You there. Don’t move. I mean it. You will suffer through this one, too. And the one after this.

Why? Because I’m a bitch, and I want you to suffer.

ALL OUR ATTEMPTS AT SUBTERFUGE HAD BEEN IN VAIN.

With ice in my heart, I watched him prepare to defend me. His intense concentration betrayed no hint of doubt, though he was outnumbered. I knew that we could expect no help – at this moment, his family was fighting for their lives just as surely as he was for ours.

Would I ever learn the outcome of that other fight? Find out who the winners and the losers
were? Would I live long enough for that?

The odds of that didn’t look so great.

Black eyes, wild with their fierce craving for my death, watched for the moment when my protector’s attention would be diverted. The moment when I would surely die.

Somewhere, far, far away in the cold forest, a wolf howled.

You know the drill. Now, hang on tight. This time, there is no beach; just glass, medical waste, sharps, and those little curly bits of metal that you get when you use a drill press on metal.

In case you deliberately forgot: Bella’s grounded, because she disappeared for three days, dove off a cliff and almost died, and was learning how to ride a motorcycle. The Cullens have returned to Forks. Jacob won’t talk to Bella because, I don’t know, Bella wants have her Gay Best Friend and her Member of the Phelps Family Best Friend at the same time?

Edward refuses to turn Bella unless she agrees to marry him; Bella’s afraid of marriage because of her parents’ marriage. And Victoria’s not dead, which means that this book might have something besides teen angst as its antagonist….

Already, there are hints. Lots of random, unsolvable murders in Seattle.

I almost forgot – the ‘book we’re forced to accept references to’ theme reappears; this time, it’s Wuthering Heights.

Ih. I can’t believe I’m still doing this.

Charlie offers to parole Bella, or give her probationary freedom, or something, with one condition: that she start spending time with other friends. Like, say, Jacob. Also, there’s a college acceptance letter from Alaska.

Oh, hell. Edward’s here. Time for paragraphs of overwrought bullshit about how desperately, inhumanly amazing he is. Some fan somewhere has probably compiled a list of all the words used to describe Edward. Possibly a numbered, sorted list, according to how many times each word was used.

I’m not sure if I want to see that list.

Somewhere in that truckload of descriptors, Edward’s stashed some stamps. And some more college applications. Because he wants Bella to go to college; his family is willing to buy her way in with large donations. And pay her tuition. And Edward’s willing to forge her applications.

Edward wants to to experience college as a human. Not that it matters; she won’t remember much of her human life after she’s turned, according to everything the various vampires in the story have ever said.

If only we were so lucky. No, we have to sit here with very clear memories of their forced critique of Wuthering Heights. Edward hoping that Bella would never fall in love with someone so malignant.

Yeah. Thanks for that, Mary Sue. We know you see nothing wrong with your perfectly perfect fantasy romance. Honestly, though? It feels as if you’ve taken the first couple of seasons of Buffy and stripped her relationship with Angel of all its redeeming qualities.

Back to the perfect, controlling male model and his ‘why would you ever want me, I’m nothing’ victim, though. Bella wants to spend time with Jacob on the reservation; Edward says it isn’t safe; I start abusing semicolons.

In case you didn’t catch it the first time around, Bella’s now in her senior year. Because she’s so amazingly brilliant, and able to keep up on schoolwork, even through the deepest, gothiest depression, and the ten thousand crippling injuries she gets every day just brushing her goddamn teeth.

Bella makes plans with one of the normal kids at school. Said normal kid is apparently related to the entire population of…some reasonably populated area between the body counts of China and Svalbard. Alice wants to make plans, too. Alice wants to go shopping. Alice apparently…unlives? ..for shopping. And possibly dressing up Bella as if she were her very own walking, talking doll.

Alice is disappointed to find out that she can’t take Bella shopping in a different country.

School ends. More mundane, day-to-day bullshit. Edward finds the car stereo, and asks why Bella felt the need to torture it before killing it, and says he’ll have to replace it.

Vampires are more emotionally fragile than your average parrot.

Speaking of fragile, Esme [the ‘mother’ in the vampire family] and Carlisle are about to get their feelings hurt, too. The tickets – or, actually, a voucher for tickets [oops] – will expire soon. Edward wants to go the weekend of the prom; he brings it up to Charlie.

Charlie, prone to bouts of random, violent anger as he is, responds by shouting and turning purple. Bella isn’t going anywhere with Edward.

Bella threatens to move out, and asks if he’d be mad if she went to visit her mother with Jacob. Charlie says ‘yes’, meaning ‘no.’

After Edward ‘leaves’ for the night, we get to experience that awesome, awkward rite of parental passage: the talk. Bella and Charlie argue over who’s more embarrassed about this, and the reader loses out when we find out how old fashioned Edward is, and that Bella doesn’t plan on losing her virginity any time soon.

Who would want to go to bed after that little chat? We certainly don’t get to. Bella decides that she wants to get the hell out of there, and talk to Jacob. Her dad approves.

But her truck won’t start. Surprise. Edward was waiting for her, and had taken out some unnamed piece of her truck’s engine

Does this sound healthy to you? No? Good.

He explains that her future had disappeared [according to Alice, who’s been keeping an eye on her that way], and that, if she doesn’t want him to visit tonight, she should shut her window.

She lets him in anyway.

The trip to Florida gets almost entirely skipped in the book, and mostly just referred to through jokes about how Bella would rather drink water than breathe it. Forks is so dry, y’know, and she’s glad to come home, where she finds out that Jacob’s been calling incessantly, and really wants to talk to her.

It takes Bella several pages to figure out why Jacob needed to hear her voice and find out if she was attending school the next day: he’d been assuming that her little three day vacation was her official turning.

The next morning, Jacob shows up at the school. Because, apparently, Bella was wrong about why he called. Jacob just wanted a safe place – with witnesses – to talk to Edward. About some event that happened over the weekend involving Emmett and one of the other werewolves. Bella figures out that the whole Florida trip was all because Edward wanted her out of the area, because Alice saw that Victoria would be in the area.

Meanwhile, Jacob’s tormenting Edward with memories of Bella.

The principal arrives, cutting off an annoying conversation about whether or not Bella wants to visit Jacob on the reservation.

In class, Bella and Edward have a very strange note-passing fit that involves erasing everything previously written, and Edward’s perfect personal calligraphy. He explains the situation, and then goes on to explain how he’d have saved her life if something had happened on the plane. Pilots passed out, drunk? He’ll fly it, of course. Engines gone? He’d grab her, kick out the side of the plane, and jump as soon as the ground was close enough.

That shit’s almost as tiresome as the betting Bella overhears over who would win in a fight: Jacob or Edward?

It’s time for another ‘hammered in your face’ metaphor! Bella’s got a job at one of the stores in town, and doesn’t want to be early, so she plays with some fridge magnets. The last two magnets wouldn’t cooperate with her ‘lining them up’ plan – magnets, they’re so fickle – and she eventually stands there trying to force them to stick together off the fridge.

Sorta like how she can’t force her two best friends together, see? Isn’t that oh so clever.

Work is slow, so she’s told to leave. After seeing a conveniently placed ‘Save the Olympic Wolf’ flyer, she decides to race off to La Push before anyone sees her deciding to do it.

The story about the ‘boundary crossing incident’ – there’s this treaty between the vampires and the wolves, if I haven’t mentioned that before – gets told again, probably so that we get to hear all about how Jasper’s ‘abilities’ work on the wolves [Jasper can control people’s emotions, but not in any interesting way; he doesn’t, for example, make it rain kittens].

Jacob tries to get metaphorical after an eagle catches a fish, calling it the natural order, and talking about how you never see fish trying to kiss eagles. Then, it’s backstory time again.

We get to hear all about the pack. How Sam, the alpha, was the first to change, and had no idea what was going on because his father and grandfather were both gone. How he disappeared for two weeks. And about his highschool sweetheart, Leah, who got dumped when Sam imprinted on her cousin, Emily.

Because, you see, werewolves have soul mates, and they imprint the instant they see them. A bond that lasts, even if one of them loses control and mauls the other.

Not that the female ‘mates’ are wolves. At this point in the story, it seems that only males can become wolves. They’re allowed to know everything, though.

Imprinting is supposed to be rare, and an exception. Unlikely to happen.

Speaking of unlikely: the wolf-boys are no longer getting any older. They can age, if they stop shifting into wolf form for a long time. Hearing this, Bella pitches a fit, complete with foot stomping and petulant squealing about how she’s the only one who has to get older.

Yeah. I know. We feel it to. We’re all getting a hell of a lot older, and we’re never, ever going to get this time back.

You guys should feel glad. Sure, I’m just about to hit my 18th page here, but I’ve saved you all a hell of a lot of time. Where do I go to get compensated for this, exactly?

Jacob and Bella argue about Jacob’s inability to refer to the Cullens as anything beyond their version of ‘nigger’ [leech, blood sucker, whatever]. ‘I’m a werewolf! And he’s a vampire!’ The brilliant retort? ‘And I’m a Virgo!’

I agree. Vampires and werewolves are equally as silly as astrology.

Bella has to run off to Angela’s house now – that friend from school with more relatives than there are envelopes in the entire state of Washington. The shiny silver Volvo is waiting for her at the border; it follows her there.

Since I’ve never mentioned that before, the Volvo is one of the Cullen’s cars.

She gets to Angela’s; Angela’s boyfriend leaves. Angela thanks Bella for saving her from a plotless film. There must be a word for this….

Nevermind. We’re late for a trip into girlychat hell. Angela explains to dense little Bella that Jacob is in love with her, and Edward’s probably jealous.

Bella fails to accidentally cut her head off with an envelope, or jam a pen into her brain. She arrives home safely, and finds Edward waiting for her in her room.

They fight. Bella refers to herself as Switzerland, refusing to get involved in territorial disputes between mythical creatures [and ruining the term for me; I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to call myself ‘chat Switzerland’ ever again]. Edward tells her she smells like a dog, and the argument is over.

Except, the next day, Alice informs Bella that she’s kidnapping her and holding her hostage at the house. Edward’s paid her off with a shiny new yellow Porsche. Exactly like the one she stole in the last book. All Alice has to do is keep Bella away from the werewolves while Edward’s hunting for the weekend.

Or, rather, for every time he’s gone hunting. Because this is such a healthy relationship.

Bella finally starts to notice that it’s a bit controlling and psychotic. Except…it doesn’t take. Obviously.

She calls Jacob to cancel her plans to see him over the weekend, informing him that she’s being held prisoner and tortured – Alice painted her toenails.

There’s nobody around to rescue us, though.

Alice introduces Bella to the new bed Edward bought for her. Black, wrought iron, sculpted metal roses. And, I don’t know what this says about me, but I suddenly realised that I might object less to this entire series if the pathetic wordsex relationship was happening between Alice and Bella….

But, no. That would be gay, and therefore wrong in a world where old-fashioned vegetarian vampires refuse to sleep with or turn girls before they’ve been married….

Rosalie drops by for a chat after Bella goes to bed…on the sofa that’s also in the room. She wants to explain even more about why she voted ‘no’ in the last book. We get to hear all about how she was turned.

Eighteen. Daughter of rich parents in the Great Depression. Beautiful, and pleased with the attention she got. And probably being used by her parents to gain higher social status. They set her up with the son of the owner of pretty much everything in town. She’d envied a friend who married at seventeen and had a kid, then began to pity her because her ‘whirlwind courtship’ would soon turn into a family of her own.

She’d been visiting that same friend, and was walking home, when she ran into her future husband and his friends. Apparently, they raped her and left her to die in the street. Carlisle found her – she knew him at the time, and didn’t like him much because his family was more beautiful than she was. He turned her.

She tells Bella about the painful process, and about the conversations she overheard during it. And about how she felt so much better when she saw her reflexion, and realised she was more beautiful than ever. And then how she began to understand that her beauty was to blame for her death. If she’d been ugly, like her friend, she’d have been allowed to marry someone she loved. And have babies. Because all she ever wanted was babies.

Then, she brags about her record: she’s only ever murdered five people. Never tasted human blood, though. She just wanted revenge.

A little more forced character development. Rosalie was always so annoyed with Bella because Edward wanted Bella. Not that Rosalie wanted Edward. She’s just vain, you see, and it bothered her that Edward thought Bella was more attractive. And she’s just so upset that Bella would throw away her chance at life and babies. Because, babies!

Oh, and the reason she has Emmett? A bear was mauling him, and he reminded her of her friend’s little baby.

That’s…just icky.

The next day, Jacob shows up at school to counter-abduct Bella. They hang out, and discuss the latest news about the pack. Another member has imprinted…on a two year old.

Jacob doesn’t think he’ll ever imprint. Or, possibly, he thinks he has, but it doesn’t matter, because his already belongs to someone else.

They discuss happier times, and less than happy times. They discuss the treaty, and how it’ll be violated if any of the Cullens bite her, or if, say, one of the tribe tells about what they are; something Jacob did back in the first book.

Bella asks if Jacob will ever forgive her for being turned; Jacob complains that his friend will be gone. Then, he finds out that the time frame isn’t ‘years’, but ‘weeks’.

Jacob says he’d prefer it if Bella were dead. Bella runs off – or, rather, rides off on her motorcycle, back to the Cullen house.

Somehow, she manages to avoid death, even though it’s raining, and she has no protective gear.

Alice is sad, of course. She thinks Edward will take her shiny new car back because she failed. Bella takes a shower and go to bed. Or sofa. Or something.

She wakes up to Edward in bed with her, and we’re subjected to a tame make-out session. They talk; Edward informs her that he’s going to trust her judgement regarding La Push and Jacob. Isn’t that lovely? Just in time, too, because Bella doesn’t think she’ll be going back.

She returns home the next day to find that Jacob’s called, and that things are missing from her room. Did her dad do the laundry? No, of course not. Perhaps it was Alice, tidying up when she was there getting things for the hostage party? No.

Edward arrives, and smells something off. Not werewolves, though. A strange vampire.

Edward calls to have Jasper and Emmett guard the house – fun fact: vampires can talk so quickly that humans can’t hear/understand them. And it works over phones.

They run off to chat with Alice, who didn’t see anything. Nobody knows what’s going on. Bella demands to be turned right then.

No. Of course they can’t. It’d hurt Charlie. They’ll just need to be more careful. Set guards.

Charlie, at this point, is thrilled at the tension he’s seeing between Edward and Bella. And Bella’s unthrilled that Jacob’s calling again. She thinks she’s going to die soon, and really doesn’t want to leave things with Jacob as they are.

She calls Jacob. She’s sorry; Jacob’s sorry; Edward wants to talk to Jacob.

He explains that someone was in Bella’s room, and asks if the pack has come across any strange scents. They discuss a renegotiation of the treaty, and Edward leaves so Jacob can come over and have a sniff.

Now for an exciting scene of Bella and Jacob washing dishes! And Jacob cutting himself accidentally so we can have yet another demonstration of how quickly werewolves heal. I suppose that goes nicely with the explanation of why he’s constantly running around barefoot, in…possibly ratty sweatpants. I honestly don’t know. Because, in a fit of realism, the author decided that their clothes don’t poof in and out of existence, making for entertainingly bad CG wolves whose pants explode off of them in the previews for the movies.

Yay.

Jacob leaves; Edward returns with the mail. Dartmouth accepted her based on the application Edward forged for Bella.

The washing machine conveniently makes some noise, distracting them from the argument over Bella postponing her turning, and reminding Bella to ask about finding out from Alice where her things were. Apparently, this never got brought up before – things with her scent on them were missing.

Seattle comes up again – someone [some vampire] up there might just be creating an army of brand new baby vampires. Which might bring the Volturi down on the entire area.

Then, they talk about whether or not Bella wants to go to some gathering on the reservation. And whether or not Bella would agree to to let Edward take her to the boundary line, and give her a cellphone so he could pick her up. She agrees, and decides that now would be a good time to take the motorcycle back to Jacob.

Edward, apparently, went shopping. He bought some shiny, fast superbike. And a helmet and jacket for Bella.

They decide not to take the bikes after all, and head to the hand off point. Because, as it says in the book, it’s just like two parents who don’t get along, handing off their child for visitation.

Also, I suppose we’re meant to believe that he fit the motorcycle in the trunk of the Volvo.

It’s story time again. The pack and the elders, and possibly some other members of their family, are having a little…legend-telling thing. Any excuse to fill a few pages, I guess.

It starts with spirit warriors: people who would leave their bodies, go into the ‘spirit realm’, and control the wind and various animals to help them win battles against enemies who decided the lands were cursed [which, naturally, prevents others from attempting much of anything].

One of the spirit warriors decides to steal the tribal chief’s body, take charge, and pass all sorts of strange rules. Like: no more spirit realm. He also took two other wives.

The chief, trapped and angry, calls on a large wolf to kill his own body. The wolf kills one of the people protecting the imposter; the chief calls off the attack and orders the wolf away.

It didn’t leave, though. After a while, the chief envied the wolf its body, and asked it to make room for him, and share. As the wolf, he returned to his tribe, and tried to communicate with them by yelping the songs of the tribe.

Yes. Seriously. Ever played Twilight Princess? The special grass that lets you call the flying thing as a wolf, and all that? Please, share in my annoyance….

The older spirit warriors knew that the wolf was under the control of the spirit. The false chief was hiding, so one of them decided to break the rules and enter the spirit realm.

The false chief, coming out to see if the wolf has been ‘defeated’ yet, sees this, and tries to kill the now empty body of the person breaking his rule. The guy jumps back into his body, but is killed before he can say anything.

The actual chief is pissed. Bullshit explanation alert: his anger was human, and the wolf couldn’t handle it; the wolf turned into the ‘flesh interpretation of the chief’s spirit.

Of course, he went on to father many sons, all of whom could change into wolves. And all the wolves were different, reflecting the spirit of the man. He lived a very long time, and eventually found ‘his true spirit wife’, gave up the wolf gig, and planned to die with her.

Then there’s another story, about the first time the pack met vampires. They killed one, and the vampire’s mate came to get revenge. She slaughtered most of the village, including one of the old chief’s sons, upsetting him enough to force him to change into a wolf again and attempt to fight. His wife saved him by distracting the vampire – she stabbed herself.

There’s some explanation about how the packs remained small after that – two or three wolves at a time, and a story about the treaty with the Cullens.

Jacob returns Bella to Edward’s custody, with a promise that he’ll be standing guard in the woods outside her house that night.

Yay. That’s over. But the book isn’t. Because, now, we have to have a graduation party! And Alice has to tell Bella about it, because, if she doesn’t, she’s seen that Bella will have another tantrum. Also, she’s foreseen what Bella will get her for graduation.

Shockingly annoying talent she has there.

Anything to pad out the book some more. Like, say, Bella flipping out over the date instead. Because she’s going to be turned soon, and has to leave everything behind. Also, she wants to know what she’s getting Alice.

Concert tickets, but, whatever. She also wants to know why Edward doesn’t want her to be a vampire.

Because he feels like he’s being selfish, wanting her to stay with him literally 4eva. And not having to worry about breaking her. And a bunch of other annoying, mushy crap.

Continuing with the random Q&A, Edward wants to know why Bella won’t marry him. The answer? She doesn’t want to be the girl that gets married fresh out of highschool because she’s pregnant.

Seattle again. Because we’ve spent enough time discussing other insipid crap. 39 people are dead, and the news is debating over whether it could be a serial killer or gang activity. Allegedly, the bodies are so badly burned that dental records need to be used to identify them. There are also disappearances.

Off to Wayne Manor the Cullen’s house! For…more talking. More stories.

It’s time for Jasper to tell his story. And show off his scars.

He explains about how vampire covens in the south are constantly warring for control over the most populated areas. They would create armies of newborn vampires – because new vampires are stronger than old ones for the first year – and try to wipe each other out.

Jasper, as a human, joined the Confederate Army at seventeen, and quickly rose to the rank of Major because of his ability. He was turned, and, because of his ability to manipulate emotions, was useful enough to be allowed to survive. He eventually escaped to the north, and, because he also feels the emotions of others – and, I guess, was no longer around people who were constantly filled with anger and hatred – began to feel guilty about feeding off people. He met Alice, who was [of course] waiting for him. And they went off to find the Cullens.

The point of all those pages of backstory, of course, was the army-forming. Some vampire is forming an army, probably to come after the Cullens. It’s time to call for help – the coven in Alaska, who are also ‘vegetarians’.

Except, no. Because one of them was ‘involved’ with Laurent. She’ll only agree if she can destroy the wolves that killed him.

Oh, and the graduation party isn’t off. And Bella needs to study for finals. And, it’s time for another custody exchange.

And time for Jacob to tell Bella that he’s in love with her; he wants Bella to pick him. He kisses her; she punches him.

She breaks her hand.

Jacob takes her home. Bella calls Edward. Threats ensue. Charlie doesn’t want any fighting, and threatens to put his badge on.

Bella suggests that her father arrest her. Fortunately, Jacob doesn’t want to press charges; Bella in Jail won’t end the books the way Bella Dead would….

Edward informs Jacob that if he ever returns Bella in less than perfect condition, he’ll be less one limb, and that, if he ever tries to kiss her again, he’ll break Jacob’s jaw.

At this point, I’m just about desperate enough that any violence will do.

Stunning retort: ‘What if she wants it?’

Then Edward won’t object. But he intends to fight for her, unfairly if necessary.

Off to the Cullen’s for free medical care. Emmett’s pleased, of course, because, hey, violence. Also, he’s got a bet with Jasper about how many people Bella will kill in her first year.

Suddenly, we’re back at Bella’s house, looking for clothes, and coming to another obvious plot point. Alice drops off some clothes for Bella to wear to the graduation party, and Bella suddenly figures out that it was the vampires in Seattle who stole her stuff, partly to test and see if they could find a hole in Alice’s ability to see the future, and partly to find a way to lead others to Bella.

But it’s graduation time. Maybe we’ll get lucky, and some sort of tragic accident will happen involving those hats, or a stage light….

No. Graduation ceremony over, she tells Edward what she figured out. Edward bails for a bit. Charlie takes Bella out for dinner, where she once again fails to die from a tragic spoon accident.

Charlie frets about how he’s let his daughter down by not teaching her how to throw a punch. See, even though he cheered Jacob on [after the fact], he’s feeling guilty. Bella should know how to defend herself if someone were to, say, kiss her without her permission.

He recommends keeping her thumb inside her fist. I think it’s a great idea, teaching her how to defend herself. Three hundred pages of Bella inadvertently punching herself in the face would be spectacularly awesome right now.

And, since there’s a party now, perhaps the thoughts of the inadvertent self-guttings she’d inflict on herself if anyone were to try to teach her how to handle a sharper weapon will get us through….

Jacob shows up at the party with two of his friends: Quil and Embry. He’s got a graduation present for Bella: a bracelet with a little hand-carved wolf charm.

A decision is finally made: the vampires are coming to get Bella. There’s no time to call in help – except, they no longer need to. Because there’s a whole back of wolves looking for a fight, and Jacob’s volunteering them.

They make plans to meet up at three in the morning for a little training out in a clearing in the woods.

There are ten wolves now. They have a chat with Carlisle – through Edward, because they can’t be bothered to become human again.

Now, we’re subjected to fanciful descriptions of the training meeting. Jasper having Emmett demonstrate a newborn’s standard attack; Jasper trying to fight Alice, and losing out to her ability to see the future; Jasper and Edward fighting to a draw.

At the end, the pack leader, Sam, decides that it would be wise to become familiar with the Cullens’ scents, so they don’t get confused during the fight. This downtime allows Jacob – described as a reddish-brown wolf that just so happens to be shaggier than the others – to approach Bella and completely neglect to kill her by licking her face.

Then, Jacob slips off to become human to discuss where they’ll be stashing Charlie and Bella during the fight. Charlie can be stashed at the reservation easily enough, but they’re likely to find Bella there. And, since they’ve got this unfortunate desire to keep her alive, that’s not a good plan.

So they decide to try hiding her scent by having Jacob carry her off somewhere. It works, and they come up with a plan to lay a false trail, and then carry her off somewhere else.

The next evening, Edward complains about the bracelet, and the unfairness that everyone else gets to give Bella presents without her throwing a tantrum. She attempts to justify it with ‘you’ve given me you!’

He processed that for a moment, and then rolled his eyes. “The way you regard me is ludicrous.”

—Eclipse Chapter 19: Selfish

Yeah. I hate to say it, but I agree.

They argue about whether or not Bella should be in the clearing some more, and whether or not she could get Seth [another wolf] or Jacob to show her the way to the fight.

Edward, who now knows all about the pack from reading their minds, informs her that Jacob is second in command, and that, if Sam wouldn’t give the order to keep her away, Jacob probably would. Also, one of the wolves is a female – Leah, the packleader’s ex. And she’s malicious, bringing up things like the questionable parentage of Embry. Jerry Springer with wolves. Joy.

But, back to the point. Bella’s learning how to manipulate, and she gets Edward to agree to stay with her wherever they plan to hide her instead of joining the fight.

Edward and Alice trade places, so he can go discuss sitting out the fight. And so Alice can tell Charlie all about how everyone else is going hiking, and she’ll be left all alone. That, of course, gets him to agree to let Bella spend the time with Alice at her place.

We’re off to another training session, where Bella has a chat with Jacob in wolf form. Then, off to the Cullen house, where Edward and Bella are alone. Edward attaches a large, heart-shaped diamond to the other side of Bella’s new bracelet, calling it an accurate representation of himself with a whole list of words that can be boiled down to tacky.

Bella tries to get Edward to sleep with her. She wants to do it before she’s turned. Edward demonstrates that he’s afraid he might break her by breaking the bed.

He then requests that Bella stop trying to remove her clothes, and that she marry him before they even attempt such a filthy thing as the sex. Because he wants their virtues to remain intact. Just in case.

Alice sees the future where they sneak off to Vegas to get married, and uses the ‘Do you love me’ thing on Bella to get permission to plan the wedding.

Off to set the fake trail. Touching things, leaving behind stray hairs. Tripping, cutting herself, and deciding to leave hints of her blood everywhere.

Nine miles of terribly boring conversation later, Jacob brings Bella to the camp site where they’ll be hiding her. Jacob wants Bella to ‘play the field’, and to admit that she’s in love with him. We also find out that Jacob’s supposed to be the alpha, but he didn’t want to step up.

It’s the middle of June, right? Right. A really, really bad snowstorm hits. Bella’s freezing. Edward tells Jacob to ‘fetch a space heater’, so he gets into the tent. And into the sleeping bag with Bella.

More time for inane chat, yay. Bella wants to know why Jacob’s wolf form is shaggier than the others. Isn’t it obvious? It’s because he’s letting his hair grow back out.

Edward complains about Jacob’s fantasies, and how loud they are. They have a long chat about Bella while Bella ‘sleeps’.

The uneasy truce ends the next morning. Edward and Bella compare notes on their top ten best nights – a ploy to get Jacob to overhear that Bella has agreed to marry Edward.

Jacob runs off. Edward brings him back at Bella’s request. Pages upon pages of weepy emo bullshit. Jacob threatens to let himself be killed in the fight, thereby manipulating her into asking him to kiss her.

She imagines an entire annoying future with him; a paragraph that feels like a lifetime. I think I’d like to die now.

Ohthankgodthefight’sstarted.

Edward relays a play by play as told by Seth, the werewolf that’s been left to guard them, or keep them in touch with the others, or something.

For some unnamed reason, Edward tells Seth to go…somewhere. Shortly thereafter, Victoria arrives. With help.

Yay. Help. Help for us. We’re back at the prologue! Death plees kthx!

Seth returns to even the odds. Boo.

Bella decides to reenact the story of the third wife. Yay!

There’s an entertaining scene in which the other vampire – Riley – gets his arm torn off, and it’s flung toward Bella. And the arm starts crawling mindlessly away.

Then, the fight’s over. More talking. ‘Aren’t you afraid of me?’ ‘Of course not.’

Except it’s not over; one of the wolves gets hurt by a straggler. Jacob, of course, but he survives.

Bella faints. Tragically, she wakes up again, after they’ve reached the rest of the family.

One of the newborns surrendered. She’s by the fire in the clearing, curled into a ball, alternately digging into the dirt and clutching her head, howling mindlessly, and asking ‘how can you stand it?’

I can only assume that they defeated her by forcing her to read these books, as this was my exact response.

The Volturi guard arrives. Jane tortures the newborn for a bit; I begin to suspect that Jane’s special powers involve the direct implanting of slashfiction into the brains of her victims.

Jane tries to torture Bella, but her awesome MarySueness renders her immune to the ghastliness that is Mpreg.

‘Oh, you’re still human.’ ‘The date is set.’ Yes. The date for the release of the next book is set, isn’t it? And the one after that….

Felix [another member of the guard] kills the newborn; we all wish we could die with her.

It’s not over yet. Bella has to go back home now, and talk to Charlie. And wait to be able to see Jacob. Carlisle is tending to him. There’s talk of re-breaking bones.

…and a strange discussion about why some talents work on Bella, while others don’t. The excuse, apparently, is that the things that don’t work on her are things that work inside the mind, instead of on the body. Except, it makes little sense, because Jane’s ability is to cause pain.

Maybe it really does involve slashfic….

More words. The story they fed Charlie explaining Jacob’s injuries involved a motorcycle accident. Charlie decides that Jacob might not be mature enough to be a valid choice for a relationship with his daughter, after all.

Bella goes to visit Jacob, and, after a bucket of emo, we have an official mention of the title of the book in the dialogue.

Yippie. A whole chapter of sobbing. Okay. Really more like half, and then a concession about the wedding and letting Alice plan it. Edward calls the whole thing off, and offers to turn her right then in what was probably a fit of reverse psychology to make Bella feel like it was all her idea to take time and move forward at his pace. Then, they’re off to the next book, to tell Charlie about the impending nuptials.

But wait, there’s an epilogue, from Jacob’s point of view. Strangely, his PoV sounds an awful lot like Bella’s PoV, but with fewer…well, okay, not really, but almost fewer modifiers.

He’s gotten an invitation to the fourth book wedding. He decides to bail – he turns into a wolf, and runs for it, leaving the pack behind.

Kinda how I feel right now, honestly; especially since I know that the next book is three books in one. I think I’d very much like to explode right now. Or implode.

I think I’m just tired right now. I might not get the next one up by tomorrow; if I do, it’ll probably just be the first of the three books that make up Breaking Dawn.

Maybe I’ll even try a slightly different style.