Wednesday, August 25, 2010

Chapter Twenty-seven: Everybody Loves Renesmee

Bella spends the first page of the novel recapping the fact that she now has a really big family, especially if you count the werewolves as cousins or something. Even Sue and Leah Clearwater are part of the show now. And it's all because of Renesmee, aww!

Everyone is happy. Bella's even more happy, because everyone around her is happy. Jasper is especially happy, because he can feel all of Bella's happy. SO MUCH HAPPY!!

But some things aren't perfect -- which is to say that they haven't become perfect yet, since they inevitably will. Renesmee spoke her first word ("mommy," aww) at the age of one week, which is slightly earlier than most kids, unless you start them really early on those Your Baby Can Read DVDs. Even they probably wouldn't say that word as part of a complete sentence like this little half-sparklepire.

And that's only the first of many wonderful Renesmee milestones. At less than a month, she's walking, and by three months, she looks almost as big as an average two-year-old. She can speak perfectly, read, run and dance and perform open heart surgery. The last one probably is less true than the others.

But she is growing really fast, and even though it's slowing down, Carlisle estimates that she'll be full grown at age four, and an old woman around fifteen. Lucky Renesmee, she never has to worry about turning 30 and really getting old. Actually, though, they don't know what's going to happen to her, since nobody has ever mentioned any half-vampire babies running around. There might be some legends in Brazil, but I'm sure that won't turn up any useful information to save the day at the last moment or anything.

There's one other not-yet-perfect thing that haunts Bella a little bit: those darn Volturi. Alice sent them a wedding announcement to head off them checking on her too early, and they sent back a lovely necklace featuring a few of the crown jewels in an overly ornate box. Oh, and there's a nice note saying that they can't wait to meet the new Mrs. Cullen! Maybe these guys aren't so bad after all.

Well, I guess there's a slight problem with that, in so much as Aro likes collecting unique vampires, and might want to steal Renesmee as the most uniquest thing ever. Bella's ready to deal with this by traveling to Italy herself and showing her sparkle to the Volturi in person. Since they can't read her thoughts, there's no chance they can find out about Renesmee. Perfectness achieved!

In the meantime, Bella, Jacob and Renesmee hunt together. Renesmee can eat human food, but human blood is way better. Animal blood falls somewhere in between, and since there isn't enough donated blood to go around (baby has learned that hunting humans is a bad thing), they're trying to get her to accept that instead. With Jacob along, they can entice her by making it into a hunting contest. Oh, those poor animals.

Jacob and Renesmee go ahead to hunt, while Bella hangs a few minutes behind them so that Renesmee can surprise her with whatever she catches. But Bella catches something herself -- her first glimpse at the Cullens' friend Irina! She's from that other coven to the north, and if you don't remember (it took me a minute), she's the one who shacked up with Laurent. Thus, she's less than happy with the fact that Jacob and pals killed her sweetie, and is only now coming back to see the happily married couple and make amends with the Cullens.

But oops, this was not the best time for them to meet each other. First of all, she saw Bella being friendly and affectionate with Jacob, who might have killed her vampire boyfriend. Oops. Bella calls her husband and has him and Carlisle come join them, since Irina growled at her -- the universal signal of sparklepire displeasure.

Carlisle and Edward go to find Irina, who ran away, while Bella, Jacob and the other wolves take Renesmee back into the house for safe keeping. I smell a plot coming!

Monday, August 23, 2010

Chapter Twenty-six: Don't Tell Mom the Bella's Dead.

Okay, the title doesn't have much to do with the chapter as a whole, but the first thing that happens is Charlie and Bella agreeing not to tell Renee about Bella's craziness -- at least not much. Thus, the title. Deal with it.

Charlie spends the afternoon watching football with Emmett before going down to La Push for dinner with Billy and Sue Clearwater. That'll be fun! Emmett apparently spends the whole time making sexually suggestive jokes, showing all the maturity that your typical immortal vampire should have.

When Charlie leaves for dinner, he spills the beans -- he knew that Bella and the vampirettes almost skipped town on him, and that she can only stay if he can keep his mouth shut. As long as he knows a little, but not too much, she can stay. Of course, she might have to leave anyway...but we all know that won't happen.

Also, Renesmee is the prettiest baby ever. Because everything is perfect. Except for her name, and now we get to know her middle name too! It's -- wait for it -- Carlie, because it's Carlisle plus Charlie. Take that in for a moment:

Renesmee Carlie Cullen. It could be worse, I guess?

Anyway, Charlie leaves, and Bella congratulates herself on not eating her father. Edward proclaims her Queen of the Newborns, being the greatest and most perfect example of a newborn vampire to ever exist.

But not everyone thinks Bella is that perfect. Emmett is convinced that his hugeness will still make him stronger than Bella, even with her newborn steroids. Bets are taken, a suitable granite rock is found (Esme won't let them use her table), and the game is on. The main wager is this: if Bella wins, Emmett isn't allowed to make jokes about Bella's sex life. If Emmett wins...it gets a lot worse (his exact words, in fact). That's...an interesting bet, but sure, why not?

Of course, Bella wins. But it's not just that she wins, it's that she doesn't even have to try to win. She can basically take her time, decide when to crush Emmett, and then do it. Emmett demands a rematch tomorrow, and presumably every day after that until he can be the big vampire on campus again.

Bella celebrates by testing her strength by crushing rocks. She does so easily, and giggles. Everyone else laughs at her silliness. DO SOMETHING, CHAPTER, I'M BEGGING YOU!

Blah blah blah, everyone tells Bella how strong and beautiful she is. Bella thinks it's amazing, because she was so painfully average as a human. And now she's finally amazing. And shiny when she sparkles.

And then the chapter is over. Oh my god, really? NOTHING HAPPENED. Some vampires had an arm wrestling match, that's seriously it! Sigh.

Spoiler alert: things do happen, thankfully, before the end of the novel. Or at least, they try to happen. You know how it is with these books.

Wednesday, August 18, 2010

Chapter Twenty-five: Yes, this was a realistic course of action.

It's been a week since my last update. Sorry! I should be able to be more timely again now.

Anyway, Edward is able to get Bella's mind off of their endless vampire sex marathon simply by uttering their daughter's name. Which is Renesmee, in case you had forgotten. I think we can all imagine how jarring hearing that come out of anyone's mouth would be, so I can completely buy it as a legitimate tactic.

Bella goes to get dressed, and finds that Alice has left her with far, far too many clothes to choose from. Oh, what a hard life it is for vampire Bella! Edward helps smell her some good clothes (no, really, he does), and they head back to the main house to check on their mutant daughter.

She's still growing, of course, but it seems to be slowing down a little. Renesmee is becoming slightly more like a normal child, and less like a baby, which is still happening way too fast considering she's something like five days old at this point. She's happy to see mom, as is the rest of the family, since Renesmee's main way of passing the time seems to be mangling spoons. This kid is going to be totally well-adjusted.

Emmett and Rosalie make lots of jokes about all the vampire sex Edward and Bella must be having. Haha, it's funny because I'm supposed to be reading this when I'm like 14 and sexual innuendo is taboo! Wait, I'm 29? Damn it, now it's just unfunny and forced. They also talk about how the whole family should get started packing for New Hampshire; it's a convenient place to move, because Bella's already signed up for school there anyway, and she seems to be handling things rather well, so she probably won't eat her classmates. Well, maybe that one kid in her introductory writing class. You know the one.

So anyway, Jacob and the wolves are gone for the day, and nobody knows why. Alice is also confused, because she can't see what's going to happen all day -- as she puts it (and this is kind of clever), he's erased her entire schedule! Also, she's pissed that Bella went for the least outlandish outfit possible, instead of one of the other 3,000 outfits that were prepared for her. Oh, Alice...

But Edward finds Jacob's thoughts, and sees what Jacob has done. Jacob talked to Charlie, and now he thinks Charlie is going to follow him to Cullen Manor. Oops? So Jacob gets there with the rest of his mini-pack, and the vampires just look at him in silence. Jakie, you got some 'splainin' to do!

He confirms that he's told Charlie, but seems happy about it. You see, what he did was...

Okay, first, let me just say this: in a way, this might be the single most ridiculous thing that has happened in this book series about sparkling vampires gods and their Native American shapeshifting werewolf buddies. It's not that anything ridiculously supernatural happens; in fact, what Jacob did (for the most part) is just a pretty standard interaction between two characters. No, it's the way things work out that's entirely impossible to fathom. I mean, we know nothing can possibly go wrong for Bella, but even if that's the rule, you'd think Meyer would at least make the other characters ensure her eternal happiness in ways I could swallow.

Anyway, back to Jacob. He left, because he was tired of hearing about how Bella was going to be moving cross-country. He couldn't take it, so he came up with a brilliant plan. Everyone is pissed that he told Charlie, since he now will either die when the Volturi learn that he's in the know, or they'll have to make him a vampire too.

But Jacob is one step ahead of them. Here's what he did: he showed up at Charlie's house, and then without a single word, phased into his werewolf form right in front of Charlie.

That was pretty much the whole plan. When he phases back, he tells Charlie that there are things in this world that he doesn't understand and can't know about. Bella is better, but she had to change a bit in order to make it through her illness. He starts to explain to Charlie about werewolves, at least, and he doesn't even want to know. To boot, he doesn't even want to know about Bella!

That's right: after seeing his daughter's best friend turn into a wolf in front of him, he's not going to ask any questions, and actually wants to know as little as possible about what's going on with Bella. Wow, that's exactly the perfect result for Bella! And exactly the opposite of what you'd expect from a father who has been hounding the Cullens for information on his daughter for weeks, and is a police chief with an inclination for solving things. This is probably the least likely response Charlie could have had, but since it makes life perfecter for Bella, it's the one he has. Everyone wins!

Bella isn't immediately thrilled with Jacob's actions, but she does sort of appreciate it, especially when she hears how excited Charlie is about being a grandpa. Which is something else that he doesn't want to know any details about, of course.

There is one potential pitfall: Bella still hasn't tested herself much around pure humans, so she could end up eating Charlie accidentally. Of course, she has the best self-control of any vampire ever, so everyone likes her odds, but it could happen. You hear that, readers? Believe it, it could happen!

It won't happen.

The Cullens give Bella some quick tips on acting like a human. Now, I can understand that it's hard once you get used to being a sparklepire to do things like not holding a position for too long, or accidentally moving too fast, or standing up for hours because it just doesn't bother you at all. But Bella's only a few days removed from being a human, shouldn't she be able to fake it pretty well? It's not a big deal, but "don't stare at things for too long" is the kind of thing I'd think Bella could handle without being told.

Before they know it, Charlie's there, and after a quick talk to Renesmee to make sure she doesn't accidentally bite her grandfather, Bella is ready to attempt to not eat dad. Bella tries to keep all her concentration on this goal, but the prospect of more vampire sex with Edward distracts her momentarily (yes, this really happens) until Jasper reminds them that she really needs to stay focused.

Charlie arrives, and is kind of shocked to see what his daughter looks like now. Even though vampires can pass as human, it seems like they really can't pass as their human selves so well. It takes Charlie a minute to accept that it really is Bella.

Meanwhile, Bella quickly learns just how tempting human blood is, and only avoids not eating her dad because...well, it's her father, and she's in her house, not out in the woods hunting.

Charlie takes a look at his granddaughter, who is completely and entirely adopted, as far as he knows. That lasts for all of two minutes, when Charlie realizes that this adopted baby -- supposedly Edward's long lost niece -- bears a striking resemblance to Bella, too. For the first time, Charlie actually wants the truth about something! But Edward tells him it's more important for him to know the public story, and that ends that. Charlie decides he definitely doesn't need to know anything...just because he doesn't.

So, with all that taken care of, Emmett throws on some college football. Florida is playing against someone, and just scored, making it 7-0 Gators. Emmett makes a joke about how they're the only ones scoring around here, and with that, Charlie takes a seat on the couch to watch the game with his new family, completely satisfied with everything he's seen.

Yeah...things tend to work out like this for Bella. If you haven't gotten used to it yet, it's time to get started.

Wednesday, August 11, 2010

Chapter Twenty-four: A new house, a huge closet, and vampire sex. Happy birthday!

In the past 36 hours, I've had to get five teeth removed, and read this chapter of Breaking Dawn so I could get on with writing this blog. One was an intensely painful and uncomfortable experience that couldn't end fast enough, while the other took place at the dentist's office.

*rimshot*

I know, it's the oldest joke in the book. But here's something that's not a joke: both were very, very uncomfortable. I'd still rather read this chapter again than go through the dental work, but it's closer than you'd think. On the bright side, it's a short 15-page chapter, so let's dive in!

The Cullens demand that they celebrate Bella's birthday, and they play along. Edward is going to give Bella her "after" car, though he's going to wait for the morning so that they can show Jacob, who will actually appreciate the awesomeness of his gift.

Alice is up next, ready to show Bella and Edward the gift from the rest of the family -- Esme most of all. Several family members make innuendo about how the new couple will enjoy their new gift alone, which is why only Alice is going with them. Oh boy.

Anyway, Alice leads them a bit away from the house into the woods...where Esme has built Bella and Edward a swank little cottage for them to live in. Awwwww. Alice stocked the gigantic closet as her special little extra for Bella, and then leaves her and Edward alone to enjoy the house.

Bella starts freaking out. Why didn't everyone come with them? She really likes the house, they all could have seen how happy she was! You see, Bella doesn't take a hint well. The fact that this leaves only her and Edward alone in their own house in the middle of the woods hasn't dawned on her quite yet. Once Edward points it out though, it's all she can think of.

Edward carries his bride over the threshold while she thinks about how every little tiny thing in her life is made of perfect sparkles of perfection. They take a quick tour of their fairy tale cottage, including Alice's closet, which is bigger than the master bedroom.

Oh, the bedroom...

...and thus begins the vampire sex romp. Clothes and fabrics are destroyed, they never make it to the bed, and they can finally go all-out since Edward is much less likely to kill Bella now. Bella's biggest concern? Since they'll never get tired, why would they ever stop?

Of course, Bella will never believe she's good enough for Edward. Actually, her problem is now that she thinks that the new, undead Bella might be missing something of the warm, live Bella which Edward was such a big fan of. Of course, Edward declares that she's even more perfectly amazing than she was as a human, so that leads to another couple hours of stony sex.

Now, Bella's big worry is that she'll never stop wanting to fuck all day, every day. Edward says that they'll get better at balancing their lives as time goes on, but it could take a few years. apparently, Rosalie and Emmett took about a decade! But eventually, it becomes easy; when you don't need to sleep, you have plenty of time to do everything you want as part of a well-balanced life.

Edward points this out by noting that he's the family's best musician, and that besides Carlisle, he's read the most books and learned the most stuff and can speak the most languages and so forth. Emmett thinks it's because he reads minds, but the truth is that Edward just had way less to do with his free time than everyone else who were busy in their respective bedrooms every night.

Yes, I think Edward just made a joke about the advantages of being a century-old virgin vampire. And that's the end of that chapter.*

*Except for the last sentence of the chapter, which implies they're about to have a lot more of the sex.

Friday, August 6, 2010

Chapter Twenty-three: Bella does stuff.

If you remember, Bella was ready to kill Jacob for calling her daughter Nessie. We pick things up now a few minutes later. It seems that Jacob wasn't even going to defend himself, but that Seth jumped in the way to protect him. He didn't attack Bella or anything, he just blocked threw himself in Bella's path and was rewarded with a broken shoulder and collarbone.

Edward apologizes, Bella apologizes, everyone is sorry! At least nobody was killed, so whoever had the under in the "how many people will Bella kill in her first year" bet is looking very good. Besides, werewolf magic means Seth will be back to normal in about a half-hour. Remember, if Bella does something wrong, there won't be any real consequences. It's a nice life.

There could have been issues, though, if Bella had actually bitten one of them. It seems that vampire venom is poisonous to the werewolves. But not Renesmee's, of course. She bites Jacob all the time! One wonders if this will keep up when Renesmee and Jacob's relationship changes after she grows up.

While Bella calms down -- Jacob and Rosalie won't let her see her daughter until they're sure she's 100% composed and not in a biting mood -- Bella thinks about everything she was told while Seth was being fixed up. In other words, it's time for some clumsy exposition! The big news is that there's no more feud with Sam's pack. The main force behind the new, binding treaty? Jacob's creepy infant imprinting on Renesmee. See, werewolf law #1 (which was never mentioned before) is that you can't kill someone that another wolf has imprinted upon, so nobody's going to go after Renesmee anymore. Jacob, the rightful super-Alpha, was okay with Bella's transformation, so Sam -- who I guess is now the Beta Alpha -- can't get mad about it. Oh, and conveniently enough, Alphas from different packs can talk to each other, even though packs have their own wireless wolf networks. They may not all be best friends anymore, but everyone is getting along just fine.

Then there's the Charlie issue. Nobody's sure what to do. Do they tell him that Bella's dead, and have a whole funeral deal? Let Charlie see Bella and make his own assumptions, thus technically not breaking vampire law? Trust me, if you haven't read these books, you'll never guess how this plays out. Seriously, try. Take a minute and come up with how you think they'll manage to make things okay for Charlie and Bella, and then come back with your answer. Sorry, wrong! I have no idea what your answer was, but seriously, I'm sure it's wrong.

Anyway, Bella moves on to thinking about Jacob and Renesmee and how that's going to suck for Jacob if the vampires have to move away for a while as part of the "Bella is dead" illusion. Like Jacob wouldn't just tag along anyway.

Now, it's time for the thrilling "measuring the baby" scene, which we can only hope will be faithfully reenacted in the film version. They measure Renesmee four times a day because she grows so fast; these exercises bore both Renesmee and the reader in equal measure. The girl is already nearly toddler-sized, which makes Bella and Edward wonder what they're going to do with her if she keeps aging so fast. But Jacob is less concerned; though Carlisle wants more data, the possessive werewolf is sure the rate of growth is slowing a little. If it'll make things easier on Bella, you can be sure it'll happen.

Bella hangs out with her daughter for a bit. Renesmee uses her ability to show mom all the boring shit she did today, like watching mommy freak out and almost break that poor werewolf's neck, Grandpa Vampire measuring her again, Rosalie doing her hair. She also shows Bella a memory of drinking blood, which doesn't cause Bella to flip out, much to everyone's surprise. Jasper is most upset at all; he's wondering if maybe anyone could avoid going crazy as a newborn if they're as focused as Bella.

Allow me to help you with this one, Jazz. If you were the main character, you'd be doing great, trust me! Sadly, you're just a secondary character, so you have to set the baseline that Bella gets to surpass by a mile. Sorry about that, but it's just the way it works. If there weren't average sparklepires, how could Bella ever truly be amazing?

Carlisle suspects that self-control could even be Bella's gift. At first, Bella thinks its a really lame power...mostly, because it is. But on second thought, it does mean that she can be a good vampire right away, instead of going through her year of wanting to kill all humans. Of course, there's still a question as to whether or not it's her gift, or just a byproduct of her preparation for being a vampire. You, dear reader, can probably figure out which by taking a guess as to how awesome Bella's power should be to be consistent with the rest of Vampire Bella's awesomeness, and whether or not "self-control" reaches that lofty height.

After an hour or so of storytelling time by Renesmee, she nods off. Bella picks up the baby's hand and puts it back on her own head on a hunch...and it works. She can now see all of Renesmee's dreams, most of which involve Bella or Jacob, with Edward and Rosalie fighting for third. At this rate, Renesmee's going to think Jacob is daddy, which could lead to some awkward times around the Cullen home.

Alice runs into the room with a brass key tied up in a big pink bow. It seems that the vampires are going to celebrate Bella's 19th birthday, even though she's not aging and is very particular about the fact that she's 18 forever. Bella protests, but Alice will have none of it. I wonder what wish that key is going to grant for Bella? We'll find out...but not until the next chapter.

Sunday, August 1, 2010

Chapter Twenty-two: Bella, Jacob, and the baby they loved.

Bella's little girl is uniquely special, probably one-of-a-kind in a very perfect sort of way. She has vampire hard skin, but has blood and a pumping heart. She can eat food, but prefers the sweet taste of human blood that goes down smooth and isn't filling. Renesmee is also very intelligent, and though she doesn't speak yet, it's probably only a matter of time. She has her own way of communicating; it seems she has the opposite gift of Edward, being able to give her thoughts to others. She basically, she's the least baby-like baby ever, and is way easier to deal with than, you know, an actual baby.

Bella's still wondering why Jacob's sticking around. Isn't he feeling tortured over how badly Bella broke his heart? Edward doesn't seem to feel so bad about Jacob anymore, but refuses to tell Bella why. The communication in this relationship is about as good as on Lost, where the communication between...well, pick any two characters, and about as much relevant information was exchanged there as between Mr. and Mrs. Cullen.

But those questions can be answered later. For now, Bella just wants to get home to see Renesmee. She races Edward home, but the Tour de Forks is cut short when three werewolves, one of whom is in a very human Jacob form, block their way. It seems that Jacob wants to test Bella before she gets to see Renesmee. Now, why would Jacob be so protective? Hmm...

Jacob is surprised how Bella-like Bella still is, so it seems all anxieties about sparkle-Bella have passed. He offers himself up as a test; if Bella can breathe him in and not try to go for the kill, then she can see her daughter. The result: now that Bella's a vampire, Jacob smells pretty bad, and she doesn't want to eat him. Well, not much; that pumping heart is tempting, but overall, he's more like a fast-food mountain lion than a filet human.

Having passed, everyone gives Bella permission to see her daughter. She's only two days old, but she's already looks all of several weeks; apparently, Bella won't have to change diapers for very long, which is perfect, since that would get in the way of all her lovely wish fulfillment. Some of the vampires are still nervous; when Bella so much as takes a step towards Renesmee, the entire room panics. I mean, why would a mother want to see her baby unless she was ready to take a bite?

Edward tries to calm the room by pointing out that Bella caught the scent of some hikers while they were out hunting. This makes the entire clan flip out, because apparently, being a vampire means you can't wait to hear the end of a sentence to get the entire story. Everyone is shocked -- shocked, I say! -- to find out that Bella did not, in fact, eat the hikers. Eventually, they will understand that she's the greatest sparklepire of all time, but for now, each new ability of hers is a little jolting.

Finally, after some more angst from the family, Bella is allowed to hold Renesmee. She gets her first feel for her child's creepy ability by seeing Renesmee's memory of her, back when she was giving birth and covered in blood. Pleasant!

After a little mommy-baby time, Jacob starts getting antsy. He doesn't want Bella to push her luck, which finally gets Bella to ask some questions. What the hell is up with Jacob? Why does he care so much? Why does everyone else act like he's got some horrible secret to hide from her? And why does he stare at Renesmee like she's the most important thing in her life?

Wait a minute...

Yeah, Bella pretty much flips out now. Jacob tries to explain that it's not really something he can control, but the thought of Jacob being in love with her two-day old baby is just a little too much trouble. He tries to point out that it's not like he wants to sleep with her (yet), so there's nothing disgusting about it at all (not true, Jacob, not true). And he even explains that the pull he and Bella felt for each other while she was pregnant was caused entirely by the connection between Renesmee and him.

All of that's not enough to make Bella happy about things, but it's at least seemed to stop her from wanting to kill Jacob. She still encourages him to run before she snaps, but Jacob, as always, decides that he needs to throw in one thing too many. In this case, he uses the nickname he's given her baby: Nessie. Like the Loch Ness Monster.

And then Bella tries to kill him. Come on, Bella, Nessie is like 10 times better than Renesmee any day. You should be thanking Jacob for showing such initiative! On the other hand, the ensuing violence might be exciting.

Spoiler: it's not.