Obscene parody of the precious gift of God

So yeah, I liked this book that is “spiritually fatal” and an “obscene parody of the precious gift of God.” Hide the children!

But see that? I said “like.”  Yesterday I said that I was going to write this week about banned books that I love, but honestly, I don’t love Twilight. I love to mock it, though. Does that count?

I listened to the first three books in the series on audio and found them entertaining and diverting enough to keep up with the series. But between books, I often didn’t remember what had happened in previous books, and when friends were waiting desperately for book four, I couldn’t remember if I’d read book three. I finally figured it out by finding it in my audible library, so yeah, I’d read it. I think the whole Twilight cult pretty much turned me off, though I am also entertained by it and understanding of it, since I am a member of the cult of Potter and a lot of people don’t understand that either.

But to get back to the subject at hand. Banning and challenging. On many levels, Twilight was made for conservative parents. Here is a supercharged, romantic story about a 17-year-old girl and her 17-year-old [vampire] boyfriend in which they can’t have sex. He makes this clear. He holds firm. No matter what, they can’t. She might not survive the experience, and no, she can’t convince him to turn her into a vampire no matter how hard she tries because he is convinced it will doom her soul. (Erm, spoilers, I guess, though does anybody really not know this? And yeah, there is more I could say about this but won’t because of MAJOR spoilers, but if you want to see that, nobody can beat what Cleolinda wrote about the fourth book., please stay on the line. And you wonder why I love mockage.) Twilight is built on moral issues and the hero always takes the moral stand. I have to believe this is part of why it was so popular.

But, that pesky vampire thing. Because Twilight is about vampires, it is considered satanic in certain circles. Supernatural subject matter will get you in trouble faster than anything, it seems. There has also been some complaint about religion because a lot of people are convinced that somehow Stephenie Meyer has hocus-pocused some sort of stealth Mormon message in the books.  So I guess this one gets it from all sides.  And honestly, if you really are worried about the vampire/supernatural thing, you have my sympathies because how do you escape that? (It has always seemed to me that people who can’t accept “make-believe” because they think the devil is in it are kind of admitting that they don’t know what “make-believe” means, or else it wouldn’t scare them, right? Okay, maybe that’s just me.)

Look, you can’t ban this book. You simply can’t. Because if you do, you rob me of one of the great pleasures of life, mocking Twilight. With love, mind you. Because honestly, I enjoyed them even if I didn’t love them, and some of my best friends and even relatives LOVE these books and I respect those women and don’t think less of them (except, really, Team Jacob?) but yeah, Twilight-mockage. Love it.

So you can’t ban it. You just do what parents are supposed to do, figure out which part of the message you want to make sure your kid gets, and discuss it with them.  And if the message is, guys in real life who act like this are stalkers, not romantic?  Let Buffy handle the message for you.