voices, NO. If anything, Twilight takes a selfish, cruel character and turns her into a proud sociopath by showing her that she can transcend the humanity she so loathes. That's the sort of thing a VILLAIN does. This really just highlights how childish and self-centered Smeyer's sense of "good" and "evil" is. Evil people do bad things to her Sue, and good people are almost as nasty but take the moral high ground. Also, the Cullens are not particularly good - they are petty, selfish, snotty, treat each other like shit and don't feel terribly remorseful if they DO kill humans. And James isn't very "evil" as a vampire goes. Yeah, he hunts people. Big deal. Edward plots to kill a bunch of innocent teenagers so he can metaphorically rape Bella to death. And really, what "knowledge" does Bella gain about good OR evil? Uh, she learns that there are some vampires who don't suck people's blood (although they don't really feel too bad if they do), and that there are some who do. That is NOT a working knowledge of what good and evil are. If I can cite Jim Butcher again (and I can, because this is MY snark), his vampires show a better "working" example of good vs evil than Smeyer could even imagine - Thomas Raith is a "good" vampire despite his recent lapse in humanity, because he tries to help others and do good things despite using humans as food. And the evil vampires are not "evil" solely because they use groupies as food, but because of their long-term plans to enslave all of humanity. Call me back when Bella's interviewed Mother Teresa and Hitler. The nice thing about the apple is it has so many symbolic roots. </b> Translation: Smeyer didn't actually have anything in mind. It just sounds cool. You've got the apple in Snow White, one bite and you're frozen forever in a state of not-quite-death... </b> ... or rather, frozen for a week or so until a total stranger comes along and sticks his tongue in your mouth. Then you stop being frozen, start to age and eventually die. https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-NbG11XiihKI/VZcHNcDnlZI/AAAAAAAAKks/onprq_2s9t8/s400/Once%2BUpon%2BA%2BTime%2BSnow%2BWhite%252C%2Bouat.jpg ''Or you get a TV show about how all Disney characters are living in Maine. '' Seriously, I think Smeyer mixed this up with Sleeping Beauty. Which STILL doesn't work, because again a total stranger macking on you causes you to become unfrozen. And in both cases, the magical MacGuffin induced an artificial coma. Yeah, I would compare vampirism to an artificial coma. Then you have Paris and the golden apple in Greek mythology—look how much trouble that started. </b> ... and what does that have to do with this?! Seriously, that makes no sense. The golden apple in Greek mythology was not symbolic - it was a MacGuffin, which existed merely to get the whole Trojan War thing going. The apple in itself is meaningless - it is used once to start the war, and is never mentioned or seen again. Even if it were symbolic, it would be symbolic of jealousy, greed, shallowness, and a willingness to be bribed. Then again, that sort of fits Smeyer's works, doesn't it? Apples are quite the versatile fruit. In the end, I love the beautiful simplicity of the picture. To me it says: choice. </b> To me, it says: Smeyer took the forbidden fruit element, and is now trying to belatedly tack on some kind of "deep" symbolism. And choice? Really? From a woman who glorifies lack of free will? Why did you pick the title Twilight? </i>Twilight was not the easiest book to title. When I started sending out queries, I called it Forks for lack of a better idea. </b> Agents kept telling me that they weren't interested in a "history of cutlery" book. I can't imagine why! Seriously, this just shows the total lack of thought that went into it. She couldn't just go through the book and look for something interesting, so she gave it a title that was pretty much guaranteed to turn off potential agents/publishers. The first thing my agent advised me was that the title was going to have to change. </b> No shit, Sherlock. <b>We played around with a lot of different titles, and nothing seemed to convey the right feel. </b> Oh, I could easily come up with a few that are better than fucking FORKS. How about''... Stalker. Vampire Stalker. Watching You Sleep. The Lion and the Lamb'' (which is totally not in the Bible). ''Sparkles. Glitters. The Hunter. Golden Eyes.'' Anything but fucking FORKS!!!!!! https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-2VZBBCahF-c/VIVWQ-SIsdI/AAAAAAAAJPk/kj7donY8mjw/s400/it%2527s%2Bfunny%2Bhow%2Bdumb%2Byou%2Bare.gif <b>We brainstormed through emails for about a week. The word twilight was on a list of "words with atmosphere" that I sent her. Though these words were meant to be used in combination with something else, the word twilight stood out to both of us. </b> "It's vague, but sounds sort of romantic in a swoony way. It's perfect!" "But I thought this was about a stalker and his victim with Stockholm Syndrome." "NO! IT'S ROMANTIC! IT'S A ROMANCE, DAMMIT." <b>We decided to try it out, and, after a little adjustment time, it started to work for both of us. It isn't absolutely perfect; to be honest, I don't think there is a perfect title for this book (or if there is, I've never heard it). </b> I can tell you a few words that are just a perfect title for that book... <b>When I look at the titles other countries have used (examples: Germany: Bis zum Morgengrauen which is "Until Dawn" or "Bite" if you add an "s" to make it "biss" (if you look at the German book cover on the Twilight International page); Finland: "Temptation;" France: "Fascination;" and Japan, which has split it into three separate books: "The Boy Whom I Love is a Vampire," "Blood Tastes Sadness," and "The Vampire Family in the Darkness."), it seems like I might be right about that. (Both New Moon and Eclipse were much easier to title, and the titles also fit better.) </b> ... or maybe it's just that other countries tend to retitle books with horribly vague titles that might sound silly or lose their meaning in other languages. Or they just retitle things for shits and giggles. For instance, the first Dutch translation of Lord of the Rings meant "Under the Spell of the Ring," half of Japanese movie titles for American movies seem to have the word "love" in them, and so on. So it's not that your book is so speshul and unique in being retitled in other countries. Not every movie/book is a Ringu that can be easily and painlessly translated without losing meaning. <b><i>I'm confused by the preface; who is the Hunter? </i>(Warning: if you haven't read Twilight, this will spoil the ending! Stop now!) </b> If you are so hopelessly stupid that you couldn't connect the preface with the climax, stop reading in general and lock yourself in a closet! Clearly you are too dumb to live. <b>Sometimes, things in the story are so clear to me that, when I write them, I don't flesh them out or explain them well enough. </b> ... like a BAD WRITER. Oh wait, that's what you are. <b>Usually the editor will catch these kinds of things. </b> Even though he/she shouldn't have to, because good writers manage to do this sort of thing without screwing up. https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-2G45xjLBwUA/VJMMrUid9QI/AAAAAAAAJV4/wgegshTEytA/s400/Editor%2BError%2BMessage.png <b>However, if it's just as clear to her, then confusion slips through. </b> Just make the fucking connection for the idiots out there instead of pretending that it's some sort of esoteric truth. It's perfectly simple and I have never spoken to anyone who DIDN'T get it, since I tend to reserve my conversations for people who can manage two-syllable words. <b>Some people get the preface, and some don't. </b> They are called stupid people... and everyone else. <b>So, to clear it all up: James is "the hunter." I think this term has caused some of the confusion, because later, he is a "tracker." But he is hunting Bella, so, in that moment, that is how she thinks of him. </b> Seriously, I cannot believe that she is actually having to explain something so frickin' obvious. And we have more evidence here that Smeyer is in love with her own keyboard diarrhea - she apparently just can't say, "James is the hunter." She has to go on a pagelong spiel, rambling about how she is such a snowflakey genius that she doesn't realize how her writings will come across to the readers. Smeyer then reprints the whole preface, and I won't bother including it, because I already mocked it elsewhere. https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-OoEH5ixsxTE/VVOgURzYRCI/AAAAAAAAJe0/2h89G7PD9FU/s400/beating%2Bhead.gif <b><i>Why do all the guys at Forks High like Bella if she's supposed to be average-looking? Is she pretty or not? </i>Some parts of Bella's experiences are modeled after real life (my life, to be exact) in order to ground the fantasy aspects of the story in solid reality. </b> "Yes, I often was mobbed by my adoring mobs of guys who begged me to make them my love slaves. It was SO tiresome! So Bella being the Sullen Goddess is not ridiculous or Suey! It's REALISTIC, because it totally happened to me! You have to believe it! PLEEEEEEZ believe it! I WAS IRRESISTIBLE!" <b>Ironically, many of the details that are one hundred percent reality are the ones that are called into question the most (as illustrated by some of my angry Amazon reviews). </b> I think Smeyer has mixed up "angry" and "contemptuous." And no, I do not believe that the whole "and all the guys are panting after her!" thing is one hundred percent reality, quote unquote. I could buy that a number of guys MIGHT potentially find Bella attractive... if they didn't actually get to know her... or talk to her. But ALL of them? Every last one? I'm seriously supposed to believe that ALL the men Smeyer met were blown away by how gorgeous she was, and were panting after her all the time to the point of chasing after her to ask her to dances, and even showing up uninvited because they wanted to sweep her away? BULLSHIT. Sorry Smeyer, you may be moderately good-looking now, but it's pretty obvious you're pouring in the wishful thinking. <b>I mentioned in my bio that I went to a high school in Scottsdale, AZ, which is Arizona's version of Beverly Hills (picture the high school in the movie Clueless). </b> So, she means a poor man's Beverly Hills. It's not a great thing to boast that you were the late Brittany Murphy, lady. https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-i8s6nAUgC7M/VG7jaePSqaI/AAAAAAAAFjA/ip7RhqS6IFQ/s400/rolling%2Bwith%2Bthe%2Bhomies.gif <b>In high school, I was a mousy, A-track wall-flower. I had a lot of incredible girlfriends, but I wasn't much sought after by the Y chromosomes, if you know what I mean. </b> Uh... yes, I do know what that means. I don't think Smeyer knows what “if you know what I mean" means, and when it is appropriate to use that phrase... unless she's implying that ALL the men were gay or that her incredible girlfriends were a bit more, um, than just friends. <b>Then I went to college in Provo, Utah. </b> Yes, it continually amazes me that this woman actually graduated from college. A REAL college, as opposed to some kind of internet scam. https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-Zh_NVBoTov8/VG7zL4VXavI/AAAAAAAAH58/kGz_XLyPbJw/s400/BYU%2BMedallion.png Oh. Well, that explains it. Yes, I know not all religious colleges are bad. I have some friends who have gone to them, and they turned out fine. But honestly, I cannot bring myself to be impressed by a religious college that seems more interested in forcing its students to conform and controls their behavior. And since it actually seems to be a decent school according to outside sources, it amazes me that Smeyer actually GRADUATED from it when she seems to have less intelligence than the above Pink Wizard Rat. And honestly, I don't think the good people of Provo probably appreciate being classed with Forks (population: just over 3,000 pre-Twilight) as a "small town." It's a university city with a decent population, not the backwater hick town Smeyer is depicting it as. It's got well over 100,000 people there, roughly the same number of people as Ann Arbor, and several times the population of Princeton! Which admittedly is not as much as Phoenix (over a million) or more specifically Scottsdale (about twice the population of Provo), but it's not a tiny backwater hicktopia. <b>Let me tell you, my stock went through the roof. See, beauty is a lot more subjective than you might think. </b> So beauty is subjective... and according to her, ALL the guys in Provo just happened to have the exact same taste and all of them thought she was the best thing since cheap ramen. And no, I'm not taking her words out of context. The original commentator said that "all" the guys were gasping after Bella, and Smeyer said that that was '''"one hundred percent reality." '''So she is actually claiming that Bella being worshiped by literally every boy in school is what happened to her. <b>In Scottsdale, surrounded by barbies, I was about a five. </b> Which, I guess, explains her hatred of blondes. Bella being worshiped by all the men in Forks is her way of revenging herself. <b>In Provo, surrounded by normal people, I was more like an eight. </b> "Normal" people? Well, what's "normal"? Ugly? Hicks? And pssttt... Smeyer, you're not that attractive. You're maybe a six. At least, until people are exposed to the diarrhea that spews forth from your mouth... and then you become more of a three. <b>I had dates every weekend with lots of really pretty and intelligent boys (some of whose names end up in my books). </b> "I didn't date LOSERS! I didn't date unpopular nerds! They were totally hot! AND they were smart too! And I totally didn't make them up! So there!" Also, I really hope she means the werewolves or vampires. Because it would just be too nasty if she put their names in as the pathetic guys who Bella barely tolerates because they're not Hot, Rich and Immortal. <b>It was quite confusing at first, because I knew there was nothing different about me. </b> "Wow, I wonder why suddenly ALL the boys are desperately scrabbling for my attention? Could it be because I'm just SO desirable? Or could it be that voodoo priest I visited?" <b>(Side note: don't ever let anyone tell you that high school is supposed to be fun. High school is to be endured. College is fun.) </b> ... and yet in her books, college is what you do to pass the time if you aren't snagging a rich man. In the first book, Bella only ever thinks of college as an ESCAPE from Forks, never as a path to anything she wants to do, or for fun. By New Moon, college has been downgraded to something Edward wants her to do, but she doesn't wanna do it because she just wants to be turned into a vampire and leech off the Cullens financially. Sigh, this whole part really reeks of Smeyer protesting too much. "I was hot! I wasn't a loser! Bella being the center of attention isn't wish fulfillment at ALL." I mean, maybe I'm wrong and she really WAS the belle of Provo. I don't know, I wasn't there. But it seems to me that somebody who really WAS the belle of Provo and had all these boys falling over themselves to date her wouldn't write a wish-fulfillment story in which all the boys are desperately panting after her, all the girls are jealous of her/worship her, and she can idly brush them off because she's only interested in Edward's Sparklewiener. Smeyer is a lot like Laurell K. Hamilton - they are both emotionally stunted women whose idealized Sues are desired by all men despite being vile selfish bitches, they both hate other women who make them feel insecure or are considered more attractive than them by ANYONE, and their entire series are basically all about the world revolving around their characters' butts. They both display their fear of aging, have essentially sexist worldviews, and have obvious resentment issues over being mothers. They both got married right out of college, and seem to have only the vaguest idea what the world outside their little circle is like. So yeah I find it very very difficult to believe that Smeyer had some kind of magical sex mojo that made ALL the Provo boys pant after her and start verging on stalker territory to show their devotion (which is what the guys do to Bella). She's a fairly good-looking woman, but a guy who likes skinny blonde athletes isn't gonna suddenly race after her. And as a sidenote, I have trouble imagining a Mormon college where you can't smoke, drink, or walk around with bedhead (not kidding!) as being "fun." But maybe that's just me. https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-aKZTy84GS3E/VHTbpGqHIoI/AAAAAAAAI9g/hWD06cZS2CM/s400/party%2Bgurl.gif <b>which shows Bella's first day a school as seen by Edward's mind-reading perspective. It explains the excitement over her arrival: </b> ... no. No, it doesn't. It explains EDWARD'S snotty-ass PERSPECTIVE on why Bella excited the student body. Just because he can read minds doesn't make him omniscient. Human minds don't have convenient Cliff's notes explaining the exact reason for our reactions. <font color="#0000ff">Today, all thoughts were consumed with the trivial drama of a new addition to the small student body here. It took so little to work them all up. I'd seen the new face repeated in thought after thought from every angle. Just an ordinary human girl. The excitement over her arrival was tiresomely predictable—like flashing a shiny object at a child. Half the sheep-like males were already imagining themselves in love with her, just because she was something new to look at. Again, this is what Edward's OPINION is. Just because SparkleAsshole says it does not mean it is reality. Oh, and it reveals him to be a huge asshole. And kind of pathetic, since he sulks when nobody is scared of his incredibly unscary self. https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-e25MbWW-PZ8/VZewXFWzOAI/AAAAAAAAKrM/QEOjxbT2w8E/s400/super%2Bmanly%2Bsparkly%2Bedward.gif <b>Do you have any tips for aspiring writers? Beware: I can only give writing tips for my style of writing, because I don't know how to do anything else! </b> Ohhhhh, the pain. I smell a LKH experience here. <b>My focus is the characters--that's the part of the story that is most important to me. </b> All teenage boys must be pretty and wangsty! All the women must strongly resemble me! <b>I feel the best way to write believable characters is to really believe in them yourself. When you hear a song on the radio, you should know how your character feels about it--which songs your character would relate to, which songs she hates. </b> Yeah, I suspect Bella and Smeyer's other characters relate best to this song: And I suspects she hates anything that isn't bad teen emo crapola like Linkin Park, Paramore, Evanescence and shit like that. <b>Hear the conversations that your characters would have when they're not doing anything exciting; let them talk in your head, get to know them. </b> ... I've seen the conversations her characters have when they're not doing anything exciting. They're so boring I want to kill myself. <b>Know their favorite colors and their opinions on current events, their birthdays and their flaws. None of this goes in the book, it's just to help you get a rounded feel to them. </b> It's also very useful when your Designated Love Asshole decides to interrogate them, since this allows you to dispense with that annoying "getting to know you" bit of characterization. It's SO annoying when your audience doesn't just accept that total strangers can fall into instant passionate love that is way better than anything THEY will ever experience. <b>I think outlining--in a very non-structured, free-flowing form--can really help. I didn't have to do that with Twilight, but it was very necessary for the other two books. </b> "It was very necessary that I outline the other two books of meandering boring shit. That way, I could drag out the moribund shreds of plot even further!" Chapter 1: Bella angsts. Birthday party. Chapter 2: Bella angsts. Exposition. Presents. Chapter 3: Bella angsts. Edward acts weird. Edward dumps Bella. Bella gets emo. Chapter 4+: Bella wangsts and flirts with Jacob. I mean, what IS there to outline? <b>Some of the best advice on writing I got from Janet Evanovich's website. She said if you want to be a writer as a profession, then treat it like a job. Put in the hours. Set aside time for writing, and then make yourself sit down and do it. Sometimes it's easy--the words flow and you can get a lot done. Other times it's hard, and you might only get one sentence done in an hour. But that's better than nothing. </b> ... except Smeyer doesn't do that. Remember when she threw a huge tantrum and refused to work any further on Midnight Sun because somebody leaked her rough draft? That's not treating it like a job. <b>Here's a tip that really helped me with book two and three: forget writing in order. With New Moon and Eclipse, I wrote out whichever scenes I was interested in, rather than starting at the beginning and working through to the end. </b> ... somehow that doesn't surprise me. I mean, a writer of tween-girl porn writing something with no plot, no aim, just whatever she feels like puking out on the page? She's sounding more like LKH every day... except she doesn't write actual porn. https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-qGfKzFEz8oU/VG70i5yFXEI/AAAAAAAAISQ/e4xF-SN27SQ/s400/motiv%2B-%2Bsmeyer%2Bthe%2Bmormon%2Bversion%2Bof%2BLKH.jpg <b>I wrote most of the books in scenes, and then went back later and tied the scenes together. </b> And people say I don't write plot-filled books! <b>It cut out a lot of writer's block to write whatever part I was most interested in at the time. </b> But my editor insisted that the part where Bella makes peace in the Middle-East while curing AIDS and stopping global warming with the force of "like, stop it and stuff" was "unrealistic." Same with the part where Edward forms his own religion called Sparklinanity and rejects more hot blondes because Bella's so much hotter. <b>And it makes it easy to finish. By the time you get around to writing the less exciting transitions, expositions, and descriptions, you already have so much done! You can see a full novel coming together, and that's very motivating. (But you really need an outline to work that way--to keep from getting lost!) </b> "Of course, this whole thing only applies to bad tween romance novels, because if you try to write a REAL book with a plot and characters and foreshadowing, this will totally screw you over." Then she gives some advice on how to get published, which has only one real part that is worth mocking. <b>Then, if you're brave, have someone you trust (who also has good taste in books) read through it and give you constructive criticism. </b> And if you're me, have someone go through it and tell you what a genius you are and how the sun sparkles out of your ass. Your little brother would be fine! <b><i>Got any recommendations for books I can read while I'm waiting for the next book to come out? </i>Amazon has a list of all my favorite books here. </b> ... and they look like she hired someone to find all the staples of various genres. All are nice, safe and noncontroversial, and she has a representative number from every genre. And surprise surprise, NO VAMPIRE BOOKS. What, not going to admit the obvious debt you owe to Anne Rice, lady?! https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-YFUp_MwKuCQ/VG7M-46m_SI/AAAAAAAAEY8/k8Qnp2nXEuE/s400/anne%2Brice.jpg <b><i>What does Bella look like? </i>I left out a detailed description of Bella in the book so that the reader could more easily step into her shoes. </b> "I want all the vapid, unimaginative semi-literate middle-class white tweens out there to imagine that they are her! Because if I gave her a mole or something, they TOTALLY couldn't imagine being her!" Srsly, a good writer would be able to do that even with a detailed description. Now, I don't have a problem with authors not describing their characters a lot. I mean, we don't know anything about the looks of Taran from Lloyd Alexander's books. Half the characters in Lord of the Rings are barely described at all, to the point where we don't definitely know what Legolas' hair color is, and you can only figure out some of Frodo's description because Gandalf left a message at an inn. But when half your book is taken up by people drooling over your Sue's beauty/your Sue insisting, "I'm so plain and non-gorgeous!", leaving out her looks is a huge mistake. For one thing, if someone we CAN'T SEE keeps going, "I'm plain!" we're gonna start seeing her as plain. If you don't specify that she's pretty, we're not gonna see her as pretty. I don't care if nobody is supposed to be gorgeous unless they're a vampire, it's stupid. When I first read Twilight, I couldn't think of Bella as anything except a sallow, plain girl, possibly with skin problems due to having her hair over her face all the time. https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-kpS-rbCWz-Y/VG7YQ68Nr4I/AAAAAAAAEu8/pWc4arhTB38/s320/sadako.jpg https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-MS7xnXSDY5A/VG7bz4GBE0I/AAAAAAAAE1U/bP-HKNLRhSA/s400/wallflower-%2Bsunako.jpg Yeah, like that. Except without the awesome. And if you cast an actress who is plain as white bread... https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-orXNV62n1xU/VG7t3uaphAI/AAAAAAAAGmw/Pih_N17Mlzg/s400/Kristen%2BStewart%2B-%2BBiting%2BLip.jpg Yeah, that doesn't help. <b>However, so many people have asked this question, I have decided to tell you what she looks like to me. But I want to stress, Bella's looks are open to interpretation. </b> Maybe you should give up your stupid "noes, I cannot specify my character's looks!" approach if people keep asking what she looks like. And no, a character's looks are not "open to interpretation." People can have different ideas about how a character looks EXACTLY, but if I imagine Bella as a blond or African-American, it's incorrect because WE HAVE BEEN SPECIFICALLY TOLD SHE IS NOT. For fuck's sake! <b>In my head, Bella is very fair-skinned, with long, straight, dark brown hair and chocolate brown eyes. </b> Yeah, that doesn't sound like a Hot Topicized version of Smeyer at ALL. <b>Her face is heart-shaped—a wide forehead with a widow's peak, large, wide-spaced eyes, prominent cheekbones, and then a thin nose and a narrow jaw with a pointed chin. Her lips are a little out of proportion, a bit too full for her jaw line. Her eyebrows are darker than her hair and more straight than they are arched. She's five foot four inches tall, slender but not at all muscular, and weighs about 115 pounds. She has stubby fingernails because she has a nervous habit of biting them. And there's yourvery detailed description. </b> https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-Ogt8DULDm7Y/VG7M-lj-_FI/AAAAAAAAEY4/BnnNmaytQXI/s400/Stephanie%2Bmeyer%2Bdescription.jpg Someone sent this too me, and yeah, it's pretty much an idealized portrait of Smeyer herself. I mean, the only things that really differ is that Bella is supposed to have straight hair, and she's supposed to be much skinnier than Smeyer is (since in real life, being "soft" and "obviously not an athlete" don't lead to natural slenderness). Does this woman SERIOUSLY think she's fooling anyone, and that we don't know she's describing a "perfect" version of herself? DOES SHE THINK WE'RE THAT STUPID?!?!?!?!?!?!? https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-zJ3nr0mpsJ8/VWFHsgMtkDI/AAAAAAAAJ_E/DpDrCepk5So/s400/obscene%2Bgesture%2Bflipping%2Bthe%2Bbird.gif <b><i>What do you mean you're switching narrators? Are you crazy? </i>There seems to be some anxiety over my statement that, eventually, the story of Bella and the Cullens and all my other Fork friends might be narrated by someone besides Bella. </b> "Now, teehee, I know that the idea of me narrating as anyone other than the idiotic Sue who looks, sounds and acts exactly like me fills you with overwhelming horror, has prompted some wrist-slitting, and has caused crazed riots in the streets. But don't worry: every protagonist I narrate will be annoying, arrogant and stupid, just like Bella." <b>Please, don't worry. I promise that Bella will get to tell her whole story. </b> Oh yay. Because I was SO worried that I wouldn't get to hear the maximum amount from Bawla Wan. <b>But when her story is more or less resolved, there are other stories left to tell. Bella and Edward will always have their roles. Don't fret—those two aren't going anywhere. </b> In other words, Smeyer was gonna turn into the YA version of Laurell K. Hamilton, wringing every last drop of juice from her franchise until people were practically begging her to retire those overused characters. But I forget: like Bella, she's lazy. So now she's effectively vanished from the world except as an embarrassing literary memory. <b><i>In the outtakes, you described Bella's prom dress in so much detail. Do you have a picture of it? </i>I did! Unfortunately, it was lost in the Great Computer Crash of '04. I've searched through pages and pages of google images for Paris fashion week 2003, but I haven't been able to recover it. (I also used to have pictures of Alice's and Rosalie's, also from the runway). Sorry! </b> <ol><li>... because when you're vampires trying to blend into the human population, it makes PERFECT sense to wear skimpy couture to PROM.</li> <li>So in other words, Smeyer couldn't even come up with some nice dresses without copying them completely (save maybe the color) from real-life clothing. Ugh.</li> </ol> <b>update A fan named Michelle—who also happens to be quite a sleuth—tracked down (using only my description in the outtakes and the clue that I found the pictures in 2003 Paris Fashion Week slides) the exact photographs that I used in creating my prom dresses for Bella and Alice. I am quite stunned that she was able to find Bella's dress, since I never mentioned that in the original photo the dress was light yellow rather than blue. Here they are: </b> https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/--rmMUsh3Q8E/VG7uJZUnzcI/AAAAAAAAGuI/aq_Kh-EQK2Y/s400/alice%2527s%2Bdress%2B-%2Bnot.jpg https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-dxANfonHXCA/VG7uIqC_8rI/AAAAAAAAG5g/y_85pBfckx0/s400/Rosalie%2527s%2Bdress.jpg Wow, Alice is dressed even more like a whore than I thought she was. Actually, they both are - Alice's looks like it would need double-sided take to keep it from just falling apart (and would totally show off your boobs if you just twisted sideways), and Bella's has just a little gauzy thin material over the boobies. Does it strike anyone else as weird that Smeyer dresses her characters like a pair of desperate starlets who probably couldn't stretch without causing a riot, but French-kissing is WRONG WRONG WRONG YOU WHORE? <b><i>Can you post Forever Dawn, or send me a copy, or give me a summary, or email me the outline...? </i>Ever since I put up my "craptastic covers" page and included the cover I made for Forever Dawn (the original sequel to Twilight), I've been getting different versions of this question. </b> .... why?! Seriously, why do they want the first drafts of a book that is ALREADY a total pile of crap? <b>First of all, here's the reason why Forever Dawn will never be published: it doesn't fall into the young adult genre. </b> That's not a reason. I have shocking news for Smeyer: lots of YA authors also publish novels for adults, and vice versa. <b>I wasn't thinking about my audience yet when I was writing it, I was still just writing for my own amusement. </b> "So obviously there are DOZENS of explicit sex scenes, describing Edward's, teehee, sparkly love-sword in loving detail!" <b>When I knew that I was going to have to write another sequel, with a more YA focus, I went ahead and finished Forever Dawn so I could give it to my big sister for her birthday (how many of your sisters have ever written you a 600+ page book for your birthday?). </b> None. And if I had a sister who gave me a giant rambling tome about a sparkly vampire and a girl so annoying she should be euthanized, I sure wouldn't boast about it. <b>Now, eventually, in the distant future, I will probably put up sections of Forever Dawn like I did with the Twilight outtakes. The reason I can't do this for a long time is because the plot line of Forever Dawn is still working as a loose skeletal outline for the rest of the series. In other words, it's chockfull of spoilers. </b> Translation: It probably has the same Alien birth scene as Breaking Dawn, and it would have been SUCH a shame if that beautiful and powerful scene were spoiled for us ahead of time. https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-YqHSnCYCQwE/VG7jZwv751I/AAAAAAAAFiw/_5C2Gxzc-vU/s400/renesmee.gif So I won't be able to put any of it here on the site until I'm past that point in the story. After Eclipse is out and we get a little closer to the release of Breaking Dawn, I'll be able to reveal the first pieces of Forever Dawn. "In other words, I'll probably release this one after I totally burn out on the whole Twilight thing, and need to keep the fans drooling with new material or risk them moving on to better series. Or they'll just forget about it because a porn fanfic came out." <b>Can you come to my town on your next tour? I actually have no control over my tour schedule. I just go where Little, Brown &amp; Co. tells me to go. At this point in time, I have no idea where they'll be sending me next fall. As soon as I know about any events I'll be at, I will post them in the calendar section of this website. </b> Can you petition Little, Brown and Co about where she'll be touring? Because there's this nice little cave on the planet Venus... <b><i>What CD is Bella listening to in Chapter Seven? </i>I took that information out because I wasn't sure how long it was going to take to get Twilight published. If it took ten years, would the band still be cool, or would it be embarrassing? Lucky for me, it didn't take that long, and the band is still quite cool (in my eyes, at least). Bella is listening to Linkin Park. As I am at this very moment. </b> Wow I thought it was Muse. Well, I have shocking news for Smeyer - Linkin Park never WAS cool, they never WILL BE COOL, and they are not cool at this moment. If nothing else, it just reinforces that Bella (and Edward, since he later listens to the same CD) are incredibly lame and have horrible musical taste. And yes Smeyer, the same description applies to you. <b>Is Twilight autobiographical? No. Twilight is a work of fiction. </b> And that fact gnaws away at Stephenie Meyer's heart and soul, leaving her weeping hopelessly through every night until the dawn. Seriously, don't humor the idiots and crazy people out there who are unable to distinguish fantasy from reality. https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-H7ljvY1lTiU/VG7xFzgi8OI/AAAAAAAAHf0/SAGG86F8uJA/s400/overly%2Battached%2Bzombie.gif <b><i>What if my question isn't answered here? </i>Try the Twilight Lexicon. </b> For fuck's sake, don't say that people should check a fansite if you haven't answered their question. That's no kind of substitute for the actual author's comments! It's like asking God a question and have him say, "Check wikipedia." And yes, I just compared Stephenie Meyer to God. I hate myself for that. Seriously, put in some kind of form so they can submit questions, and have your webmaster check it regularly and weed out the crap. GET OFF YOUR LAZY ASS.