TWILIGHT: Chapter 11-Complications

CHAPTER SUMMARY: More boring conversation between Bella and Edward and oh look, Billy Black shows up at the end.

NOTES/THOUGHTS/REACTIONS:
Once again, Bella assumes everyone has no lives and are completely engrossed in her and Edward as they walk into class. Then oh look, it's a movie day and we get this sentence:

A movie day-the lift in the class was almost tangible.
From Twilight, page 218

First, that hyphan is once more used wrong. It should probably be either a period, which ends the sentence, or it could be a semi-colan. Either way, it should not be a hyphan. I'm getting mighty tired of her abusing these things. Second, looking at my trusty Webster, I looked up the definitions for tangible. 1) Reality made discernable by touch, 2) Existing in reality; concrete.
So...the lift in the mood was concrete or made touchable? That makes no sense so I'm calling a wrong word use on Meyer. She should have just said the mood became uplifted or something or something instead of trying to show off her "creative" use of words. By "creative" I mean bad use of words.
The movie begins and suddenly we get a pointless scene with Edward and Bella being all tense for no real reason that I can see. I don't get the signifigance of this at all. This whole thing could have been skipped. Actually, this whole chapter could have easily been about two to three pages tacked on to the next chapter. At least then the title would have made some sort of sense.
Anyway, we get to see Bella go to gym after and Mike expresses concern over Edward and Bella and I frankly do not blame him for doing so. But of course, Bella takes issue with it and pretty much ignores whatever he says. Even has the nerve to call it an arguement when she sees Edward again. Now, here is what happened:

"So," he said as we walked off the court.
"So what?"
"You and Cullen, huh?" he asked, his tone rebellious. My previous feeling
of affection disappeared.
"That's none of your business, Mike," I warned, internally cursing Jessica
straight to the fiery pits of Hades.
"I don't like it," he muttered anyway.
"You don't have to," I snapped.
"He looks at you like...like you're something to eat," he continued,
ignoring me.
I choked back the hysteria that threatened to explode, but a small giggle
managed to get out despite my efforts. He glowered at me. I waved and fled to
the locker room.
From Twilight, page 221

First, edits: there should be a comma after he said in the first sentence. Second, that was not an arguement Bella. That was Mike expressing concern like a good friend (although admittedly jealousy probably had something to do with it) and you pretty much ignoring him and blowing him off and generally being a bitch. There was no need to get mad at Jessica, of all people. She had nothing to do with Mike bringing this up. Or are you mad at her because she's not attractive enough to keep Mike's attention off of you or something? Considering your self-centered behavior, that wouldn't suprise me. Either way, you're being a bitch.
Edward is likewise being a jerk when he expresses annoyance at Mike, never mind that in last chapter and for the previous part of the book he's been saying that he and Bella are a bad idea. Bella proceeds to get upset when she learns that Edward spied on her in gym through people's mind and frankly I don't know why she's so shocked. I'm also cannot believe this is what she gets upset over. Not the sneaking into her room to watch her sleep part, no. Him spying her in gym and seeing her be clumsy is the part that upsets her. She's also not even upset at the blatant invasion of privacy; she's upset that he saw her be clumsy! There are so many things wrong with this I don't know where to begin, but I'll let it go because the rant will be too long.
We get more boring talk between Edward and Bella that is basically a continuation of the conversation from last chapter. Because you know that was so riveting. Edward drives her home (notice how all of a sudden, Bella never uses her car now that she has Edward to drive her?) and there's an awkward talk between Bella and Charlie about the dance where she basically lies to him again. For a girl that doesn't like to lie, she does it an awful lot.
Cut to next morning and Edward is there (driving her again, truck sure isn't getting much use is it?) and he then proceeds to ask her his burning questions. His first? Her favorite color. Please. Bella says her favorite color changes every day which basically means Meyer couldn't be bothered to think up a color, that would require thought for character, and so went the lazy route. This is her bogus explanation of Bella's wardrobe:

"What's your favorite color?" he asked, his face grave.
I rolled my eyes. "It changes from day to day."
"What's your favorite color today?" He was still solemn.
"Probably brown." I tended to dress according to my mood.
From Twilight, page 228

Excuse me, what? She's never given any indication of this before in the book and also it is never shown later. Plus, her mood never changes so how can she dress according to it? This brings me to reason eleven for disliking this series.
REASON ELEVEN FOR DISLIKING TWILIGHT: Too much telling and not enough showing. What she does show, tends to contridict what is told.
Meyer has a habit of making her characters tell us things. We are expected to buy that Bella is plain. Yet later we're told she's beautiful. We're told Edward is perfect (actually it's pretty much beaten into our heads), yet from what I see he's anything but. Then there are the things like Bella apparently doesn't know much about cars but she tells models of cars and notes their price range and stuff like that. There isn't anything necessarily BAD about telling people things but at least back up what you tell people. If we're supposed to believe that Bella is this plain jane girl, don't have five boys fall at her feet. If we're supposed to believe Edward is perfect, don't drill it into our heads; show it in his actions. But no, Meyer seems to think that just saying it in this book makes it true. That's called sloppy and lazy writing.
More questions proceed throughout the details of Bella's day and we get even more corny when Edward asks her favorite gemstone and she says topaz because it's the color of his eyes. Gag me, first of all. Second of all, there is no such thing as topaz colored eyes because topaz's are an orange/gold tinted stone. If it was a vampire thing then okay, but none of the Cullens are described as having gold eyes and other vampires have red eyes so apparently Edward had gold eyes when he was human. Which anyone can tell you is impossible without use of colored contact lens. Meyer would realize this if she a) thought about it and b) did some damn research on gemstones and possible human eye colors. Now possibly, this was Meyer's creative way of saying Edward had light brown eyes, in which case she should have said so. But I don't think that's the case.
More pages are wasted on classes and Edwards "burning" questions. He even asks Bella about Phoenix and I have to laugh at Meyer trying to make the city sound beautiful. Okay, nothing against Phoenix, I'm sure there are parts that are beautiful. But it's still a city which can be loud, crowded, and crime up the wazoo. Also, I was under the impression weather in Arizona could get ridiculously hot and the air can get very dry and there is a lot of worry about droughts. Or am I thinking of some place else? I've never been so I could be wrong. But I'm supposed to believe this is more beautiful then a deep woodland forest town? Are you kidding me? I'm sure there's great architecture and I know Arizona has beautiful deserts, but those deserts aren't in Phoenix from what I understand. Also, has Meyer smelled creosote? To discribe that smell as "pleasant" is utterly ridiculous and obvious that she's never smelled it before in her life. I'm also wondering where Bella has smelled it because I doubt the smell blankets the whole city and suburbs. Unless she lived near a coal burning warehouse or something, she wouldn't smell it.
Anyway, the conversation stops and then we finally get the explanation for the title of this book and I have to say that like everything else in this book, it makes little to no sense. It is not significant to the book in any way, or even significant to Edward and Bella's relationship. After more boring talk, we finally get the explanation for the title of this chapter: Billy Black shows up and he knows about Edward and doesn't approve. That is one complication, not multiple ones. So technically this should be called complication or better yet, questions because that is basically all that goes on in the chapter.

WORDS A TEENAGER WOULD NEVER USE/WORDS USED WRONG/WORDS THAT DON'T BELONG: tangible (used wrong), palpitations
BOOK THAT IS BETTER: The Looking Glass Wars by Frank Beddor
WHY IT'S BETTER: A fresh take on Alice in Wonderland that is exciting with great characters. This actually kept me interested in it from beginning to end.