Team Edward

Christmas Break '07, I did what I do every Christmas break. I went to the bookstore the night I got back to my hometown and picked up three books I had never read, so I could enjoy some pleasure reading over the month long break. One of the books I happened to pick up was Stephenie Meyer's Twilight. It was under the best seller section, it was considered young adult lit, and it mentioned something about vampires... I was instantly fascinated. I have always liked the supernatural genre of television, movies, and books, such as "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and "Roswell," so this novel seemed right up my alley. Also, I think its important to see what my future students are exposed to within the YAL circuit.
I remember getting home around ten that night, and I decided to just jump into this novel. I ended up staying up the entire night to finish it and then driving to the book store the next day to purchase both New Moon and Eclipse. I spent the entire weekend locked in my room immersed in this tangled love story of Bella and Edward. My dad actually thought I was mad and avoiding him because he did not see me for almost two days straight.
Needless to say, I was hooked, and I still am. I own all four books, I watched the movie in the theatre three times, I have the soundtrack in my car stereo right now, and I also have a "Team Edward" shirt hanging in my closet. Judge me all you want, but I think this book has the capability of opening doors to get students interested in reading beyond their required texts. It offers romance, action, supernatural elements, and characters that you relate to and care about. The fact that the "Twilight Movement" is a phenomenon sweeping the globe shows that my thinking can not be that far off.
In my Multi-Modal class we were assigned to read an article about how the Internet influenced the phenomenon that is now Twilight. I thought it was really interesting that it actually mentioned a website: www.fanfiction.net, which I visit quite often. I really got interested in writing creative fiction by wanting to alter or elaborate characters and plot lines of movies, television, and books that I had read. That is pretty much what this website does. It allows for anyone to post stories, poems, etc. in relation to films, books, television, etc. So sometimes when I'm bored, or I don't have the time to read an entire novel I will read a story on this website. I think it is really cool that I was not the only one led to writing through movies and television.
I do want to warn those who have never used fanfiction.net. Because anyone can publish the quality of stories (both in writing and topics) is not always so great. A good tool to get around this is to click on the rating bar when looking up stories, usually the K-T (kids through teens) sections offer stories that could be appropriate for young adults (emphasis on usually and could) . There is also a genre bar where you can pick action, romance, etc. Most of the stories also offer a summary before you click on them, so if there are any subject/material that you do not feel comfortable with reading you can most often avoid stories that contain it. While this is perhaps not a website I would suggest to use in a classroom, because anyone can pretty much go anywhere within the site to access any material without restriction, it does offer some really good examples of writing techniques, such as changing genres, developing character, etc. It is also a cool way to judge the popularity of certain works, for example the Twilight section offers almost 70,000 entries (this link will take you to only the K-T rated material).
The Twilight series is an amazing group of novels that I think anyone interested in literature, and especially those interested in Young Adult Literature, whether for teaching purposes, personal enjoyment, or just raising your kids, should read.
"And so the lion fell in love with the lamb...."