I Think I Need An Intervention

So, if you read Dogwood Girl much, you are probably wondering what happened to me. Well, I left for Hilton Head on Thursday of last week. That was the day I started my 544-page "beach read," Twilight.

I didn't know much about it, except that over the course of the summer, I kept on seeing high school girls at the pool reading this thick-ass dark book. Lots of girls reading them. Female lifeguards taking it on the stand with them, blowing the whistle for adult swim with one hand and cracking the book open with another. Anyone who knows me knows I love a big-ass thick book. Everybody had copies of the first book, and then I started seeing a second and third one, all with these slick dark-looking covers, and I thought to myself, that looks like something I would read, and then i thought, it also looks like a V.C. Andrews-type thing, which, let's be honest, is just plain crack addiction reading. Knowing I'd be hanging out on the beach, and not wanting to read anything too heady while I'm drinking beer, I picked it up before we left. (By the way, South Carolina, no alcohol on the beach? $1,000 fine? Dumbest law on the books EVER, totally would kill tourism to enforce, plus, I'm pretty sure that telling people they can't drink on the beach is un-American and considered a terrorist threat on American society. Also? Girls with "Cocks" on their shorts should just be shot.)

I proceeded to read that thing all the way down 16, only pausing to look up at that Christmas tree in the median, and then put on a bathing suit, and took it to the beach with me. I didn't put it down again until dark, when i was forced to go to dinner. I read it when I came in drunk at 1 a.m. after drinking with my old friends. (Had to read that little section over the next morning, I admit.) Took it with me to the breakfast buffet, but didn't crack it, only because Todd stared me down disapprovingly when I reached for it. Started reading it back on the beach that morning. Read it after everyone (finally!) left me at the pool that afternoon. Read it after getting dressed for the wedding until time to leave. Read it after the reception in the 30 minutes we took to get changed. Thought how wonderful it would be to read it at the reception, but resigned myself to an evening of drinking with my favorite high school friends and their wives. Sigh.

Read it like a fiend all the way home on Sunday, up until about bedtime, where I flipped through the remaining pages. Only about 50 pages left, i thought. Like a nicotine addict worrying about the pack of cigarettes being there in the morning, I debated putting back on clothes and finding the nearest bookstore before bedtime, so that I would have Book II there when I woke up and drove to the lake.

Finished Sunday night. Drove to the Lake on Monday morning and promptly used new nephew as an excuse to get out of the house. Hauled baby all over middle Georgia on a mission to find a bookstore. Found one. Bought second and third books in the saga. Noted with relief that there is a fourth one coming out August 2nd. Shed an inner tear that the saga would end. Drove to best coffee shop in my universe (apologies to Joe's!) and prayed for baby to sleep while I started reading 2nd book.

Reluctantly went home when needy three-week old nephew got hungry. Committed crime of lying by omission when asked by husband if I bought another of "those books." Silently fumed while husband and sister made fun of my high school vampire obsession. Later loaned first book to sister, as her interest was piqued, and who doesn't like a good vampire story when a newborn is sucking you dry every two hours?

That was Monday at noon. I just finished 600-page book 2 about 30 minutes ago, and I am just blogging about it so that I can draw out starting number three. I mean, I only have eleven days until the fourth one comes out.

Are they good? Well, they are young adult fiction. They are definitely in the romance genre. About on par with a Harry Potter, as far as suspense goes. I would be lying if I didn't say that they could use more sex, violence, and strong language. I would be lying if I said I didn't cringe when I watched a teaser trailer for the movie and then listen as my husband derided it as Goth Gossip Girl in the Cascades.

Um, yeah, they're pretty damn good. Look out, Jamie Fraser; We might have a new hero in town.