As I said, it burns. This book has a poor plot, and the romance is even worse. I hate to agree with all of the crazy nay-sayers, but I do. I used to be a HUGE fan, but after a while... it starts to burn the skin. The Aesops in this book are downright painful. Rampant sexism, and disturbing paedophilia even! Before you start with the "imprinting is not necessarily sexual", it is! It is designed for reproduction, as such, it is SEXUAL. At no point does Bella make a serious choice for herself. Even the choice to be a vampire, her biggest planned choice, was not made by her. It was Edward who chose when and Edward who chose how.

Their romance is bizarre at best. I ask you, what do Bella and Edward talk about? I'll tell you- being vampire and human. Now that Bella's a vamp, what is left for that little relationship? They never even really bonded, other than Edward asking her some silly and pointless question. Never do they seem to spend time really getting to know each other. And their love was a completely instant thing. Bella fell in "love" with him because he was cute. Edward fell in "love" with her because she smelled nice. The characters are pretty interesting for the most part, and that I'll admit. The problem is that all of the really main characters are flat and dull. The side characters are actually pretty interesting. Bella is completely uninteresting, Edward was shooting for a angsty and complicated cynic, but completely missed. While Alice is described as bubbly and optimistic, I can't remember reading more than 2 moments of her optimism. She and Edward are both quite controlling too.

Another main issue is the mental abuse. Everyone says that it's there... because it actually is. I read through the profiles of the mental abuser and the victim. Guess which two characters fit almost perfectly.

On the whole, the series is alright if you only want some entertainment. If you read too deeply, be prepared for some wall banging. The worse part? All of the bad messages aren't intentional. They're just there! So don't hate on Meyer for all of the bad Aesops. She doesn't mean it. It just happened.