Twilight: Zigging When Everyone Else Zags--With A Link For All You Zaggers Out There

A disclaimer: I have read none of the Twilight books. At the height of the furor over the books, I did consider reading them. And the entire set is owned by a member of my household who shall remain nameless but who is not the member you would assume owns these particular books so it would've been easy enough to do. But I didn't because a) I have a long history of zigging when everyone else zags (See: Andy Gibb vs. Shaun Cassidy, Rad Daly vs. Scott Baio , etc) and b) I have given in to this kind of temptation when it comes to books before with results that left permanent psychological scars.

Most recently, I gave in to the hype about Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code. A book's topping the bestseller lists for ridiculous amounts of time usually works to dissuade me from reading it (zig-zag) so it took recommendations from lots and lots of people close to me to convince me to give this book a try. I have to give Brown credit for a suspenseful plot--had it not been that suspenseful I would never have made it to the end of the book without simultaneously stabbing myself in both eyes so as not to risk ever having to look at a passage from that book again. (Seriously? After six years the main things I remember about the book are the albino monk and Dan Brown's egregious overuse of the word "upwelling.") In case it's not obvious I am still a little bitter about that experience.

Before that, it's all the way back to 1992 and The Bridges of Madison County. It was short, which was a good thing but the prose was so purple it was practically grape-scented and essentially the whole thing boiled down to a glorification of adultery which left me less than impressed.

In the case of the Twilight books, even people who have ravenously devoured all four books admit that the writing is not all that great. So no, I haven't read the Twilight books or seen all of the first movie but I know lots and lots of people who have so in honor of the release of the Twilight sequel New Moon, I'm going to send any New Moon fans out there over to Jen Lancaster's blog Jennsylvania where she has posted her own version of New Moon acted out by the official action figures of Bella, Edward, Jacob & Alice. (Spoiler alert--though I doubt very, very much that anyone for whom this movie could possibly hold a plot twist or secret not already leaked or purposely read about is likely to click the link.)