Eclipse
No. 3 in the Twilight series
by Stephenie Meyer
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Little, Brown and Company (New York): 7 August 2007. Hardcover: 640 pages. ISBN-10: 0-31-616020-2 ISBN-13: 978-0316160209 Suggested retail price: $18.99 (US) Tags: Native Americans; Romance; vampires; Washington (state); werewolves; Young Adult Tactical strength: [6/10] |
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Bella loves Edmund Cullen the vampire. She loves him so much that just hours of separation can drive her to distraction. Since Edmund's body remains eternally 17, Bella begins to panic as her 19th birthday approaches. Bella wants Edmund (or someone in her family) to turn her into a vampire right away so she can remain a teenager for every with her one true love. But Bella has complications. The vampires and the werewolves have a treaty: the werewolves remain in their territory as long as none of the Cullen family bites a human. One bite, and a war will break out between the vampires and the werewolves.
To complicate matters further, another vampire, Vanessa -- the kind that does drink human blood -- wants revenge on Edmund. In saving Bella in the first book Twilight, Edmund killed Vanessa's lover James. Vanessa wants revenge by killing Edmund's lover, Bella. Vanessa creates an army of vampires to attack the Cullens. Since the werewolves want nothing more than a chance to kill vampires and the Cullens could use the extra reinforcements, the Cullens and the werewolves renegotiate the treaty and work together to battle against the vampire army.
Throughout the preparations, Bella keeps trying to get someone to turn her into a vampire, and she really wants her love Edmund to do the biting himself. He agrees on the condition that she marry him first. Edmund claims to be old fashioned and be married before he bites or has sex with Bella. (Yes, Meyer does imply that Edmund, although almost 200 years old, remains a virgin.) Bella has some image issues about getting married at 18, so she balks at the idea of marriage.
In addition, Jacob, the Native American werewolf, continually expresses his love for Bella, and he tries to convince her that she would be much better off with a werewolf than a vampire. But Bella knows what she wants and tries to remain dedicated to Edmund -- in spite of the passionate kiss that Bella and Jacob share.
Of the three books in the Twilight series so far, I found Eclipse the least interesting. All the physical action takes place off stage, and we spend all our time inside Bella's mixed up head. She wants Edmund, but doesn't want to marry. She doesn't want to hurt Jacob's feelings. She worries about how her parents will take her sudden disappearance if she becomes a vampire. The pacing in Eclipse works better than the very slow start of New Moon, but New Moon had an excellent climax that built both narrative and emotional tension. Meyer shoves battles and confrontations into the background and focuses almost exclusively on Bella's emotional state. You could easily rename Eclipse as "How Bella came to a better emotional place." After two previous books dealing with Bella's emotional ups and down, I would have preferred to watch the actual battle rather than the battle of warring emotions in Bella's head.
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