How Twilight is Re-Vamping Romance

The popularity of this teen vampire series is simply astounding: "In 2008, the four books of the series claimed the top four spots on USA Today's year-end bestseller list, making Meyer the first author to ever achieve this feat.^[27] The series then won the 2009 Kids' Choice Award for Favorite Book, where it competed against the Harry Potter series.^[2] - In an interview with USA Today, US president Barack Obama said that he and his ten-year-old daughter, Malia, often bond over the Twilight books,^[50]" -Wiki

Recently I came across this article from a perspective that I found to be a breath of fresh air considering the apparent wholesale acceptance of these books and films. They also address the question that I've been asking, "How is this storyline capturing so many hearts, minds and box office dollars?"

"Twilight proved its mighty cultural force when the second film in the series, New Moon, broke all-time opening-day box office records, beating out Titanic and Dark Knight. [2] Since the release of the first Twilight book in 2005, 85 million subsequent books in the series have been sold. Twilight’s cultural conquest is phenomenal. But how did this averagely-written, clichéd storyline capture so many hearts, minds and imaginations (not to mention over one billion dollars in book, DVD and ticket sales)?

Though Stephanie Meyer is not a brilliant author, she knows how to make an illicit romance with a vampire look like a clean, pro-abstinence story of unconditional love and good vs. evil (and convince even Christians.) [3]"

Read the full article here.

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