< Twilight (novel)

Twilight (novel)/Headscratchers


Welcome to the Twilight Headscratchers. This is the page where you can ask about Plot Holes and have someone who knows the series answer them. And, then, if their explanation doesn't make sense, you can come right back.

If you want to discuss Twilight, you can always Take It to the Forums. And, if you want to complain about Twilight, there are plenty of sites out there just for that purpose.

That out of the way, let's start the show:

Be sure to check out Stephenie Meyer's 2007 Q and A for answers to common questions.

  • If the Cullens are supposed to value human life so much, then why is Bella the only human they ever lift a finger to protect? There are many points in the story when other humans are hurt or killed (sometimes in large numbers) and the Cullens don't even seem to take notice of it as long as Bella isn't one of those people. In fact they show a deliberate, callous disregard for anyone who isn't Bella. If they truly value all human life why do they prioritize one over all the others? I understand why Edward does (because he's blinded by love or whatever) but shouldn't the others be more practical about it? Especially Carlisle who's supposed to be incredibly compassionate? Wouldn't someone whose trademark is meant to be their super-human concern for human life be willing to let one person die if that person remaining alive required hundreds of others to die? (and Victoria does kill hundreds of humans while creating her "new born army" for the one and only purpose of getting revenge on Bella) or at least flinch a little when confronted with suffering and death of hundreds of humans? Sure, he's does the whole doctor thing, but once they step foot outside the hospital he doesn't really seem to give a fuck what happens to them. Actually, other than not doing any of the killing themselves, I don't recall any of the Cullens ever being shown doing anything to prevent human suffering.
  • Why does every one in the story, even the members of the wolf pack who don't know Bella that well, seem to be willing to risk their own lives and let countless others suffer just to spare Bella? It seemed like any time anyone even dared imply that Bella's life may not be worth more than literally everyone elses they were instantly reprimanded for it and portrayed as a bad person for the rest of the story, but no explanation was ever given.
  • In Eclipse during the training montage, why do the wolves show up just to listen to Jasper give a speech and then stand around watching while the vampires spar? Wouldn't it have been better for them to get some hands on (or I guess paws on) experience fighting vampires?
    • Explained in-universe as the wolves not trusting their ability to fully restrain themselves when fighting against the Cullens. Instead they just get the theory part of the lecture.
  • Also, regarding the speech itself, why aren't any of the were wolves or vampires (even the speech giver himself) ever shown using any of the advice given there-in? The battle with the new born army didn't look tactical at all, they didn't beat the enemy by being smarter or more well prepared, they just ran straight at them and ether bludgeoned them or ripped them apart that's not superior tactics or training it's just pure brute force. It would have been really nice to have actually seen some of Jasper's supposed tactical skill in action, but since we didn't the training montage just felt like unnecessary padding.
  • Going back to the battle again, why was so much hype given to the new borns being this big, powerful threat? It didn't look like the Cullens or the were wolves had any trouble just ripping them apart with their bare hands and the battle didn't even last that long and was pretty one sided in terms of casualties especially when you consider that the new born army had the advantage of far greater numbers.
  • Is it ever explained why Bella is immune to some vampire powers and why she is not immune to Alice's or Jasper's powers?
    • Nope, not conclusively any way. I may be wrong, but I don't remember the explanation ever going beyond her just being "special" in some unspecified (plot convenient)way. I think there was something about her being a psi vampire (unless that was just the Fanon explaination) but that wouldn't explain why she's immune to some powers but not to others and also doesn't hold up in general since she doesn't display any other symptoms of being a psi vampire.
    • I'm pretty sure it's explained in the Official Guide. She is immune to powers that have to do with her mind (thoughts), like Edward's (reading her mind), as well as Jane, Alec, and Zefrina (who all play mind games on you). Alice and Jasper both deal more with the physical (the future, or messing with one's endorphine system or whatever to make you experience a certain emotion).
    • So, why is she immune?
      • Apparently, it's genetic. Edward has trouble reading Charlie's mind as well (but no trouble reading Renesmee's). Also, Renesmee gets a sort of combo of the talents of her parents, so that supports this theory as well.
  • Why, when Bella was about to have the baby in Breaking Dawn and they ran out of blood, was the only doctor available the one who got sent out to get more blood? You would think that the doctor would want to stay with Bella (who was pretty much on the verge of death) and send one of the others to get the blood and wasn't it also at one point emphasized that Edward was the fastest of the Cullen family? You would think it would make far more sense for the medical professional to stay with the physically unstable pregnant woman while the fastest of the group went out to get the blood.
    • Ummm . . . because he's the only one who can actually get blood, being that he's the only doctor? I'm not too sure about this, but I have a feeling that they don't just give random people off the street bags of donor blood.
    • If it's already been established that vampires can live off animal blood and the baby needed blood because it was half vampire, then why did it have to be human blood? still seems like there were ways around leaving the potentially dieing pregnant women without any medical care. It also seems like any of the others, given their vast array of special abilities, could have gotten into a building undetected pretty easily.
      • I'm almost certain that it's stated somewhere in the book that they didn't think that animal blood would be appealing to the fetus, and they were concerned about Bella immediately getting nutrition.
      • That also makes no sense, if animal blood was the first blood the fetus tasted then how would it even know that it preferred human blood? Babies eat whatever their mothers eat, it's not possible for a child to reject something that it's mother eats since the nutrients travel straight down the umbilical cord and into the fetus' stomach (so it's never given the opportunity to throw it up or anything), so even the animal blood didn't "appeal" to the fetus, it would still absorb the necessary nutritional value. It's also been proven that, after being born, babies tend to prefer whatever food their mothers ate most while they were in her womb (you'd think Carlisle, as a doctor, would know that), so by feeding Bella human blood while she was pregnant they would actually be pre-programming Renesmee to crave human blood. Why would vampires who believe that drinking human blood is wrong want to do that?
      • What at least some of us don't understand is why they didn't just give her a blood transfusion. It would have to get in her blood to get to the fetus anyway, so why take the roundabout way of drinking it?
      • Come to think, it could be because Meyer is Mormon. I'm not sure if they are as opposed to blood transfusions as Jehova's Witnesses, but unless she just wanted another gross factor that seems likely.
        • It's definitely not that; this Mormon troper has donated blood about a dozen times now, and has members of her all-Mormon family who have recieved blood transfusions. Methinks it was the gross factor.
  • Why didn't they just give her animal blood when they ran out of human blood?
    • Just guessing here, but maybe they figured she would have less of a moral objection to drinking blood that was willingly given by someone, as opposed to drinking blood that came from an animal that was killed for that express purpose? Of course, there's lots of loopholes with that, but it's a guess.
    • I don't think they actually ran out of blood. Bella was still chugging down blood when her equivalent of "the water broke" happened, and wound up spilling her cup on the couch. It was just that they had little left, and I'm not sure what they were thinking - that she might need some after the cesarian or something? - but at least it effectively got Carlisle and Esme out of the house in time for Edward to dazzle us with his elite surgery skills. Most likely the whole thing was just a way to add drama, since Carlisle would never have done a Rosalie and tried to eat Bella while performing the surgery.
  • Hypothetical question. So, Jacob was attracted to Bella because Bella was destined to give birth to his soul-mate, right? So does that mean that, if Bella had chosen Jacob (I know Edward was supposed to be her true love but lets just pretend she makes some sort of cosmic mistake and wrongly chooses Jacob or had a one nights stand with Jacob that resulted in pregnancy) and they had wound up having a child, that Jacob would have wound up being overwhelmingly attracted to his own daughter to such an extent that he would have fallen in love with her and forgotten all about Bella in favor of her? Because, in Breaking Dawn, pretty much the instant Jacob lays eyes on Renesmee he forgets all about Bella (making it clear that Bella's role was simply that of a vessel), he doesn't even seem worried anymore that she might be dead and Jacob is only ever drawn to Bella (not both Bella and Edward), so it seems more just like one of Bella's eggs was destined to grow into his true love regardless of whose sperm fertilized it, not necessarily that he was meant to fall in love with the child of Edward and Bella, or else he would have felt some sort of attachment to Edward as well. It just seems like things could have very easily gone wrong and wound up in a weird, incestuous love triangle.
    • She wasn't thinking about the implications of what she wrote.
    • Short answer: yes, it would. We will never know for sure, though, and that is most likely a good thing. It could have been that Bella's magic ova/imprintee candidate egg required the specific combination it would get from Edward's genes to be "The One" for Jacob. If so, then if Bella had chosen Jacob, he would never have met his imprint object, as she would never have been born.
    • Perhaps he didn't want Bella to become a vampire because somewhere he knew that Bella wouldn't be able to give birth to her child anymore.
  • What was the point of having Bella talk about how she didn't want to be the kind of girl who gets married out of high school and never leaves her home town or does anything with her life if she was just going to wind up doing exactly that without protest any way? Since she required almost no persuading to change her mind, that whole little speech seemed kind of pointless. Why did becoming a vampire make her decide that she was content to never leave Forks again? Especially since, being immortal and having all that money, there were more opportunities open to her than there were when she was human.
    • Because she won't stay in Forks forever; the Cullen family is implied to be leaving in, maybe, a few months. She, Edward, Nessie, and Jacob (if he comes) can leave the rest of the family for a little while and set up somewhere else for a few years, or they can stay with the family. They have free will to do whatever they want. All the kids do - they are all implied (or outright stated) to have left the main "family" for some amount of time before, and just returned when they felt like it.
  • How was it possible for a vampire getting a human pregnant to be such a rare thing that none of the vampires had ever heard of it happening before and could not possibly predict how it would turn out, yet so common that information about it could be found on Google? That seems like a bit of a contradiction. It also seemed like (when it did happen) it was the sort of thing that vampires tried to keep quiet so, again, a simple Google search easily turning up detailed and accurate information about it seems highly unlikely.
    • Simple. No one thought of it before because Carlisle, who told them all about being vampires, didn't know that a vampire could have the self-control necessary to sleep with a human. Or he did know, but he also knew how dangerous it would be for a human girl to carry a half-vampire baby. It's also entirely possible that the Volturi wouldn't tell him about it, thinking that he might be one of those who might want to experiment with the idea. I have no idea about the Google thing, though.
    • Well then you didn't answer the question at all, since the google thing was what I was asking about.
      • If you are referring to the place in Breaking Dawn part 1, where Robert Pattinson Googles "immortal children", I would like to point out that immortal children are something else, they are human children that have been turned into vampires. Dhampyrs (vampire-human hybrids) weren't supposed to exist in that universe, or nothing is known about them, because Carlisle's logic is that no vampire other than himself and one or two of his amazing children would ever be able to have sex with a human instead of just draining her blood.
  • On the honey moon, when Edward doesn't want to have sex with Bella again for fear of hurting her but Bella really wants to have sex, why did neither of them consider doing it again with her on top? It seems to me that that would have drastically reduced the likelihood of him hurting her because she would more in control of what was happening than him and you'd think, if she was so desperate to do it again, it would have occurred to her to try a different position at least once. Why do they both act like missionary position is the only possible way for people to have sex?
    • Oh, Stephanie Meyer, you poor, poor woman...
  • I'm sorry if this was asked before, but I have to ask, what is the need for vampires to have super-strength and speed? I mean, lets think nature. Cheetahs, for example, are incredible fast animals, but their main preys, gazelles, are really fast and agile too and have panoramic view, so the cheetahs need their speed to have a chance to catch them. Considering vampires main prey is humans, one of the most easy to catch mammals in the world, is there any need for those enhancement at all? Sure, we have our brains and technology, but so do vampires! If they need help, their eternal beauty is enough of an advantage in order to catch gullible fools like Bella. And if they really need to chase their victim, they don't need much speed: vampires don't have to catch their breaths, humans do; vampires are eternally young, humans don't. All they need to do is chase them until collapse, wolf style. Is there any part in the book where the reason of their superpowers is explained?
    • The only explanation I can think of is that vampires get their powers form a supernatural source, not from natural selection/evolution, so their powers wouldn't be determined by the same rules that govern the animal world.
    • But Meyer said her vampires are supposed to be based on science, so that rules out that explanation.
    • Perhaps it's not in order to hunt down humans, but to be able to fight with their 'natural enemy', the werewolves.
  • Ok, I accept that Renesmee physically matures at an accelerated rate,even thought none of the other vampires in the series age so, even being half human, you'd think it would make more sense for her to age more slowly than the average human because she has vampire blood in her, which usually stops ageing dead (pun intended) but what ever, I'm over it. I just want to know what makes her STOP maturing when she reaches a certain physical age? How is the physical age at which she will stop maturing determined? What keeps her from just continuing to mature at an excelerated rate until she's an old woman?
    • Difference between maturing and aging. Maturing is your body growing into its adult stage--finishing puberty, mostly. Aging is your body slowly falling apart and dying out from under you.
    • Well, the average female is not fully physically developed until she reaches the age of 25, I know this because of an unusual medical problem I have that made it necessary for my doctor to explain it to me. So why does Renesmee stop ageing when she's a teenager?
    • Because Stephanie Meyer doesn't know that.
    • Did Not Do the Research
    • Meyer seems to have this idealized view that teen = fully mature and capable adult. Bella, for one, is 17 and TOTALLY knows exactly what she wants and what life-altering choices are right. At 17. Because no one EVER makes mistakes at that age. But to that same extent, all the other Cullen kids are pretty much teenagers as well. It honestly comes off more that Meyer herself wishes she were 17 again and that ideal is reflected through the fact that she's trying to portray the teenage years as the age of maturity, nevermind that there is still some growing to do, hormones are still quite active, and most of her teenage characters have displayed some completely idiotic tendencies.
  • Speaking of Renemee, how does it work that she's developmentally 18 when she's only been alive for seven years? Maturity is more than being physically adult and intellectually gifted. A real 18-year-old has 18 years of life experience as well, which a seven-year-old, regardless of intelligence and physical growth, will not have. Nothing changes the fact that Renesmee has been alive for less than a decade. I'm sorry, but this whole thing still screams "pedophilia" to me.
    • The character of Renesmee was created solely for the purpose of resolving the love triangle; Meyer didn't want Jacob to end up alone (because in this series not being married is considered a fate worse than death), but I guess the though of him moving on and having any sort of a life that didn't involve Bella was just to painful for her, so she had the reason that he and Bella were so drawn to each other be because she was destined to give birth to his actual true love and gave the baby an adult mentality and had it age at an accelerated rate in an effort to reduce the Squick factor of a teenage boy being in love with a baby. Basically, she couldn't think of any better way to resolve the rivalry between Edward and Jacob while still keeping Jacob in Bellas life and without having to concede that, if Edward was Bellas true love, then that would have to mean that Jocobs feelings for her weren't real (were just infatuation.)Since this story operates on the old "there's someone for everyone" principle as well as the belief that who a person will fall in love with is predetermined by fate/destiny it does not allow for emotional Red Herring s because it perpetuates the idea that when you meet your true love you instinctively know it and by that reasoning it's not possible for a person to falsely believe that they are in love (the feeling always has to at least mean something significant.) She slapped together a slopily written plot device that would eliminate all those problems in on fell swoop without requiring the characters to deal with their complicated feelings for each other in any sort of mature or believable way. It's basically a really extreme example of Babies Make Everything Better.
    • Meyer said that Renesmee already has an adult mentality. Despite Meyer's claims, this does not work on several levels. One being that Renesmee is already somehow able to read and understand things on an adult level without anyone actually teaching her. An adult mentality does not mean an adult's level of knowledge. That comes with time. The other issue is that if Renesmee is growing at an accelerated rate, the constant change in her body and hormones would play havoc on any cognitive processes she could have, no matter how "adult" she is supposed to be.


  • Okay. The final deba- battle of breaking dawn. So whoopie. Bella-Sue can project a shield that defends against metal powers. So why didn't the Volturi just go in for the kill? Like, go down physically? So what if they can't use their speshul powers? They're still super strong and are lighting fast. So why didn't they just run up to the cullens while they thought they were protected by Bella's shield, and go in for the surprise attack? Then they could've won, taken in Renesmee to either kill her or study her illogical tendencies, and headed home. Unless you're saying that Bella can deflect physical attacks also, then the Volturi could've just wrapped the entire thing up nice and easy.
    • Edward addressed that; Aro was scared they might actually lose, since they were going up against an superor number of Vampires (the witnesses they got probably wouldn't fight with them), in addittion to werewolves who are great at fighting in a pack and killing vampires. Without their powers, their actual fighters would die quickly by virtue of having to deal with three or four attackers at once, leaving the rest of them Volturi who are more focused on social and mental finese. And launch a suprise attack? Against a vampire that is currently reading your every thought?
    • Alternate strategy: I'm pretty sure Edward wouldn't be focusing on the entire volturi guard. So why doesn't one of the insignificant ones just go, take Reneesme, and run before they notice? People don't always think things through when they do something. It's called impulse. And since Edward is concentrating on Alec, Jane, or someone important, I'm sure he wouldn't have realized what insignificant person #1 was going to do.
      • Except that would imply that Aro had a plan for his main players having their powers nulified. None of his guard would take such an action (especially since their plan was to kill Reneesme, not kidnap her) without Aro's approval first. So that strategy wouldn't work; Aro's too much of control freak to let his guard make a move without his approval first, and he never came across a situation where he couldn't just use Jane and Alec to stop them in their tracks.
    • If that's the case, why didn't Aro think of an alternate strategy before? I know that it's the first time Jane and Alec were ineffective, but he knew Bella could block their gifts. If the Volturi really is so powerful and dangerous, just why couldn't they think of something else?
  • Alice sure shops a lot. The Cullens always have fashionable clothes. If you're immortal, that's going to add up to a lot of possessions. Are they, like, constantly getting rid of stuff? What's wrong with antiques and wearing vintage? (In this case, that would mean reusing things you bought decades ago.) The whole thing is just so wasteful.
    • It is wasteful, but it's also a way of showing off just how rich and luxurious the Cullen lifestyle is. Which if you think about it, kind of goes against the whole "don't attract attention" issue of their lives.
    • I could be wrong, but I think I remember a line in Breaking Dawn which said that the Cullens wear most of their clothes once, then donate them to charity. Why no one's gotten curious about the sudden upswing in highly fashionable homeless people days after the Cullens arrived in Forks is beyond me.
    • Consignment stores carry high-end clothing and are linked to charities sometimes, that would probably be the least wasteful option.
    • Well, to be fair, this is an issue with the Vampires Are Rich trope in general. Fridge Logic dictates that someone who's immortal may look at consumption and acquisition differently than your average human.
    • Of course, given their college bills (as in, multiple degrees for Edward alone), this leads to the question of how they could afford fancy clothes and such, despite moving around so much, along with those college bills, on just one doctor's salary.
    • I think in the books it says that Alice uses her psychic powers to predict what will happen in the stock market and then the family invests money accordingly, which explains where they get the money from, but renders their status as beacons of morality kind of sketchy. Also, if they supposedly care about human life and human suffering so much, you'd think they'd use that money to help people.
  • If Edward has no blood, how could he get an erection and have sex with Bella?
    • Vampires do have blood. The usual argument for all vampires being impotent is that that have no heart beats and, therefore, no way to pump blood to their erections, but the physical biology of vampires is never clearly explained or unanimously decided upon by writers of fiction. Some series (not Twilight, but ones that actually feel they owe their readers an explaination) make a point of saying that vampires do have heart beats, but that those heart beats are far slower than that of a living person and grows slower and slower the longer they are "un-dead."
      • Really, if you think about it, it wouldn't make sense for vampires to have no form of circulation because they digest blood (if they didn't it would just sit in their stomachs and they would never need to feed) and if they digest something it has to move through their system some how. Going on that logic their having slower heart beats also makes more sense because, in most series, vampires seem to need to eat far less often than humans. Also, usually when a vampire gets cut blood gushes out, this would not happen if they didn't have some form of circulation.
      • Also vampires in fiction are constantly doing things that require flowing blood like walking around. It doesn't really make sense to accept "supernatural" as an explanation for that, but not for erections.
  • When the Volturi are on that rampage to destroy Renesmee, the Cullens have like a month's worth of warning, right? It's a big part of the story that all they need is for the Volturi to listen to them, and that's why they need to gather so many vampires- to stop the Volturi long enough for them to explain. So why don't the Cullens just call the Volturi and tell them everything?
    • For that matter, why not just set up a video recorder and tape Renesmee's freakishly fast growth and development? Mail several copies to the Volturi and mention that they also sent a few to their dear friends as mementos, so the Volturi can't "lose" it.
      • It pains me to defend the books, but: the Volturi don't actually care about Renesmee being a dhampir instead of a child vampire or whatever, they just want an excuse to go to town on the Cullens and then 'collect' the survivors. The friendly neighborhood vampires the Cullens round up are reinforcements as much as anything.
      • Funny how they didn't act on that desire on one of several earlier occasions. Like with the discovery that Bella, a human, had known about their secret for a good long while now while getting to remain human and alive in New Moon. Or the whole mess with Victoria raising up an army for the sole purpose of killing Bella in Eclipse. If they really wanted an excuse, either of those would have worked.
      • With New Moon, they relented because Bella would eventually become a vampire, and killing her then would also pretty much mean killing the two memebers of the Cullen Clan they're interested in collecting and hey, they're immortal. What's a few years to them in the long run? With Victoria's army, they were betting that the mind-reader and the chick that can see the future would survive no matter what, and if they're lucky a few Cullen's would die and they could come in and incorporate the survivor's into the fold. Not to mention that in the latter case they only had justification to go after Victoria and her army. They have to keep up appearances of being fair; they couldn't take any actions against the Cullen's at that point.
      • But it's made clear that they're supposed to be evil. What with the pointless murder of Bree Tanner and all. All the same, though, if they really only wanted an excuse to go to town on the Cullens, either the fact that they let a human know about them and then ditched her with every intent of not ever coming back or the whole issue of a vampire army being created and slaughtering who knows how many humans out of revenge solely against them could have worked as well.
      • It's clear to the reader, but in story they're lawful evil as far as every other vampire is concerned. The killed Bree because she was released from her creator's control before being trained, and thus breaking one of their laws. And you seem to keep missing the core point; Aro wants to add Alice, Bella and Edward to his collection of superpowered vampires. In the former, Aro saw throuh Alice that Bella would become a vampire, which would take care of that loose end plus give him something to hold over Edward's head a few hundred years down the line. And with the Vampire Army, they had no justification to go after the Cullens, but didn't step in sooner just to see if the Vampire army would kill off a few Non-Edward or Alice Cullens. We're even told in the last book that they're MO for recruiting vampires with cool powers is to find a reason to kill off most of the covern, use that one chick's power to influence people's relationships to destroy the relationship a new recruit has with their covern then strengthen their bonds with the Volture so they join willingly. So in short their plan in Breaking Dawn was to gather witnesses, go to the Cullen's and hold a trial. They're use their power to destroy Edward's, Alice's and Bella's relationship with the rest of the Cullen's (including Renemse), and probably strengthen their relationship with Aro for showing "mercy" and "compassion" so they'd be more willing to join. Then they'd scapegoat Rosalie for creating Reneseme since she wanted to have a child, kill off as many of the Cullen's as they could and decide to "offer" the survivor's a place with them.
      • So in short, it's actually a brilliant plan, which is why I'm convinced that S Meyer has been stealing ideas off of someone else, as that was more thought than she put into her main characters.
      • Lawfully evil people can still take the laws to extremes to suit their own needs. They could have fixed the Bella issue themselves by turning her right then and be done with it instead of waiting for the Cullens to do it on their own time and risking Alice's vision being wrong due to outside variables over time. If they had done it themselves, they could have made Bella one of theirs and forced Edward and the others to remain with them because of it. They could have taken the fact that Victoria was only making a vampire army to kill Bella and get revenge as justification of saying that the Cullens cannot manage on their own and thus force their way. Not saying the way they did it wasn't brilliant, but if they're really as evil as we're supposed to think and only using the opportunity Renesmee gave them to try and take over the Cullens, then by all accounts, they could have taken any one of the many previous instances instead of letting the Cullens get away repeatedly.
      • The Volturi need to keep their reputation as fair judges intact, which is why they pass over those opporunities. They didn't turn Bella at the time because A) Dinner was incoming, and she might die in the result, B) It would foster resentment from Edward, not something you want from an underling and C) It's important that his workers either join of their own free will or manipulate the situation so they think they willingly joined. Had they already fed they might have kept them there longer and Aro could have tried to manipulate them into joining. But the point is that Aro, being ageless and having lived for a very long time is incredibly patint; he can afford to wait until the perfect opportunity to bring them into the fold, he doesn't have to rush or take chances.
      • But how is Renesmee a better excuse to go to war over? Once she was shown to not be an Immortal Child, they wouldn't have had any rules to go by. As opposed to the "don't let a human know about us and live" rule or the "don't endanger the secret of our society" rule, both of which the Cullens did and did blatantly. Alice's visions have been shown to not be perfect. Aro could have discovered this, gone "no, we're not going to just wait on this", and turned her then, possibly bringing her over to their side immediately and thus having a way of drawing in the Cullens as well. If they were trying to get Edward and the Cullens to join them willingly, going after their Mary Sue daughter would not be the way to go about it. It would have just as much of a negative effect as you said there would be if they had killed Bella when they first found out about her. My point is that saying they only used the issue in Breaking Dawn as an excuse to try and nab the Cullens doesn't really work, as they could have used anything at any point to do such, and especially going after their daughter would not endear them to the Cullens or get them to want to join them willingly. And while they could try to play it as Renesmee being evil and them "saving" the Cullens while really manipulating them by destroying their bonds, that's still something they could have done, pretty easily given their added numbers and the lack of Bella's "love shield", when they had Alice and Edward, the two main ones they wanted, right there in Volterra.
      • Again, Aro's patient. You don't get to where he is and live for how ever many centuries he has by taking impulsive actions. You're also missing the fact that when they had that meeting in the second book they were waiting on food, which arrived just as they left. Turning her then would have risked Bella's survival, so they had to let her go then. And once she left, well Aro's immortal; what's a few years to him? plus he has the added weight of having Edward and Alice owing him one for not forcing the issue, which is always useful for manipulation purposes (Yeah, Vampire: The Masquerade player here). As for going after Renesme, when they tried that they didn'tknow she was Bella's actual daughter, since they know she wasn't pregnant before her wedding, and there wasn't enough time afterwards. All they knew is that there was a baby with vampire blood, nothing else. But that would give them an excuse to cull members of the covern they didn't want and absorb the rest.
  • What happened to Bella's superhuman ability to smell blood? It's given an entire chapter of focus in the first book, comes up once in the third, but then just disappears. Not even the haters mention it.
    • My guess, Meyer needed padding to make the book longer so she picked one little thing to describe in excruciating detail just so there would be another chapter.
    • Much like Bella's clumsiness, it only appears when it's useful for plot convenience.
    • Perhaps Meyer realized that being able to smell blood actually isn't superhuman after all. Blood(when outside the body) does have a certain odor, after all as any medical professional/rescue worker/woman who has had a period could tell you.
  • Why is it considered okay for Edward to claim he's holding off on sex for Bella's own good? Respecting someone's wishes makes sense, but if they say it's for your own good, they are trying to control you.
    • Edward's reasons to not have sex are both to protect Bella from physical harm, to protect her soul and because that is the only "sin" HE has not committed. He is not withholding sex only for her sake but his too.
      • Except that he continues to do this after they're already married and already had sex. If it's breaking bones and causing her to lose consciousness, then yeah, I would say his withholding it actually is for her own good for once.
      • The reason he started withholding it again after they were married was because he ended up giving her significant bruising all over her body during their first time. He didn't want to risk hurting her again, or possibly worse, which is why he initially wasn't going to have sex with her again until she was a vampire and could handle it without injury.
  • How would Edward sparkling in public cause people to realize he's a vampire?
    • In general, it would probably just tell them something was off about him. I'd be more afraid about vivisection than being shredded and burned, but then again I haven't been an angsty, sworn-to-secrecy vampire for the last century. It's a lot more unusual than it appeared in the first film's Special Effects Failure.
    • For that matter, if a divinely beautiful, sparkling man showed up in a town holding a celebration for a saint, wouldn't people think he was an angel and it was a sign from God or something?
    • Or that he had just used too much body glitter. Lets keep in mind that he was going to reveal himself during a festival. Lots of people dress or act extravagantly at celebrations. The likelihood is that they would have taken him to be one of those types. But all in all, it's still better than his original plan of slaughtering a bunch of innocent people just to force the Volturi into assisting in his suicide.
  • Jasper goes berserk at the scent of a single drop of Bella's blood, yet Good Vampire Carlisle seems to have no issues sending him to a school where someone is bound to get a bloody nose or a cut at some point. Now, Alice can keep an eye on the future and possibly get him out of there, but then why didn't she foresee the paper-cut disaster?
  • So why in the world didn't Jasper go crazy in the first book when Bella's delicious blood is splashed all over the ballet studio after James' attack?
    • It might be down to an instinct to attack...and James was right there. And all Bella can see is some fighting, Alice might've fought him off.
      • It still should have warranted a similar reaction from Edward as what we got in New Moon. Especially considering that Bella was in even more danger then with a vampire actively trying to hunt her than she was with one who temporarily lost control.
      • He could have held his breath in the studio so he wouldn't catch the scent of her blood.
      • Then why don't they hold their breaths all the time so they don't smell any human blood and go into a frenzy? Especially considering that, as "vampires", Word of God has stated that they don't need to breathe.
        • From the Midnight Sun draft, if they don't breathe, they can't talk. They need to breathe in to vocalise. Not to mention that people would eventually notice that the creepy pale kids never breathe ever.
        • Yeah, but how often do they actually bother to TALK to anyone other than Bella and each other? And Meyer seems to portray the regular humans as complete idiots who can't even notice that a guy stopped a van with no injuries to speak of and skip school whenever it's sunny, so I doubt the fact that these people don't breathe is something she'd have any of them notice.
        • Well, whenever teachers talk to them for instance. And they talk to each other a lot too. So that's a lot of oxygen right there. At least Meyer thought about it a bit and stated Edward was always on the lookout for thoughts that started to piece together what they were, so in character they were mindful that someone might find out.
        • How often in the actual books do they bother talking to anyone other than Bella? Sure, we could assume they'd have to talk to teachers and students and each other, but then again, we could also assume Bella actually did anything during the months she spent near-catatonic. And if they don't need to breathe other than to talk, then they could have conceivably held their breaths while around others until they specifically had to speak.
        • Edward said in the first book that breathing is mostly something they do unconsciously because breathing was a habit they acquired when they were alive. Which is pretty lame even as Handwaves go, since breathing isn't a habit, it's an automatic action, like blinking. And when Bella becomes a vampire, the Cullens remind her to blink occasionally when around humans, so they apparently don't hang onto all their human "habits."
  • Wasn't Jasper the newest Cullen to the "vegetarian" diet? Carlisle was on it longest, so that would explain why he was the most controlled. Still, the series is pretty inconsistent about whether or not the Cullens can hang out with Bella cheerfully or be driven mad with the desire to nom on her.
    • Actually it's not a matter of time. Carlisle's compassion was so big that he never was able to bring himself to kill another human being for their blood and the other Cullens were turned by him so they were introduced to respecting human life from the get go so is easier for them to resist to be around humans. Jasper has problems because he was turned by a normal vampire and was trained as a vampire soldier of sorts.
      • I could be remembering wrong, but I'm pretty sure Alice wasn't turned by Carlisle either. And her human life was so traumatic she can't even remember it. So wouldn't she theoretically be even more messed up than Jasper?
        • Alice's situation is a bit complicated. [1] Basically, she had a vision after waking up from the changing process, and it was of her and Jasper living a happy life with the Cullen's. She found Jasper as soon as possible, and then they went to find their new family together. I got the impression that the intensity of the visions and hope of having a good life overrided her thirst.
  • Bella becomes a vampire. Why are we not told how her human friends and family take this or her crazy pregnancy?
    • Bella didn't really seem to care all the much for her human "friends" she seemed, at best, to tolerate having them around because that was slightly better than being alone (all the while cringing at their every imperfection), she was probably thrilled to have an excuse to never have to put up with them again.
    • Well we do see her dad's reaction: he basically just pretends it's not happening, saying he doesn't want to know any details. As for her friends, she wasn't really planning on ever seeing them (or her mother) again, bless her heart. Although that's going to be kind of hard considering that they still live in the same town and Esme built them a little fairy tale cottage and everything. And that Carlisle was having trouble passing for 30 at his job by the second book...
      • Not to mention the issue of how the Cullens and Bella were prime gossip-bait. Surely it would only be a matter of time before Jessica came pounding on the door to visit for the next holiday and see how things were going.
    • Basically, Bella doesn't care about her human friends. Given her portrayal of them and her general "anti-human" stance, it's pretty clear that Meyer doesn't like the normal, non-special human characters. They're only there to emphasize how special and different Bella is.
  • Which leads to another issue - the Cullens left Forks in New Moon partly because of the Jasper incident but also because they apparently had been there too long and would start to raise suspicions. At the end of the book, they all come back like it's nothing. No one questions this and apparently there's no issue with Carlisle going back to work or Alice and Edward starting up at school again.
    • It's been a while since I read the book, but I thought that was just Edward straight-up lying to Bella (again).
    • Which still leaves the question of how the Cullens were able to reclaim their house, property, job, and places at school, even though they were gone for months, with no intention of returning.
    • Actually, to Stephenie Meyer's credit, she did seem to grasp that writing Bella's pregnancy from Bella's POV was not a good idea. Other than that, though...
  • How does Edward impregnate Bella? As a vampire, does he continue to make sperm? But that wouldn't make sense, considering they're 'like stone' so they can't age. And since when did he have the body fluids to create sperm? It's not like he, or any vampire can convert blood into sperm, and I don't think venom can carry sperm in it. [it melts contact lenses!] And he can't have been carrying sperm in his testicles for a hundred years; considering that they die off, just as eggs do in a woman's uterus. Even if they did manage to survive for a hundred years, how do they remain potent, considering that sperm need to be frozen, and then heated up slowly to remain potent. Wouldn't Bella, being nice and warm at 37 C, kill off any of Eddie's sperm? In any case, since sperm have to be frozen in order remain fertile, how would it travel up Eddie-kin's erection and go into Bella's uterus? And then defrost and get to the egg in Bella?
    • The only thing we have to go on regarding that is the vampire venom replacing all fluids in the body. Apparently, that somehow includes sperm, though by that logic, you would think it would either turn her or the fact that the venom is supposed to be acidic would tear open a hole inside of her.
    • HOW THE SPERM LIVE IN EDWARD'S VENOM FOR 1xx YEARS? IT CAN MELT CONTACT LENSES! HOW WOULD THEY SURVIVE? And if Vampires are immortal, why would they need to breed? Sperm would be useless, because usually if a vampire loves a human, they turn them into a vampire, not have sex with them as a human! So having sperm is completely, and utterly useless! DHAMPIRS SHOULD NOT EXIST IN TWILIGHT.
      • Not to mention that dhampirs are completely pointless in a universe where vampires have no weaknesses.
      • It's just another way of pointing out how special Bella is. One of the big downers for being a female vampire was that they couldn't have kids. Well, surprise! Bella gets to be the all-perfect sparkly vampire AND have an equally all-perfect sparkly kid. Doesn't matter what aspects of the world Meyer has to turn on its ear so long as she can ensure Bella gets everything she herself would want.
  • Upon reading Edward's mind in Breaking Dawn, Aro finds out everything... except that Bella has a powerful shielding power which she has been using pretty successfully on others. Bella even mentions several times how good it is that Aro hasn't figured it out yet, basically pointing out the Plot Hole. Is there any explanation for this?
    • Aro only knows Bella's power is limited to Edward and people close to her, similar to his own shield. Bella discovered she could extent her shield in the battlefield. Edward didn't knew this so Aro was not prepared to get Jane and Alec blocked by her powers.
      • How did Edward not know that? Didn't part of Bella's training to learn how to control her shield involve him being attacked over and over until Bella got it right?
      • But the point was that despite this practice, bella was still having difficulty protecting just Edward (even when she was clinging to him, i.e. he was right next to her). When Aro read Edwards mind, Edward was still under the impression that Bella was still strugling to do that, at that point only Bella knew she was protecting everyone - BECAUSE SHE FOUND OUT A FEW SECONDS AGO
  • In the first book, why did the Cullens think it was a good idea to take Bella to Phoenix? They jumped through hoops to ensure that her dad wasn't attacked, wouldn't someone think that hiding in the same city as Bella's mother was not such a good idea? There's plenty of places to go, and the Cullens have a lot of money.
    • In the movie, at least, one of the big reasons she wants to go to Phoenix is so the Cullens do not get blamed for her disappearance. It's a logical place for her to go.
      • I believe it was similar or the same in the book. Of course, it may have been easier to just SAY she was going to Phoenix and then go somewhere else.
  • If Bella has a Magic Mind Shield that makes it so no vampire powers work on her how does Alice keep seeing her future? For that matter why does Jasper's emotion control work on her (as seen, at least in the movie, when he makes her happy about her Birthday party)?
    • In the books, it explains that she's only immune to mind powers. Alice doesn't get inside her head, she just sees what's coming for her. Jasper effects her body chemistry, not thoughts. Granted, the line between mind and body is blurry at best but this is never brought up in the books.
    • Even better, the test they use to see how well Bella can extend her powers is to subject Edward repeatedly to a vampire who can generate painful electrical currents. If she can only block mental attacks, how the hell is she invulnerable to that power?
    • Its outright stated by the character that her power is like Jane's, but that she can't project it like Jane does. Jane doesn't actually cause pain - she just makes you think you're in pain
  • Okay, so depressed Edward wants to rip open his shirt and sparkle in public, thus revealing the existence of vampires and goading the Volturi into killing him. It's sort of a roundabout and melodramatic way to commit suicide, but whatever. What I want to know is this: who the hell is going to look at someone glittery and think 'vampire'? I mean, seriously, if I saw some guy glittering in the sunlight, I'd think he had too much of a thing for body glitter. Vampires aren't exactly noted in lore for their sparkliness, so why would the Volturi (or Edward) find the idea of him sparkling so terrible? He'd just look like some stoned kid with leftover rave herpes (i.e., glitter). No average person is going to look at some prismatic teenager and go, "Gasp! He's sparkly, he must be a vampire, guys!" They'd probably be more likely to ask him how much he had to drink before he went crawling through a glitter factory.
    • This is a fair complaint in the movie, where Edward's "Look" can easily be achieved with enough glitter lotion. But bear in the mind that in the book, Edward didn't just sparkle. He was like a human diamond that you could use to blind people in the street if you wanted to. No cosmetic products can produce the same results, so even if they don't realize that he's a vampire, they're going to be elbowing their buddies going "Dude, that guy is sparkling, WTF?" which is more attention than they Volturi want. His choice of suicide makes more sense in the book as well. The only way to kill a vampire is to tear it apart and set it on fire. The only thing strong enough to pull a vampire apart is a werewolf or another vampire. Edward didn't know the wolves were around again, his family clearly wasn't going to kill him, and the whole "kill it with fire" aspect made it impossible, or at least really hard to do it himself. The easiest way to find other vampires was to go find the Volturi. It was also said, or at least implied (I think, it's been awhile since I read the books) that he tried just explaining his reasons for wanting to die and asking them to kill him, but they said no, which was why he resorted to making a scene.
      • Then why didn't he just douse himself with gas and drop a match? That's really not that hard.
      • I always assumed that he couldn't do that. Vampires, I believe, had to be ripped apart into multiple pieces and then burned to death. If a vampire attempted that, they'd regenerate too quickly for them to effectively kill themselves.
      • So he could have gone and aggravated a vampire he didn't know and have it rip him apart. Word of God has that most vampires are vicious and competitive.
        • Not the case. The Romanian coven died to regular arson, and their physical prowess and surability outranked the Cullens. By the description given by Meyer, Edward could have killed himself with a match(no gasoline needed). His very skin is flammable, and even if it wasn't, he could just light the inside of his mouth on fire.
      • That would involve tracking down another vampire. Not to mention that the other vampire could just rip him apart but not burn him, leaving him concious in a few dozen pieces.
      • I'm going to have to call bullshit on the, only can be torn apart by the strength of a vamp or a werewolf. There are crazy strong machinery that are used from everything from construction to mining. I haven't read the books, but assuming that vampires and werewolves in Meyer's little story are not as physically strong as freakin' Superman, then I don't know why Edward can't run around with his super speed, find some heavy machinery. Light himself on fire with gasoline, get torn apart, then let his already burning body finish him off once he's been torn into pieces.
      • Furthermore, if you saw someone glittering more than it seemed likely that you could do just with body glitter, you wouldn't think "What's that? Can't be glitter. Is it that guy's skin??" You'd think "Wow! That guy's got some awesome body glitter! I didn't know body glitter could sparkle so well!" When a person's wondering why someobody's sparkling, they won't exclude the possibility that it's body glitter, because why should they? If they're open-minded enough to believe that Edward's a supernatural being of some kind, they're definitely also open-minded enough to believe that there's body glitter that sparkles a lot more than the regular stuff.
      • I got the impression that Edwards plan relied more on just angering the Volturi, rather than actually revealing to anyone that he's a vampire. If he really wanted to cause a huge scene at that point, he could jump off a building to show that he's almost indistructable or just light himself on fire and regenerate. The sparkling wasn't a reveal, it was a warning to the Volturie that 'This is just the beginning, I'm going to cause problems, I'm going to piss you off, and you'll have to kill me.'
  • How do you look at someone like they're something to eat?
    • Physically: I think it's like looking at someone you want to bone, but with more drooling.
      Emotionally: I think this what you actually meant, but I guess it's similar to looking at a woman you randomly woke up with. It's weird, freaky, and he's just trying to keep a straight face.
      Metaphorically: Don't you get it, eating=sex! Edward is an intentional virgin. Do you realize how hard that can be at 17 and every girl is throwing themselves at you?
  • So a dude who is over 100 years old wants to bang a 16-year-old girl? I've not read the books, does it address this at all?
    • You really ought to read before posting a Headscratcher. Bella is seventeen in Twilight and eighteen by 'New Moon. She's legally old enough to consent to a relationship. Not mature enough, probably, but the law doesn't set limits on maturity.
    • Technically Edward is also 17 years old. Sure, he's been 17 for awhile, but he's only 17. The book says they are stuck at that age. Also, he doesn't want to 'bang' her, it's the other way around, Bella wants to have sex with Edward, but he adamantly refuses until they get married.
      • Wrong. Technically, Edward is over 100 years old. You seem to think that the phrase "Edward is 17 years old" means "Edward has the body of a seventeen-year-old." It doesn't. The sentence "Edward is 17 years old" is only true if he was born seventeen years ago and didn't exist before that. It really bugs me, the way people don't realize that sentences like "he's been 17 for many years" don't make sense. You can't be 17 for more than one year, after that year has passed you'll be eighteen. Being a century-old senior citizen who looks young doesn't make him technically seventeen, it just makes him a very old man who doesn't look that old. You might as well say that if an thirty-five-looking twenty-year-old man dates a fifty-year-old woman who looks young, then the fifty-year-old and the twenty-year-old are the same age.
      • Technically (what is this, the third one?), based on the mythology of the series Edward does have the body of a 17 year old. Specifically, he has the same unchanged body he had at the age of 17 the instant he was turned. He still has 90+ years of living experience on Bella and Your Mileage May Vary on just how squicky that is.
      • Yes, that was the point the above person was making. He does have the body of a 17 year old. But that does not make him 17. In the words of John Green: "I want to explain why it's wrong for adults to have romantic relationships with teenagers. It's not because we look old. It's because we are old. It's not a question of the youngness and chiseled-ness of your pecs, it's a question of how many times you've been around the sun." Which, in the case of Edward, is 86 more times than Bella.
      • It's not age, exactly, that's the problem with adult/teen relationships; it's maturity and the unbalance of power. It's wrong because the adult knows a teen is not old enough to fully make good decisions or think about their consequences, so starting a relationship with one is like taking advantage of their inexperience. Despite being over 100 years old, Edward and the other teen-when-changed Cullen's seem to still mentally be teenagers. Edward has a tendency to be pretty serious and reserved, but I never got an "adult vibe" from his actions, behavior or dialogue; it's like his overall mentality hasn't changed in 100 years.
  • In New Moon (the movie anyway; I can't remember exactly how it happened in the book) Edward takes Bella to the middle of the woods, then proceeds to dump her. He drags her all the way out just to do that, and she accepts him back later like nothing happened? Shouldn't he constantly be having to make it up to her?
    • Well, he did offer to beg for forgiveness. It's not his fault that Bella decided to just take him back. And, anyways, Edward spent all of Eclipse punishing himself for it--it would have been kinda cruel of Bella to kick him when he was down.
      • Except that he did a bunch of other things that deserved some serious groveling. Like removing the engine from her car. Coerced her into marriage. Tried to isolate her from her friends. Yeah, maybe it would have been cruel of Bella to not accept him back, but given all the other stuff he's done, it'd hardly be kicking him while he's down.
        • At the risk of nit-picking, it wouldn't take a whole hell of a lot of effort to convince Bella to ignore her friends. She was doing plenty of that on her own.
    • Well, in the book, it's not as simple as that, though not in the way you mean. In the book, when she gets Edward back, she assumes she's dreaming and Edward has to practically beat her about the head to convince her he's real. There's still absolutely no period of "How the fuck could you do that to me!?!"
    • At the end of New Moon, when Edward insists that he could never stop loving Bella, he berates her for believing that he had fallen out of love with her. In other words, rather than conceding Edward had actually done something deceitful and dishonest, he (and by extension, Meyer) shifts the blame for Bella's depression onto Bella herself for trusting the man she "loved" to be honest with her.
  • Why does the book go into so much detail about how people look? Isn't that really superficial? I know Bella's a teenager, but isn't this supposed to be an ethical look at sex?
    • Yes, but it's also a teen love book. The entire idea is to capture how a teen looks at the world.
    • It's a story without pics so describing his looks is important. Bella doesn't fall in love with Edward till she knows the whole truth about him. Edward's looks didn't made his life better or easier, neither of the Cullens and specially Rosalie had their looks make their choosing to be vegetarians any easier.
      • Number one, no. It is not important to describe his looks in that amount of detail just because it doesn't have pictures. Most books do not have pictures. And yet, most books do not find the need to describe the main male characters beauty a total of 165 times in the first book alone (and yes, that is the real number of times Edward's beauty is mentioned). That is far beyond being "excessive". Even for a teenager in first lust, that's excessive.
      • Number two, yes, she absolutely falls in love with him before knowing the whole truth. In fact, she falls in love with him despite the fact that she's still fairly certain he might want to kill her. It's kind of the whole point of one of the book's most famous quotes (the "three things" quote where she says a) she knows some part of him wants to nom her and b) she's still irrevocably in love with him... in short, it doesn't matter if he's a good person or not).
      • And number three, yes, his looks absolutely make things easier for him. That is in fact, the reason given IN THE BOOKS for why he is so good looking. Smeyer specifically states that vampires look so good so that people will trust them and do whatever they want. So yes, Edward has to "suffer" with being a vegetarian, but it is also stated that all the humans give the Cullens preferential treatment.
    • 'A story without pics'? You mean book? Thanks captain obvious
      • But she doesn't describe his looks. "Gorgeous" isn't really a description, it's a value judgment. We have no real idea what he looks like, other than that he's red-headed, pasty and sparkly with a crooked smile.
      • You must not have been paying attention: Hair is tousled bronze (reddish-brown) his eyes are liquid topaz with purplish almost bruise like circles under them... they lighten and almost disappear when he has fed. Long, black lashes, perfectly sculpted face with high cheekbones, straight nose, perfect full lips with razor sharp, straight, white teeth and is a bit feminine given that he looks like his mother Elizabeth, pale skin perfectly smooth, alabaster white and his body is more boyish, but lean and strong. I think Smeyer was describing a Bishonen.
      • Because apparently the looks are the only notable and worthwhile thing about him. Take that away and you're left with an obvious abuser, and no one would be interested in getting with him.
  • Jacob's Character Derailment: how could he grow from a friendly nice guy into a total jerkass in Eclipse? Is it just a way to deal with the Love Triangle?
    • He started to behave like a Jerkass the moment Edward came back on New Moon. It's not character derailment; it is Jacob getting jealous and hating Edward. The girl he loves is in love with the enemy. It would be Character derailment only if it happened offscreen and for no good reason.
    • Except that he suddenly went from nice guy to prick. Sure, jealousy can play a part, but it doesn't fully explain the assault. And if it was jealousy, then how could he suddenly be okay with ending up with their daughter?
    • It's an Author's Saving Throw. Meyer had written both characters as suitable matches for Bella (in her mind), so there was no clear reason for her (Bella) to choose one over the other. If Bella had just arbitrarily picked Edward, it would make her seem like a jerk for Breaking Jacob's heart. BUT If Jacob does something difinitive that removes him from the running, Bella can choose Edward as the "clearly better choice".
  • How can Eddie be constantly cold to the touch? Things are cold in real life because they are drawing heat from their surroundings; such as your hand. He'd have to dissipate the heat somehow in order to stay cold... or does magic not obey the Laws of Thermodynamics and I'm just reading too much into this?
    • Well, things frozen in time would be cold. I think Meyers just didn't realize it would be colder than anything in the universe.
    • I honestly don't think this of all things is impossible. Some metals and rocks feel cold to the touch because they're good conductors.
      • Upon reading this comment, I hereby declare Edward Cullen to be a lightning rod.
    • I thought Edward was cold because, being a vampire, he's actually dead. One of the few things the Meyerpires have in common with your average idea of a vampire.
      • It does explain why his body temperature is below average (i.e. way below 36°C). It does not explain why he's apparently cold as ice and doesn't really seem to get warmer.
    • Yeah, it's just a magic/supernatural thing that isn't the same as reality. You know, a Trope.
      • Which would be fine, if Meyer didn't insist on using science to explain how her vampires worked.
    • But as I recall, Eddie-kins kept Bella cool all night when they were at their honeymoon. Would she warm him up, instead of him keeping her cool?
    • Another issue: I think in the first book, during the meadow scene, there is actually some heat transfer from Bella to Edward after she's been lying against him, and they both comment on it.
  • How the heck do the get the energy they need to transform. All I ever saw was four of them eating muffins! True, a large pile of muffins, but is that it? Is that where the food budget for this poor tribe goes?
    • I'm pretty sure they do a lot of hunting. There's a lot of energy in matter if you can convert it differently than via combustion.
  • The tourists taken in by the bad vampires in Rome just disappear? What about their families, what about the investigations that would have to be done in order to find out why so many groups of people keep disappearing!
    • The Volturi all have magical powers. Maybe they can do really good cover-ups.
    • They're humans. Apparently they're not worth any care or concern from the supernatural beings or important people. And Meyer seems to believe that regular humans are too stupid to figure out certain things. Like that tourists tend to disappear in this one area quite frequently. Or that a guy just left a huge dent in a runaway van by stopping it with his bare hands and came out with no injuries to speak of. Or that those Cullen kids have missed half of the school year.
      • *sighs* Amazingly Meyer actually wrote an explanation if you guys bothered to at least look at the Twilight wiki before complaining (not that I blame you considering the material). They have a vampire who can make anyone so attracted to her they'll do whatever she says and follow her for however long it takes. So she goes very, very, very far away, gets a good group of people (probably from different sources to leave less of a link) and then guides them all the way back to the castle to die. So even if people start investigating the disappearances, they'll aways be looking several kilometres in the wrong direction.
        • And like most of what she says, the explanation makes little sense. This is from the same woman who said an island could exist off the west coast of Brazil. For all we know, "very far away" could mean the next block over. To that effect, searches tend to cover a fairly wide area. It doesn't matter how attractive a person is, most people are really only able to travel so far, so she'd have to remain within a certain distance of the end location. And given how often people are being led to the castle and their doom, eventually, people are going to pick up on the fact that there are groups of people entering a building and none of them come out or ever seen again.
        • 1) Supernatural attractiveness, keeping peple from thinking clearly. 2) She could have chartered a bus or a van. 3) The former is not doing her homework, the latter is stating that they don't hunt within their city or the surronding area to avoid suspicion. Much further than the next block. 3) It's a castle with secret entrances, surely at least one would be in a spot where nobody would notice people entering it (due to it being secret and hidden).
  • Don't the vampires ever question their existence or wonder why they are the way they are?
    • Normal vampires are controlled by their thirst. Quenching it is like a drug: it makes them content and lazy. They don't really have time to think. The vegetarian vampires are different, but it's not like they have anyone they can go ask about all of this. The Volturi seem to be the only people who know anything, and they completely don't understand them. And even the Volturi are fallible: They didn't know a vampire could make a human pregnant under certain circumstances.
  • If sparkling is such a threat, why can't they put on concealer, face paint, foundation, etc.?
    • Their skin would "eat" this human products I'm sure Rosalie would had found a way to use make up if she could get away with it.
    • How do, to quote Meyer, "cells with a singular facet of crystal with vampire venom lubrication," "eat" makeup? If venom is acidic, and Edward inseminates Bella with venom, injects Bella with it, and every vampire on EARTH is injected with it THROUGH TEETH... AAAHHHH!!
    • The venom destroyed Bella's contacts, so it looks like it applies to inorganic material (maybe not even all of them or on the same way), but when in contact with human living blood cells it transforms them, or when the venom that is mixed with sperm is transformed into vampire sperm. So that one shouldn't be acid to make sure that in the hypothetical case it finds a human egg it fertilizes it, instead of destroying it. Of course I'm not saying is perfect science I'm speculating how it works according to the events of the books.
      • The biggest problem with that, though, is she should have just been vamped from the sex. No way sex that rough didn't provide some vaginal tearing, and if kissing open-mouth was too dangerous for fear of getting vamped, sex should definitely be. I think the possibility of Edward tearing Bella a bit is a lot more likely than her having a nasty case of gingivitis.
      • Well if Bella was properly lubricating, even if the sex left her bruised it doesn't mean her lady parts are going to get torn up. (Vaginas are very elastic--a baby comes out of it, after all!) Also, I don't think Edward knew at the time that his gentleman parts had also venom; he was working under the impression that his saliva was the only poisonous part of him (ha so going down on Bella for the first time). It looks like they hadn't really researched vampirism at large given that they didn't know about the hybrids, not even the Volturi that are more ancient than the Cullens.
      • But they know that the eyes contain venom as well. And yeah, the vagina is elastic, but extremely rough sex will cause at least microscopic tears in the vaginal canal. If the sex was enough to leaves bruises, it was enough to leave tears.
      • Bella was a virgin. So was Edward, so I doubt either of them knew anything about lube. Even if they did, if her hymen was intact at the time, even very gentle sex would have torn that.
      • I assume that there's different types of fluid in the vampires with different levels of potency. Also, sperm doesn't enter your bloodstream.
      • Actually, some of the fluids and stuff in semen CAN enter the bloodstream through the vaginal walls. That's how ST Is spread.
      • True. Flesh isn't absorbent tissue for nothing. I'm just assuming that neither was a virgin or that Edward was too small to stretch her, and then all that's left is how venom could be neither acidic nor alkaline enough to dissolve all of Bella's ova, yet still hurt like fucking hell when it enters the blood stream.
  • For that matter how do they get their Kaleidoscope Eyes past everyone?

Jessica/Angela/Mike/Tyler: Hey Edward.
Edward: What?
Jessica: Weren't your eyes yellow this morning?
Edward: No.
Jessica: Yes they were, I saw them. Angela, Mike, and Tyler say them. All of our teachers saw them!
Edward: No they weren't.

    • Its stated that they didn't got close to humans before Bella entered Forks. Not to mention that they could have told everyone that sometimes they use contacts. Edward just didn’t think of that because he was too busy feeling the "urges he never felt before on a century." People often miss that Edward became a big dork around Bella.
  • Vampires eat humans. Wouldn't this be more likely?

Bella: Hi.
Edward: (reveals fangs and kills her)

    • The END!
      • In Midnight Sun, Edward was actually calculating how fast he could kill the entire class before eating Bella. [2.5 seconds per head, if you were wondering.] Unfortunately, this does not happen. DAMN IT EDWARD, JUST KILL HER ALREADY.
    • They've went to high school forever without incident. It would more likely go like this:

Bella: Hi.
Edward: Go away.
'Edward (Later)': Hey, Carlisle, could you tell the school I transferred until we move? There's this girl at school that smells very delicious, and I don't think I can handle not biting her if we share any classes.
Carlisle: Sure, son! I'm glad you understand the importance of keeping our secret, and since we'll be moving soon you'll be re-learning the things you missed in another two years anyway. I'll ask [any non-Jasper sibling who attends school] to take a look at this girl to make sure you're not just trying to skip classes, but I'll send a sick note for tomorrow. Now, let's go play a game of catch!

    • And this is actually what happened. Edward left for two weeks, but he both missed his family and got resentful.
      • Apparently just staying home wasn't an option. It was either go to school, or move to Alaska. Those are the only two choices.
  • So, you know how Smeyer says that female vamps can have sex with human men, but not get pregnant, because their bodies don't change? If their bodies don't change and can't stretch, then the vaginal canal can't tent, meaning it's about two inches deep. Her vamps also are freezing cold, and all their bodily fluid has been replaced with acidic venom. How's that for a treat, gentlemen? A smoking hot babe with two whole inches of freezing cold, acid-filled lady bits just waiting for you!
    • I think you're being entirely too literal. "Their bodies don't change" means "they don't age and the biological functions required for conception no longer occur". It doesn't mean things don't bend, stretch or tent (otherwise it would be impossible for them to do things like walk or smile).
    • Then again, there is still the cold, acidic passage...
      • It wouldn't feel cold to them. They are cold themselves. And again, they're acidic too. You can't be bothered that they're filled with acid when you are yourself
        • I think you're missing the point. It's not that the female vampire would be uncomfortable with herself, it's that no man wants to stick his penis in a cold, acidic orifice.
  • And yet another plot hole - it was implied in Breaking Dawn that Tanya and her sisters usually killed the men that they slept with. And no one notices that men go off to some remote part of Alaska and are never heard from again? In this day and age? Not to mention the fact that it sort of undermines their clan being "good" vampires for abstaining from human blood, since they're still providing death by screwing (arguably a more pleasant way to die, but still...)
    • Actually, that was long time ago. They didn't live in Alaska all the time, that was a settlement they got after they became vegetarian and they haven't killed men for at least as long as Carlisle has known them. They are good "reformed" vegetarian vampires.
  • What was the point in calling the werewolves in Meyer's world "shapeshifters"? While they may not turn at a wolf on a full moon, don't really see why she would care. Just look at how she raped Vampire folklore, I don't think she would care about werewolf mythology either.
    • The closest guess I can give is that she didn't want her so-called 'shape-shifters' to be the monsters that werewolves are made out to be, chucking away prospects like slaughtering the ones they love when the full moon shines down or being killed by silver. But then again, it's only a guess.
      • My guess is that when she continues to write the books from Leah and Renesmee POV, she might have a last real werewolf storyline/character to be part of the story and needed to make a differentiation to plant the seed of it, again just a guess.
      • Wasn't it mentioned somewhere that "real werewolves" had been hunted to near extinction by the Volturi in an attempt to show just how badass the Volturi were supposed to be?
      • Why not just make it that the tribe was one of the few werewolves left? It's seems Meyer just wanted to create some small, instantly solvable conflict between the Volturi and the Quileute tribe.
      • Or she plans to introduce the last real werewolf on future stories. Maybe he would be Leah's love interest, given that is odd that she left her unpaired, specially on this books.
    • According to Meyer's FAQ, the thing with the werewolves/shapeshifters was just a loophole brought up so that the Volturi wouldn't have an excuse to launch an attack. She said that under most circumstances, everyone would just go with it and call the Quileutes "werewolves", they only used the shapeshifter card for the Volturi.
      • Honestly, it just sounds pointless. Why not call them shapeshifters in the first place then? If they are shapeshifters and not werewolves, then why do they only transform into wolves? And what's with taking creatures and giving them completely different labels? Her shapeshifters are werewolvess and her vampires are fairies...why not just call them what they are?
  • In the new novella, Victoria is apparently hiding in a house in the woods. A house that's painted bright pink and blue and green and white and has elaborate trim and looks like a gingerbread cottage. For God's sake, why??? Why is there a house like that in the middle of the woods of Washington? Are there fairy tale LARPers or something? And why would Victoria live there? It sounds like a house like that would just attract a ton of unwanted attention. Or was it Victoria the one who made the house look like that? Because again, why? That's just stupid! It makes no sense at all!
    • Makes perfect sense to me. Who would be expecting someone to be hiding there?
    • But why is it there to begin with? Are there a lot of abandoned cottages in the woods around Forks? At least Bella and Edward's dream home had the excuse that Esme fixed it up for them. Either someone built a brightly-painted storybook cottage in the middle of the woods, or Victoria painted it that way. Which leads again to the question of why? Did she take time out of her meticulous revenge scheme to make her hideaway look like a Easter egg?
      • It could also be someone's vacation house, with her super sense she could had known how long there had not been humans around and she is smart making some questions, and doing some digging she might had know for how long the house was safe or in any case she could had just looked for a home of someone that would not be missed (and elderly couple, a loner that had few or none family and friends or with a habit of disappearing often enough that their loved ones wouldn't go looking for them till months passed, a drug dealer's hideaway...) and ate them to make space for herself. There are many ways to get a house once you are a merciless, smart and powerful killer.
      • There's a lot of oddballs living in the pacific northwest, not all of whom keep reliable contact with civilization in general. If the house isn't on a major road, it might be days or weeks between other people seeing it. Victoria eats people. I see no reason to assume that the cottage was abandoned when she found it, and if it's unreasonable to think she'd take time to make her hideout look like an Easter egg, it also seems like a good bet that she wouldn't take much time to make her hideout not look like an Easter egg, especially if she already chose a spot that was out of the way.
        • Dunno, maybe it's because all the books stress how boring and common and ordinary everyone in the area are. Perhaps that's why the thought of there being something like that is so odd...
    • Actually sounds like a blatant Hansel and Gretel reference to me. (i.e. Victoria is the Cannibal witch, Bree and Diego or whomever the abandonned siblings.) It falls in line with the rest of Meyer's unsubtle use of all things metaphorical or allegorical.
  • So, how is it that James can't smell Bella until he's downwind of her, and then can suddenly follow her scent all over town despite the fact that she drives everywhere? No one leaves that much genetic residue, which is why bloodhounds can't follow a trail if the person gets into a car. Even with SOOPER VAMPIRE SENSES, if he couldn't smell her five feet away, he also can't smell her in a car.
    • I assume that James could smell her before, he just didn't remark upon it because he assumed the smell was just a residual from someone who had passed through before, until he realized that she was right there. This still doesn't make much sense, because if her smell is so fantastic, why wasn't he going, "Hey guys apparently there's a real hottie in town, let's go find her" or something? But it makes at least a little more sense. And he still shouldn't be able to smell her in the car, either.
    • It is clearer in the books: James and his coven were not even close to town they were passing by when they hear the Cullens playing. They also didn't think it possible for a human to be alive amongst seven vampires, so, if they did smell her, they'd think they'd just eaten and she was dead.
  • One thing that occurred to me recently is the birthday scene in New Moon. I recently turned 16, and my best friend has another month to wait until she's 16, which means I'm older than her. it doesn't piss me off though. In fact, I'm often happy that I'm older. So why is Bella wangsting about being older than Edward? Heck, she isn't really older, anyways.
    • It was probably meant to give her a reason to try and get Edward to turn her. Other factors probably included the stereotype that guys have to be older than girls (not a problem for Edward since he's been around for over a century) and Bella afraid of being old and wanting to hang onto her youth.
    • She's 18. Edward stopped aging at 17. Paedo!Bella (technically, Ephebo!Bella) would have no longer been able to legally have sex with Edward in all fifty states if he remained a legal entity and his chronological age had stopped increasing at the time of his original death. For some reason, this matters to her. It was also a milestone towards her becoming wrinkly and dead.
      • Of course, that's only assuming that the age of consent in all states is 18. It really shouldn't be a problem since some states like Washington have sixteen as the age of consent. No problem there.
      • But that doesn't make sense: presumably, Edward's legal age would not be fixed at 17, because that would be really freaking suspicious.
      • "...in all fifty states..." "...if he remained a legal entity and his chronological age had stopped at the time of his death..." I never said it made in-universe sense, and followed it up with what seems to be the author's intent ("...a milestone towards her becoming wrinkly and dead").
    • It has less to do with legalities and more to do with Bella simply being pretentious.
  • Why does Edward Cullen pass around as a 17-year-old when he could pass himself off as a an 18-year-old with full legal rights? If I were a 100-something-year-old vampire with the body of someone in his late teens, I would still prefer to be treated as a young adult than as a teenager.
    • The books state that the Cullens started to study there two years before Bella arrived so Edward 17th year old person passed himself as a 15th year when he first entered school, and has been "aging" accordingly. So he will legally reach 18 at some point, guessing he can play a slowly aging young adult he might be able to graduate from college, again, and pretending to be 23 or 24, before starting all over again. You have to wonder how did he passed as just 15 years old and Rosalie and Emmett passing as 16 year old ones, specially Emmett that is already big for his age.
  • If the object of a werewolf's imprinting were to become a vampire, would the werewolf reject his imprintee? Canon makes out that they truly hate each other, smell awful to the other, and have a biological impulse to kill is triggered. But then Breaking Dawn has Jacob imprint on a half-vampire and be totally cool with it? WHAT IS THE LOGIC?
    • Well, half-vampires are inexplicably rather different from full vampires. The temperature and the smell are different, for example. Bella describes Renesmee as smelling halfway between the best food in the world (human) and the most beautiful perfume in the world (vampire). Presumably she smells a bit off to Jacob but not to the point of burning his nose like a full vampire.
    • Author's Saving Throw. Meyer needed SOME way of keeping Jacob as Bella's best friend.
    • I personally think the imprint would be broken. Imprinting was described as a way of getting the best werewolf genes for the next generation, and so if the girl became a vampire (Leah being the only female werewolf, so most imprintees would be female) then she would no longer be able to breed and the need for an imprint would be gone. That's just what I think would happen though
  • It just bugs me that when the Truck is delivered to Bella upon arriving in Forks, the Jacob and Billy Black don't bring a ride home. Did they walk--well, wheel--there?
    • Wasn't Jacob only 15 at that point? He wouldn't have been old enough to drive, at most he'd have had a learner's permit. And the reason Bella gets the truck is that Billy can't drive it any longer because of his accident, isn't it? Perhaps they didn't bring another vehicle because they couldn't actually drive it home. Maybe Charlie took them home? I can't remember :P
      • Disabled people can still drive- they just use hand controls instead of pedals. So who knows? Charlie probably drove them home.
      • Obviously disabled people can still drive, but they would have to be in a vehicle set up with hand controls instead of pedals. The reason Bella got that specific car is because Billy could no longer drive it, it's not set up to accommodate his disability. That's the reasoning given for Charlie buying the truck from him. How they got home, though, is a mystery!
        • It didn't directly involve Bella, and therefore was of no importance whatsoever.
  • Why do they call the vampires "vegetarian" just because they drink animal blood rather than human blood? Maybe this is just my inner Granola Girl talking, but vampires drink blood, and since there isn't any such thing as plant blood, vampires cannot be vegetarian.
    • It's more of a injoke between vampires than an actual scientific definition. Normal vampires see humans as little more than food (or blood), and have no qualms sucking them dry. "Vegetarian" vampires see people as living, sentient beings and thus only eat things they perceive to not be intelligent, self aware beings. In other words, it's taking an incredibly simplistic view of meat-eaters and vegetarians and apply it to a vampire perspective; from their point of view sucking you dry is no different from you enjoying a nice steak, and drinking animal blood is not that different from refusing to eat meat for moral reasons. Or in short, just apply the MST3K Mantra and don't think about it too much.
  • How come The Second Life of Bree Tanner is told in past tense and first person if the narrator dies at the end?
    • Maybe because that's how she normally writes and she didn't want to be a spoiler?
  • So, Aro keeps Marcus on because he has a useful power. Aro himself is a mastermind who also has a useful power. Then...there's Caius. He doesn't show any useful power; in fact, he seems to have no special power at all. On top of that, he's extremely belligerent. You'd think that a group whose plan relies on subtlety wouldn't pick a total hothead as one of its leaders. And if he does have some awesome power that we don't know of, what could possibly be Meyer's motive for not telling us?
    • I don't know about the first half of the question, now that you mention it, but a possible motive could be leaving herself a backdoor to come up with a good explanation for keeping Caius on hand. Y'know, somewhere down the line.
      • Since she's apparently done with the series I doubt it. From what the wiki says he was impressed with his hatred for the Romanian vampires and that's why he got his position. Personally I had a moment of Fridge Brilliance while working at the movie theatre today (my god, opening night those girls squealed when Jacob took his shirt off. It was deafening) that Caius is kept around specifically to make Aro look more compassionate and friendly in comparison, as a better disguise for the fact that he's easily the evilest of the lot.
  • How exactly is the live action version of Edward hot? I know little of these books, but his actual book self seems appealing. Robert however turns him into Uncanny Valley.
    • Uncanny Valley isn't the same for everyone. The fact that many girls find him hot is enough. He doesn't have to be as hot as described in the book, as that's just Bella's description.
  • Question - If Edward can foresee that leaving Bella will make her do insanely stupid crap to get herself killed and/or to see Edward again, why does he decide that that's a better plan? The worst thing that could happen if he stays with her is that Bella gets turned into a vampire, and even that's pretty unlikely from what we've seen of her resilience (and having a vampire doctor nearby doesn't hurt. But, if he leaves her, chances are that both Bella and he will DIE.
    • Actually Edward imagined that Bella will be sad,but like any normal teenager she will get over it. He never guessed she will get herself killed over him and actually she didn't the accident happened when she did something reckless but she wasn't planning suicide if she did Alice would had warned Edward and he had never had left. The fact that she never actually planned on hurting herself is the missing link on his plan.
      • There's no reason he couldn't have Alice look ahead for Bella's ultimate reaction, but then reason was never his strong point.
  • Bella's sudden moral to do this the right way at the end of Eclipse. As someone who doesn't seem really want to save herself till marriage it annoyed me right at the end of Eclipse that she only wanted to have sex after they were married? She never cared before, so why now?
    • Well Bella didn't had a moral reason to wait, she though it was unnecessary, and ridiculous but it was not like she had a moral reason to have sex before marriage. But Edward explained her his reasons. She decided to please him because she has dated him for two years now she knows very well that he will regret it after the did and it was only a month's wait. It doesn't seem that hard to believe that after thinking about it, she decide that it wasn't such a big deal to wait till they said their vows so he could be more at peace when he turned her later on.
    • She also only wanted a baby two seconds after finding out she was pregnant, after openly admitted that she never, ever wanted to be a mother.
    • That could be explained as her lying to herself since she was so set on being a vampire (she might not want to think about anything which could affect that happening, such as her wanting a child) or more likely she might not have really thought about it until she was pregnant with Edward's baby. Beforehand she had probably been thinking about babies in general, rather than her baby specifically and what that would be like
  • What was up with the climax of New Moon? So Alice has a vision that Bella was dead, and immediately decides to tell everyone that it already happened, even though it was a vision of the future. She then sees that Bella is very much alive, and decides to hang around for girly time, instead of calling her family and letting them know, oops, her bad, Bella didn't die! And then, when they find out what Edward would do, why didn't they call the Volturi and give them warning of Edward's plan? She said the Volturi were fond of Carlisle and would possibly spare Edward out of charity, plus they want him to join their group. Why not tell them that Edward is suicidal and misinformed, and could the Volturi just restrain him when he goes to expose himself?
    • Because apparently vampires don't have cell phones and it wouldn't be nearly as dramatic.
      • The Volturi are very old-fashioned and are perfectly content with that. They don't seem to need or want electronic devices.
  • If newborns are so much more powerful, then why couldn't Bree protect herself when the Volturi tried to kill her?
    • I don't think they're necessarily more powerful than any other vampires, they just have less control. They go into violent rages and are almost incapable of stopping themselves (except Bella, of course). As a result, they tend to inflict a lot more damage than older vampires that will pick their battles and feed with discretion in order to avoid being exposed to humans or get into that next big fight that might end with them being torn to pieces.
      • In short, they are Berserkers.
    • On top of this, it seems that the Volturi are so feared specifically because they are so much more powerful than the average vampire and nearly all have special abilities. It wouldn’t make sense if they weren't more powerful than the newborns, at least. Why would anyone fear them.
      • No, younger vamps are definitely stated to be more physically powerful than older ones a number of times, example: Bella states in Breaking Dawn that despite Edward being able to move his legs quicker, she (being a newborn) was so powerful that one bound of hers equated to three of his, so she could keep up with him. The problem with Bree was that she was frozen with fear of the "Dark-Cloaks", given that they frightened even her (read: Victoria). As to why people would fear the Volturi a.) the abilities (Alec alone could probably incapacitate an army) b.) newborn strength can be countered effectively if you know how to fight them (hence Jasper training the Cullens) and I'm guessing the Volturi have had plenty of newborn fighting experience.
  • One problem that I just cannot get out of my head is that of the werewolf origin myth, specifically the actions of the wife. First, she kills herself rather than, say, slicing her palm or cheek or some other non-fatal area. If the vampire was so bloodlusty as to have slaughtered an entire village, you'd think it wouldn't take all that much to distract her. Second, there are literally bodies piled up around her (In the film at least, not certain about the book). She has to have spilled liters of blood by now, and still be smelling it, and yet the addition of just a tiny bit more distracts her from her fight long enough for the werewolf to kill her. Although, maybe the wife just had the same Fresh Steak Blood™ as Bella.
    • Because if she didn't kill herself it would have been less dramatic.
    • Freesia-blood, dear, it makes all the difference.
    • But in that case, a simple cut would have worked perfectly well and the self-harm wouldn't have needed to be fatal.
    • The wife didn't know how fast the wolves would kill the vampire, and she likely didn't know how strong the reaction to her blood would be. She had the quick thought that she could be a distraction, and decided to kill herself and give everyone else a chance to live.
  • On the same note as the question above, why was the woman in the story allowed to bleed out? it doesn't happen instantly,why didn't anyone try to apply pressure to the wounds before she bled to death? or why didn't she herself try to apply pressure to the wounds once she saw that cutting herself had had the desired effect? did she want to die?
    • Apparently. From what I remember she stabbed herself in the heart. I don't think applying pressure will help much.
      • On the other hand, how was she to pull the knife out so she could bleed profusely and distract the vampire? Her heart was practically exploded and all her muscles relaxed. It would have been more efficient to open an artery or, if she really was suicidal, cut her own throat.
    • Ok then, why does she stab herself in the heart? As the commenter above explained, that would have impaired blood flow and even if you're going to use the argument that she didn't know that and was probably panicked at the time it still doesn't make any sense because she'd still want to use the quickest method and stabbing someone in the heart is pretty difficult (I imagine stabbing yourself in the heart would be even harder) it still would have been far easier and faster for her to just cut her wrist or throat (and it's common knowledge that those areas contain arteries.) Plus, even if she were desperate to save her husband and panicked and all that, you'd think she still wouldn't want to kill herself and would posses enough sense to realize that there are plenty of ways for a person to make them self bleed without dieing. Really, in the end, it reads as her having been suicidal and waiting or an excuse to end it all (which the vampire attack provided her with.)
    • The real question is, why didn't Bella stab herself in something more vital than the arm? If she had, she would have had to be turned to save her life, which is what she wanted.
    • In-universe it's been handed down and retold by members of the tribe. I would think that it this point it's a fictional story based on real events. We don't know exactly how it happened, and I would guess that "stabbed in the heart" sounds a lot more meaningful and symbolic than "cut an artery" or something closer to what could have happened.
  • James is said to have supernaturally keen senses and his sense of smell is acute enough to tell that a vampire wearing Bella's coat brushed against a tree to try and throw him off. If his sense of smell is THAT good, hitting him in the face with Mace or Pepper Spray should have overloaded his senses and sent him into catatonia or unconsciousness.
    • Vampires can't lose consciousness.
    • But they can be detered. Though, maybe they enjoy the scent of pepper spray, it's not like blood smells at all delicious to humans either.
  • Did I miss something or will Bella will live her eternity with her bloody stomach in pieces? I mean, Smeyer told that when someone becomes a vampire, their body freeze in time somehow, which means they can't heal, and didn't Bella became a vampire when Edward was tearing her belly apart to make her give birth?
    • Nah, the venom conveniently heals everything. That's why Esme, who jumped off a cliff, is not eternally confined to her bed. And Emmett was mauled by a bear, but he's fine now, obviously.
  • In Breaking Dawn, Renesmee's bites are described as non-venomous. However, Nahuel, another Dhampyr, is said to have turned his aunt. So does the status of a Meyerdhampyr venom differ on a case-by-case basis or is this another example of inconsistencies?
    • When did he turn her? Dhampyr venom may manifest post puberty or maybe only in males.
    • Original Tropette here: According to the Twilight wiki, Nahuel turned his aunt soon after birth.
    • Well, doesn't Renesmee turn Bella? Maybe they have venom before and soon after birth but lose it later.
    • Only the males are venomous. And it's Edward who turns Bella.
    • There only had been one male hybrid and that male is venomous. Smeyer hasn't explained if this is a coincidence or only males can have venom.
      • Since it seems to be inherited from the father (in such a union, the vampire is always the father and the human always a mother), maybe S Meyer would say something like venom is a Y-chromosome thing. Y'know, like an interest in cars, being unable to cook their own food, and losing their temper.
    • There's something like six female hybrids and one male hybrid outside of Renesmee. Only Nahuel is venomous. Thats approx. 7 non-venomous girls and one venomous male. Its quite likely that only males are venomous (though random chance is still possible too)
  • Why do the Cullens even associate with humans at all? I mean, no one goes to their house (or anywhere near there), they never age, which does end up bringing some awkward questions (as evidenced by New Moon), they don't need food, they don't need to keep buying clothes, etc. so the money is almost pointless. And, as an added bonus, keeping the kids away from humans will prevent anything from going horribly, horribly wrong! Other vampires seem to be able to do this. What makes the Cullens so special that they have to?
    • I think it's the father's doctor instinct. Plus I think they are all doing their best to reject their vampirism. Remember, Carlisle turned them to save their lives, not because he wanted them to actually be vampires.
      • Then why the flip don't they interact with people and generally act like humans?
        • They don't interact with humans because for being "vegetarian vampires", they still hold the attitude that they're superior and that humans are not worth their notice. But it's not like they have anything else to do with their time since Carlisle is the only one who actually does anything for a living.
        • Or that the risk of flipping out if someone gets a papercut is too much of a risk for them to take. Plus, the better they get to know a human the more that human will notice about them.
        • In which case, they shouldn't be going to school and hanging out around humans on a regular basis to begin with.
        • Then they become detached from humanity and become monsters overtime. The whole point behind them interacting with Humans is to get them to see them as people, not as food. If you don't interact with humans, eventually you'll stop considering them as people and start thinking of them as something lesser. Plus, Charisle is a doctor. He's always going to be helping people because that's what he does (and apparantly Edward in a few cases goes through med-school). If they don't interact with humans, how is Charisle going to blend in?
        • But they're still detached from humanity anyway because they don't see humans as people. At all. Edward was fully intending to slaughter a room full of innocent people, and only decided not to because he was worried that Bella's blood would go cold by the time he got to drink it. If anything, Carlisle being a doctor makes him blend in LESS, not more. The process of becoming a doctor takes years and there is a constant need for continuing education to learn about the new styles and approaches. The Cullens are constantly moving around to avoid people noticing that they don't age, and yet Carlisle has a well-known reputation as a very experienced doctor. That is counter-productive to the whole "don't let the humans find out about us" issue.
        • That situation was because Bella's blood was overwhelmingly attractive to him to the point he stopped thinking rationally (which doesn't make him a Complete Monster so for the love of god don't bring that page up. We're trying to clean it up right now and tropers like you are just fucking it up more.) As for Carlisle, there's this wonderful thing called forgery, fake credentials, etc. and he's got enough money to buy people's silence and skills. We already know that Alice has a contact who specialises in creating new identities for people; wit enough money Carisle can buy enough documentation to show he's as skilled as he is (and he probably does go for more education to keep his skills up to date).
        • His thinking was still rather concise and logical for his intent to commit mass slaughter, especially given that Bella's blood going cold before he could drink it was the ONLY thing keeping him from going through with it. Forgery and buying documentation does not earn one the level of reputation we are supposed to believe Carlisle has, to the point where he was sought after by several major hospitals. Lets also keep in mind that the regular education for a doctor involves YEARS of continuous work, something Carlisle cannot afford to have if they want to downplay their identities as vampires. Even if he is attending Harvard every decade or so, that means he'd be spending just as much time re-learning everything as he is actually working and thus not have the time to build up a reputation. Plus if he's constantly re-doing medical school, tenure ensures the likelihood that professors will probably stay at Harvard for more than ten years, and Carlisle is quite distinctive in appearance and apparently adept enough in this field to be noticed. False documentation and money can't buy anyone a reputation like that. And that's not even going into the required background checks on all medical personnel by law and how Carlisle is able to fake school records and the memories of the alumni. Especially if this is the guy who is supposed to be running the hospital. Not only would this likely not work, but just the fact that he's attempting it at all kind of puts a spotlight on him and the family that makes it questionable whether they are even really trying to keep their secret hidden.
        • He's naturally a hunter, and you're still dodging the issue that his was a one-off occurance for him. As for Carlisle, the forged documenation only refers to his identity along with documentation to back up whatever level of skill he wants to pass as. What makes you think he always goes to Harvard instead of just going to new unniversities? And he got his reputation through his work, he didn't buy that. He just bought the credentials to get the work to begin with. And again you're not counting the fact that A) Charsile is incredibly wealthy, B) he's made a lot of contacts over his long lifetime, C) he's a doctor in a small-town, and D) people with less money and skill have managed to pull off similar forgeries. All he has to do is spend enough money to buy records and the right's people's words (or just save their lives) and he can get in.
        • What "one-off occurrence"? He's killed people before and he honestly hasn't shown any indication of giving a damn about them now, if his desire to murder a classroom full of innocent folks and complete nonchalance at the blatant loss of life Victoria's causing until Bella is directly threatened are any indication. If he considers slaughtering people to be an acceptable loss and doesn't care how many innocent lives are destroyed as a result of his actions, saying he's detached from humanity is an understatement. And the whole "hunter" bit doesn't excuse him because he's constantly being emo about "being a monster", not because he actually regrets how much he's hurt people, but because of what his actions may imply about HIM. I think Carlisle goes to Harvard because Word of God says he goes to Harvard. Reputation takes time to build up. If he's constantly moving and changing his identity to avoid detection, that does not allow much time to become well-known. And law requires the checking of those credentials. Someone's bound to notice things are off at some point. As for your points, A) wealth can get the illegal documentation but not a reputation, B) he couldn't make that many contacts over his long life because that would increase risk of detection when they realize he's not aging (and being doctors, that's kind of a likely scenario), C) a well-known doctor in a small-town running the only hospital the town has and thus would be required to have worked there for a good while previously and have the officials looking into his background, and D) for how long and as opposed to how many who tried and failed? The law enforcement and medical licensing officials are not that stupid. He can forge to his heart's content, but they keep track of who is licensed and who isn't, and those people have to regularly update their status. Time-wise, it makes no sense. Legal-wise, it doesn't work. And none of that changes the very real fact that he's making himself noticeable to the point of endangering their secret. Unless they have amazing hacking skills that lets them remove any previous evidence of Carlisle's other personas, which Meyer never said they had. Just like she never said how he got past official investigations or that he bribed people to lie for him, which would still involve people knowing something's not right about him anyway and thus endanger the secret. Face it, Carlisle as a doctor is an obvious issue in terms of the "don't let anyone find out we're not normal" plan.
    • First off; Edward killed people he thought deserved it. A far cry from innocent people, and even then he eventually came to hate doing it. Was he indifferent to people dying because of Victoria? ...who knows? It's never brought up, he was more focused on Mary Sue and her safety. Again with Charlise, yes he probably has people who knows he's not normal. He doesn't seem oppossed to the idea at all; he doesn't bat an eye at Bella knowing that he and his family are vampires, and he doesn't care when Bella's father finds out about it to.
      • And that certainly makes it better, doesn't it? As long as Edward thought they deserved it. Then again, he apparently thought a bunch of high school kids deserved it, too. And again, he only hated it because it meant HE was a bad person for doing it. Yes, he was indifferent. He made no mention of them and expressed no concern despite knowing that people had to be dying for Victoria to be creating a vampire army. He didn't give a damn about Victoria at all until it became clear that Bella was the target. Nevermind that they could have taken her out and prevented the immense loss of innocent lives or anything. Plus his comment to Bella at the scene where innocent people were being taken to be eaten by the Volturi was an apology for her seeing it, not that it was happening. He doesn't care about anyone besides Bella. If Carlisle has people who know he's not normal, that means their vampire secret isn't a secret and they're breaking vampire law, which would then set the Volturi off. It's still counter-productive to the "don't let humans know" problem. Bella, being a Mary Sue Author Avatar, was obviously going to be an exception. And I suppose her dad should have been expected so Bella could keep what little she may have valued from her human life. But hell, it's honestly a surprise that the entire town doesn't know about the secret with how poorly they hide it.
    • There's a chance it's something like they want to identify with humans, because they still want to be human/e though they are vampire. It's like when someone converted to a religion prefers to spend time around other people from that religion in order to not get the "wrong" influences... just opposite, so that they are vampires converted to humanism instead of humans converted to vampirism.
      • Then, it could also be that they are secretly looking for a "missing" component to their otherwise perfect, four-couple family, given that they basically cut out any and all contact with humans after Bella is turned.
        • Except with Charlie, Sue Clearwater and the Quileutes. Makes one wonder how Bella could drive to Charlie's on Christmas Eve without being noticed.
  • Is it ever explained why Bella is Vampire Catnip with built-in psychic shielding?
    • Nope, it's never explained in canon. It's mostly a plot contrivance to keep us from ever wondering why on earth a girl like Bella (intended to be very, very average so as to relate to every reader) would be surrounded by so much ridiculous supernatural nonsense. By being, in the magic of the universe, a very very special snowflake, Bella is supposed to attract this vampire-and-werewolf stuff like a magnet. Also, it serves as an excuse to have a practically omniscient male lead while preserving the "drama" of will-they-or-won't-they, and to move the plot along whenever Smeyer needs it moved along (which is pretty much every time.) She's the ultimate McGuffin.
    • It's part of the Mary Sue package (but she is a better example than any other, if you ask me): On the one hand, she attracts the hottest guy ever; OTOH, he can't hurt her even if he wanted. Have her cake and eat it too. And because she's plain average, she also hasn't to deal with other girls becoming bitchy at her. No wonder many women like the idea.
      • Somehow though she gets it from her father too, who has a lesser verion (Edward can only sense his emotions).
      • Except for the little detail that Edward is supposed to be able to read minds, not emotions,
      • Emotions come hand in hand with thoughts. And it's written in the Midnight Son draft that Edward can only read Charlie's emotions, having no clue what his actual thoughts are.
      • There's still a set difference between what's going on with a person emotionally and mentally. Otherwise, Jasper would be able to read thoughts and Edward would be able to read the emotions of people other than Charlie.
    • In the meadow, Edward explains that every person has a different "essence". He is basically saying that Bella smells so freaking good to everyone because she is a "good person". (That is, by some different definition of "good person" that no one ever has heard of before.)
  • Why in the world do the Cullen "kids" keep attending high school over and over again? Sounds like some kind of special Hell. I realize they can stay longer in one place the "younger" they start out, so why can't they just say they're homeschooled? That would also limit their contact with humans and lessen the chance of suspicious questions being raised.
    • Several reasons.
      • High School on this small town is the place where the much amount of minds collide, so Edward can have a close surveillance of the humans in case someone start to have ideas so they can move out before they investigate it.
      • Home schooled newbies could get more people paying attention to them, than a group of snobbish kids feeling they are better than anyone could do.
      • Jasper needs the practice of being around humans and they cannot have him alone with just Alice to prevent him from eating one of the kids, so they all go.
        • And what does Jasper use for practice? High school kids.
      • They choose overcast places so they can go out, it would be stupid for them no to try to live as humans as possible lives, I mean they don't pose as HS all the time but in Forks it was the easiest way to go out almost daily, stay together and Jasper to practice and they were going to need papers for college anyway soon enough. It just made sense when they moved back for them to pose as students for a couple of years.
  • Why in the world would the Cullens choose a town like Forks to live normal lives? S Meyer admitted she just did a quick Google search on the area (but the flaws behind her findings are a whole different post) but why didn't she just move them to a big city where it would have been so much easier to go unnoticed? A small town like Forks is ripe with gossip and they're actually more likely to get noticed and talked about (as we saw in 'Twilight') than if they were in a larger city where, lets face it, people barely notice anything not related to their own lives.
    • Well, I'm not a fan of the series or anything, but I think it's because Forks was the most overcast place in America so they could go outside more often than in a big city. I assume that it's also because they live so long, they've lived in big cities before. And that Jasper dude who is the youngest, he is still at risk of cracking and attacking a human, right? So it's best to live in a place with a smaller population while he's training or whatever, so he won't be overwhelmed by all the fresh meat. I think that's probably a better argument than the overcast-town one, because I live in a place that's famous for being foggy more than any other place in the country, but it's still bright blue skies pretty darn often.
    • Also, they name of the town is Forks, and thus represents a "crossroads" for Bella.
  • How many Bellas have there been?
    • Could you elaborate?
      • Certainly. Edward's been a teenager for God knows how long. He's also a vampire. Vampires drink blood. Vampires have no human emotion. Do the maths.
      • It's explicitly said, both on this page and in the book, that Vampires do, in fact, have human emotion. Maybe ones in other universes don't, but in this they do. There have been no other Bellas, Edward is celibate and drinks animal blood.
  • If vampires can't bear children through traditional means, why don't they just bite a few kids and "adopt" them that way?
    • Because they'd be stuck in child bodies forever.
    • Immortal children are executed, along with their creator. Although nothing stopping them from just raising normal kid's and changing them upon adulthood...
      • Besides the fact that children normally tend to get into accidents. Involving blood. Which sets vampires into a frenzy. Not to mention that kids aren't the best at keeping secrets, and saying the wrong thing at the wrong time could bring more attention to the 'parents.'
  • The book has a lot of issues, but for now, I'll just bring up one of the biggest... Bella. Just, Bella. Well, why everyone loves her. I have a hard time buying the whole "Her blood smells good" thing because Edward has been a vampire for over a hundred years. He's been to many places and has probably been around hundreds of thousands of girls. I just have a hard time believing that Bella is so super duper special. Trying to go into this could've made some good plot, but it's never really explored. (in canon, anyway. I've actually read a few decent fanfics that try to explain what REALLY goes on in Edward's mind and why he REALLY wants her, what he's really thinking and whatnot) I'm just saying...
    • Because Bella is Meyer's self-insert, so Meyer gives her everything she herself would want. As such, Bella is a Mary Sue.
  • God help me, I can't believe this even occurred to me, but... Jacob is supposedly obsessed with Bella because his werewolfy imprinting senses knew that one of her ovum would apparently become his imprint-ee. Since we have obviously established vampire men make sperm (I'll skip the rant about men being "unchanging" and how spermogenesis actually works)... why isn't Jacob equally obsessed with EDWARD'S little spermies? I mean they have 23 chromosomes that Bella's egg does, so... I'm just gonna... stop here. I am not responsible for any fanfics this piece of Fridge Logic produces.
    • Ho Yay, anyone?
    • Males produce sperm throughout their life (or unlife in this case). Females are born with all the eggs they will ever have.
      • So many questions follow this line of thinking. If Jacob was going to imprint on that one particular egg, what would have happened to his interest in Bella if she'd already lost that egg or if she HADN'T had a baby out of that egg? Furthermore, what would have happened if the baby HAD been an Edward Jr instead of Renesmee?
        • If they're 'unchanging', and 'like stone', THEN HOW THE FRIGGIN' HELL DOES EDWARD STILL PRODUCE SPERM? I understand that the female Meyerpires can't have kids because their menstrual cycle is frozen, so wouldn't the male vampire's ability to make sperm stop too? And then there are all the issues of how Edward impregnates Bella... [as seen above]
        • If Jacob would have imprinted on the child that egg became no matter who the father was, as his lack of obsession with Edward implies, then what if his obsession with Bella had led to HIM having a child with her? It's quite likely that they would have ended up together if Edward hadn't existed, and there was that bit in Breaking Dawn where Edward tried to get Jacob to get Bella to abort Renesmee and have Jacob's puppies instead. It could easily have ended up being his OWN sperm that fused with that particular egg. Was the imprinting magic trying to make him have a daughter with Bella so he could imprint on his own daughter?
        • We don't need to hear about the sperm thing anymore, it's already been adressed further up. Anyway, my theory is that he would imprint on a female only (since it's around to futher the species); futhermore it could only be an imprinting on the eggs (as said above). However, to elaborate on that point, it could be he wanted those eggs in his gene pool, meaning he wants to either impregnate the eggs directly, or through the child that came from one. If he imprinted on the eggs then he wouldn't imprint on Bella, but would on Renesme (or whatever her name is).
  • Okay, Rosalie grew up during the Great Depression and although she saw people sleeping on the streets, she thought it was little more than a rumor. How is that even possible? I understand that she and her family were very rich, but how sheltered and oblivious do you need to be not realize that something bad was going on? Didn't she ever read newspapers, or listen to the radio, or hear gossip, or just go out and see tons of businesses closing down and long lies of people queuing up for jobs? I know she's supposed to be very shallow and self-absorbed, but isn't this stretching it a bit?
    • Not to mention that her father was a banker. Even if his bank didn't go under, he'd still be worried about runs on it and holdups and other such things.
  • As much as I like Robert Pattinson's snark that Edward is a self-hating centenarian virgin, WHY? Is there really no way he could've got any before? And if yes, why didn't he go mad instead?
    • It's pretty unlikely that he couldn't get any. It's much more likely that he didn't want to.
    • It would ruin Meyer's over-wrought message of abstinence.
      • Because sex is totally worse than murder. *Sarcasm*
    • By the way isn't there a Word of God stating or implying Edward never touches himself?
  • So we have a universe that contains Vampires that are all complete Mary Sues. The most important being the whole "Nigh-impossible to kill" bit which makes the entire setting and story completely idiotic and bogus in this Troper's opinion, but not because it's a ridiculous raping of things common to Vampires in media works. No, what puzzles me is what exactly is stopping the top vampires from simply building an army and curbstomping humanity and making them a slave race/cattle? Why do they put up with having to hide among their food when they're clearly stronger than normal humans?
    • Because vampires are sopposed to hide in the shadows, like good little man-eating monsters, and for some reason Meyers did not feel like destroying this particular aspect of vampire mythos.
    • Fisrt off, the proper answer would probably be; 'well, they never asked'. Vampires have been around for centuries, and obviously Bella has heard about them and was able to look them up online, so vampire pop culture exists in Twilight, meaning in the beginning vampires decided there was no real need for secrecy. However, just because there's no need for secrecy doesn't mean there's no need for proclaiming your existance to the world. And it's only in this the 'information age' that a careless vampire would leave a tangible trail to convince the authorities that any witness who survived an encounter with these nigh unstoppable killing machines that they aren't crazy. And it's only in these recent years that humans have actually become organized enough to set plans in motion for the eradication of vampires and the means to do it, i.e. it's implied that atomic bombs can kill Vampires. Now, if you're in a position of power and you found out that an army of nigh unstoppable killing machines are slowly eating your species, and that any member of your family could be next, how long would it take you to organize the planet's population to eradicate said beasties? I give it a month. And as for the Vampires building an army; you say, they're up to Mary Sue levels in power. If you had up to seven billion chocolate bars, and each with their unique flavor, and these chocolate bars tend to gather in groups and move really really slowly, would you actually bother amassing an army to corral these chocolate bars instead of casually picking one up and popping it into your mouth as you've been doing for years? Overkill.
      • Sure, it may be that way now, but the issue there is that this was their reason for going into hiding a good couple hundred years ago. When humans DIDN'T have bombs or the strength or resources to kill the vamps. There was literally nothing stopping them back then. Word of God made a comment about their choice to the effect of "who would want to be the king of cows?"
      • any rancher will tell you that having total control over cows, especially if you live in a culture where they're a primary food source, would be pretty fucking sweet.
    • Humans had weapons more than 200 years ago. Granted, no nuclear weapons, but canons and muskets (sp?) and pistols. Maybe the vampires, who were obviously a minority, saw where this was going and decided to go into hiding.
  • I only read the first book, so you'll have to bear with me here... I'm told that in the last book or so, Edward has sex with Bella and he's so rough and strong that she blacks out. I guess the idea is that he can't control his strength, but I have a hard time buying that. If he can't control his strength, does he crush metal doorknobs every time he opens a door? Does he break the TV remote every time he pushes a button? If he taps someone on the shoulder, does he break their bones?
    • Some men black out during Orgasm, I imagine it would be hard to control anything at that moment. Given that vampire sex is supposed to be on par with normal orgasm the *entire* time....
  • Why is Bella convinced that Jacob is some weak little thing that can't protect himself? First in New Moon Bella assumed the wolves had been killed by Laurent (it could be said that she didn't know them yet). But then she becomes even worse by continuously telling Jacob to stay out of the fight because he'll die or that he doesn't stand a chance. He is a flipping WEREWOLF he can take care of himself.
    • Because Bella sees the vampires as the only truly competent beings
  • WHY would Bella pick Edward over Jacob? For God's sake, I don't even like Twilight and I think that he was a nice enough guy, pre-Flanderization, anyway.
    • Did you not also notice that Bella tended to freak out every time Jacob ignored her or showed signs of moving on and forgetting about her? She may have said that she wanted him to move on and find someone else, but her actions made it clear that she wanted to marry the rich, powerful, white guy but have the poor brown guy keep worshiping her and pining away for her.
    • Because Bella wants to be pretty, young, and powerful forever. Edward can give her that. Jacob can't.
      • Wow she's evil and petty. This is portrayed positively?
      • Apparently. She's the Author Avatar, everything that the author herself both is and wants to be. That only makes it creepier when you realize that everything Bella does is seen as acceptable and that everything she thinks is what Meyer herself believes.
  • The climax of the first book. There are seven good vampires against two bad ones. Of those seven vampires, one can read minds, one can see the future and one can alter emotions. The only way the Cullens could possibly have the disadvantage is if they split up. Which they do. Instead of running around, why not just make some sort of trap for James and Victoria? For instance, they knew that James would go to Bella's house, so why not just ambush him there and be done with it?
    • Because Meyer realized a little late that she needed to fit in some real conflict somewhere amidst the romance.
  • Why does everyone keep saying Renesmee stops aging when she's physically 17? I can't see any mention of this in the book, and if she ages at roughly 3 years a year and stops after 7 years, shouldn't she be 21? It just bothers me since everyone complains about her being forever underage but I don't see how she is.
  • In Breaking Dawn, why didn't Bella just get the baby out when she's developed enough to survive but before the baby nearly killed Bella? That way, Bella had a better chance of becoming a vampire.
    • Come on. Bella isn't that smart.
  • Something I've never really understood. The wolves have body temps of about 106 or 108 or whatever it is. This is supposed to be so they can go out in the cold and still be warm, right? However, if you've ever been sick with a really high fever, you know that everthing feels ten times colder than it normally does. The book even talks about this at one point, with Edward's mother! She was dying of the flu and Carlisle said that her fever was so high that she didn't notice how cold he was. It's always bugged me.
  • In Eclipse, when Edward and Bella are in the tent and Bella is slowly freezing to death (good god, why couldn't it have ended then?) Edward keeps offering to run her around outside to warm up. Now, I'm no expert, but how exactly is that supposed to warm her up? Now, if she were running, yes. It would get her heart pumping faster and it would get blood circulating again, warming her up somewhat, but if he was just going to run her around with her in his arms, she's not doing anything that would warm her up! She'd probably get colder because they'd be going at higher speeds in a blizzard.
    • Because, I don't know if you noticed, but a lot of the plot is built simply around finding as many excuses as possible for Edward or Jacob to pick Bella up and carry her or for her to have to press her body against theirs; it's not based in logic, it's just there to facilitate the chased, "forbidden fruit" titillation that the story is built on and that the author was so absorbed with creating that she forgot to have things make sense.
      • Please. She never meant to have things make sense.
  • Am I the only one who actually pities imprinting wolves more than their imprintees, in some ways? I mean, the very nature of imprinting means that they will do whatever the girl wants from them, right? I am assuming here that Sam attacking Emily is an aberration caused by lack of control/emotional distress, since it doesn't seem to be a common issue. But my thinking here is that the imprintees have a choice. Yes, Claire and Nessie will in theory be groomed to love Quil and Jacob, but it might not end that way. They might always see the two guys as parental figures or friends. They can choose, the wolves who imprint on them are, by the nature of imprinting, no longer in control of their lives. They have lost their free will. It bothers me that no one else seems to notice this; all the horror is saved for the imprintees' possible fates. Not saying that shouldn't be horrifying, but it's not the only scary part here. Maybe Leah's lucky in some ways that if she finds a new love, both of them will be able to enter into a relationship without any coercion whatsoever.
    • Agreed, you're definitely not the only one. It's a horrible system all around, but it IS worse for the imprinters. It would be better if the imprinter could be free of the connection if the imprintee chose someone else.
      • Imprinting sounds like an addiction to me. Maybe it's how Meyer expresses that she wishes she had more power over the men in her life.
    • I also tough it was kind of funny that Jacob originally talks about imprinting with disgust and disdain but then, when it comes time for him to imprint on Bella and Edwards perfect, wondrous, miracle baby he's not only totally ok with it, but completely willing and enthusiastic. I guess, since Renesmee inherited Mary Sue genes from both parents, Jacob had no choice but to love her, the internal logic of the story would not have allowed it to be otherwise.
      • Are Mary Sue genes recessive?
    • http://twispitefic.livejournal.com/35504.html you guys are going to love this.
  • I'm surprised nobody mentioned this one yet, when everyone is trying to get witnesses why does Edward ask "what do you hear, what do you smell"? Why can't he just flat out tell people the truth and say he knocked up Bella on their honeymoon? It's a lot simpler than risking a negative reaction by his weird questions, and I'm surprised nobody else had the brain to tell him.
    • Because whenever characters in this series are required to decide on a course of action, they always go with the one that will create the most drama, even if it's the least practical option. Really, if you think about it, if it weren't for the characters making bad decisions (for which their being emotionally overwhelmed is usually given as an excuse) and melodramatically overreacting to things, there would have been hardly any story to tell.
  • I still haven't heard a good reason as to why the Cullen youngsters are perpetually in high school. Even turned as teenagers, they could easily pass off as adults. No sane person would want to be in high school forever, having to hang around teenagers 100 years younger than them and always learning the same things over and over. Some people justify it that knowledge changes so they should keep going to high school to learn the new things, but adults in real life don't live as high school students every year and they do just fine. The main Headscratcher in all that: why don't they spend their time doing something productive, something they would actually enjoy? Again, no one would want to hang out with teenagers 100 years younger than them, and it's pretty clear it's the case for the Cullens, since they generally avoid hanging out with the other students. They're immortal, they have all the time they want to master arts and sciences, and we do know they've gone to college and are proficient in some of the arts. Anyone with eternal life and youth, and access to lots of money would want to spend their time pursuing something big, not attending high school every year of their life.
    • My theory is that Meyer wrote a High School AU fanficiton based on the Southern Vampire Mysteries and then changed the names and some of the character details so she could get it published.
      • I second this theory. Even the Bella's-blood-smells-better is consistent with Sookie's blood being intoxicating to vampires.
      • Both relationships are at least partly built on the fact that one is unable to read the others mind.
      • Bill helps Sookie learn to control her psychic powers and Edward helps Bella learn to control her mind shield thing.
      • Both stories also involve a war involving vampires and were wolves in which the female main character winds up playing and integral part (though Bella's significance in the conflict seems far more contrived and the extent to which she actually helps in the conflict is questionable.)
      • Both heroines are virgins and both male leads are mysterious, brooding, tortured types.
      • If you think about it, Twilight is The Southern Vampire Mysteries with all of the subtler inter-character conflicts ( like the fact that Bill originally had an ulterior motive in pursuing Sookie) removed and replaced with a vampire were wolf love triangle which sort of happened in The Southern Vampire Mysteries, but was more of a minor sup-plot and wound up not really being integral to the story. You could tell which part of the story Meyer liked best.
      • There's even a line in The Southern Vampire Mysteries in a conversation between Eric and Sookie during the time that Eric had amnesia wherein vampires are compared to lions.
    • Then again, if you have eternal youth and life, you may find it easy to be patient. High school now isn't what it was in the 60s, 70s or 80s, and maybe if you're not Edward (who, even after having been through an excruciatingly painful vampire transformation, does consider American high school anno 2005 to be "purgatory", as the drama queen he is) you find the changes nice and the updates in information interesting and have hope that teenagers won't always be required to go to high school or whatever.
    • They could just be bored. They don't need sleep, they have no real need for jobs or anything of that sort. Maybe going to high school is just their way of getting out of the house. Add on to the fact that the Cullens, as vegetarians, seem to like clinging to what is left of their humanity, doing what humans do is the closest they can come.
  • I don't normally care that much about shipping or canon relationships, but... Was there any legitimate reason that Bella went with Edward instead of Jacob? Edward left her for a long time and was a bit cold about it, Jacob was nice too her, in fact, nicer than Edward ever was. But she didn't seem to have a hard time choosing to go back to Edward when he returned. Was that ever explained?
    • According to Meyer, it was the vampire mate bond that tied them together. That was why she couldn't be reasonable about Edward and the pain he caused her. Besides, if you read New Moon, the only reason she was with Jacob to begin with was that he filled the Edward-shaped hole in her heart.
    • It's suggested throughout the story that the source of all Bella's unhappiness is the fact that she feels she's special (that she was meant to be one of The Beautiful Elite) but is being forced to live as a normal person; she does a lot of talking about how she's never felt like she belongs and how different she is. If she had gone with Jacob all she would have gotten out of it was getting to be with Jacob (she herself would have remained normal and would have had to live an unremarkable life) but choosing Edward allowed her to be beautiful, powerful, wealthy and glamorous for the rest of eternity. The author tries to spin it as the whole true love gambit, but anyone who was paying attention could see that Bella had ulterior motives.
  • Bella seems to have no problems making friends without putting in any effort whatsoever--okay, fine. But...where are all her friends from Phoenix? Didn't she grow up there? Spend her childhood there--for many years, long enough to make tons of friends. And yet, she never gets an email, a phone call, a visit. In fact, the only pre-Forks relationships she seems to have maintained are her mom and step-dad. Just wondering.
    • It's quite common for heroines in classics to be isolated. In fact, many of them hardly seem to have a close friend prior to the events of the novel. Probably it's to get rid of too many irrelevant characters because an intelligent audience doesn't want to read about any ordinary friendship and all the banal dialogue most of us undergo.
    • The thought that Twilight is conforming to one trait in classics is creeping me out ...
  • The whole "forbidden fruit" angle that gets played up. Where does this come up? I read the first book, and, well, nobody makes any active effort to keep Edward and Bella apart. The romance is played up as "forbidden" but I haven't seen much sign of it.
  1. ↑ Alice was alive in the early 1900's. As a child she had premonitions, but usually stayed quiet about them. At one point she had a strong feeling that something bad would happen to a friend of hers, but they were ignored. If I remember correctly, the child ended up dying. Another, similar, incident happened, and she was eventually labled a "witch" and "changeling" by the townspeople. One day, she had a vision that her mother would die, and her father chose to ignore it. It happened, and her father got remarried. After another vision, Alice realized that her father killed her mother in order to be with Alice's step mom, and the two were currently planning to kill Alice. Alice ran to the local authorities and reported her father and step mom, but unfortunately her father had already had her labled as mentally disturbed. Her father had her put into a mental asylum. While at the asylum, Alice was subjected to "shock therapy" and other "cures", which eventually caused her to have amnesia. A vampire happened to work at the asylum and realized that Alice was not crazy, but a legit psychic. He became her friend while attempting to help her use her powers. Eventually Alice had a vision of James coming after her, him having smelt her blood only moments before her vision. The vampire friend bit Alice to protect her, and went to distract James. Alice woke up and her first vision was of her and Jasper joining the Cullen family.
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