For Sabotabby

Do I have to read Twilight in order to have an informed opinion of Monica Hesse's theory concerning why smart, literate, feminist women find themselves being bitten by Meyer's execrable prose and frightening worldview [warning, link contains some abelist slurs]?

In "Twilight," Edward Cullen waffled between wooing and eating new girl Bella Swan. He chose love. In "New Moon," the darkest installment of the series, Edward becomes convinced that his girlfriend would be safer without him, so he dumps her in order to protect her and then vanishes. Bella, catatonic from the pain, finds solace in Jacob Black, the devoted friend who has just learned he is a werewolf, and their relationship grows deeper, and this description is utterly, utterly useless because none of it gets at what the "Twilight" series is actually about, which is being 17.

It's a time capsule to the breathless period when the world could literally end depending on whether your lab partner touched your hand, when every conversation was so agonizing and so thrilling (and the border between the two emotions was so thin), and your heart was bigger and more delicate than it is now, and everything was just so much more.

I'm not sure I want to be reminded about being 17. I was really dumb then. Yes, things mattered more, but they hurt a lot more too, almost all the time, and I'm pretty sure I was insufferable.

So I'm pretty sure I shouldn't read Twilight, which is good, because I've no desire to. But I don't fault those who do. After all, I like Die Hard movies.