Bitten

So I read this in two nights. Ahem.

Aren't I a little old to be devouring vampire love stories?

(But it was actually pretty good. I could give an actual critical review, with quotes and everything, but I'm withholding judgement until I read the second one. Or third. -- Some things were very good. Some things not so much.)

Young adult novels have always been some of my favorites. I think we are forever young adults. That is the age who makes up who we are. I used to disappear into a book regularly during the "young adult" reading stage. I would go to the library, check out the maximum five books, read them in a week, and go again after school as soon as I could. I learned how to get things through Interlibrary Loan. I read everything, though...not just young adult novels. I even read essays about literature, and books of short stories. I learned which kind of books I liked and learned how to explain why I didn't like others. I escaped my little town, the friends that didn't understand what I liked. I learned that not everyone was like me. Books were...my outlet.

And when I wasn't reading, I was writing. This is why I majored in English in college, because I couldn't imagine doing anything besides going to class with a book, eating with a book, staying up late with a book, drying my hair with a book, and, well, you get the picture.

But writing is so hard, and reading once you've taken a few writing classes...whew boy. It's hard, sometimes, for me to get past the critical reading in my head. But I persevered through the first obvious character introductions, ignored a few cliches, and, suddenly, was drawn in. The way I feel when I read these or these or these. What a thing, to be able to create another world! An interesting, vibrant, believable world. And then, to be able to draw people into it, to help people who are awkward or strange or different (most of us, the interesting ones, are these things anyway) feel a part of this creation...wow. And Stephenie Meyer definitely belongs to this set of rare writers. I will read more than just Twilight, as soon as I can figure out where the library is here. And what I need to get a card.