I’ve had almost a lifelong fascination with the historical Vlad Dracula, and that naturally extended into an interest in the world of vampires. But the appeal was never in the darker, more monstrous aspects of their existence, but their immortality – just think how many lifetimes you could have, how much you would get to see and to if you had an eternity. So my tastes went more towards Anne Rice (oh, how I loved Lestat) than Stephen King.

But my interest waned, as these things sometimes do. And now, the only remnants of my vampiric obsession are what remains of my once extensive vampire library, my bat tattoo, and my cat Mina (Khayman, my first vampire-namesake cat, died a year ago). But I admit, a part of me is still fascinated, and always will be. From time to time I’ll still read a vampire tale, like The Historian or Anno Dracula.

When I first saw Twilight in the bookstores a couple years ago, I was intrigued by its cover and title, but when I read the synopsis, I dismissed it as a piece of YA vampire fluff. But in the last few months, so many bloggers have sung the praises of this novel, that I figured I would see what all the fuss was about. I’ll warn you right now. I’m about to rave (and rant a bit) about Twilight and its sequel, New Moon, so if you haven’t read these books but plan to – well, consider yourself warned:

*** MINOR SPOILER ALERT***
Reader Discretion Advised

I picked up my copy of Twilight from the library last week and set it aside, then ended up reading it in one day. The story of Bella and Edward had me enthralled from the moment they meet until the last page. Obviously, it’s a novel targeted towards a younger audience, and there’s nothing too deep going on here, but still – I loved it. I instantly empathized with Bella, particularly with her clumsiness. As someone who is quite accident prone (I blame it on my Sagittarian sign – we’re known for our two left feet), I laughed and shook my head many times at things I could see happening (or have happened) to me. The tension between Edward and Bella is electric, and sustains the 500+ pages of this book. True vampire aficionados may be disappointed by the lack of focus on the vampires themselves, but really, Twilight is all about the intense love between these two.

So, after racing through that book and knowing there was a sequel out, I couldn’t wait until a library copy became available and went out the next day and bought New Moon – and read that in a day as well. Since Edward is not present for most of the novel, I can’t say I enjoyed it as much as Twilight, but it still held me in its thrall and I couldn’t stop until the last page – wondering all the time when the heck Edward was going to come back! I admit to getting fed up at times with Bella’s neediness towards Edward and Jacob. If I was Edward, particularly in some of the last scenes in New Moon, I’d be a bit exasperated with her lack of faith in him or their love – the girl seriously seems to have some self-esteem issues. But then I guess when you’re comparing yourself to a beautiful immortal, you’ll always come up short.

So okay, these books are YA vampire fluff, but they’re well written, extremely entertaining and have me hooked.

Needless to say, I can hardly wait until Eclipse is published! And since film rights have been optioned, there’s a very real possiblity all us Twilight fans will get to see Edward on screen – yowza! It’s OK for me to think a 110-year old teenager is hot, right?

Bookie has some great posts about these books, and continues to post info about the series, helpfully tagged (it’s thanks to her that I finally caved and read these books). And a discussion about Twilight will be taking place later this month over at Overdue Books if anyone would like to join.