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Well, it's not bad-bad...
I mean, they were trying for a Southern Gothic take on Twilight, weren't they? They had to be. It's like this book and Twilight are from different authors filling out the same Mad Libs. "Ethan Wate is a boy who hates living in the sleepy town of Gatlin despite being a popular jock, until he meets a girl named Lena. They're drawn to one another because Ethan is the only person whose mind can be read by Lena. As it turns out, Lena comes from a family of good witches who are in conflict with the evil witches." I haven't read Twilight and even I can see the family resemblance.
The thing is, Beautiful Creatures differs from Twilight in the fantasy it presents. While Twilight is about the fantasy of the perfect guy, and all the problematic issues that entails, BC is more of a persecution fantasy. You know, it's not your fault that no one invites you to their party, it's just that none of them can understand your secret awesomeness. And that's why BC, unusually for a YA novel, has a boy as the narrator, so the reader can swoon over how he defends Lena and her wonderfulness. Nothing wrong with a persecution fantasy, I mean, there's a reason we all loved X-Men when we were teenagers (or when that awesome cartoon was on in the 90s). But if you don't think a persecution fantasy through, you're going to have problems. After all, say you're in the X-Men universe and you're not one of the people with the model physique and the skintight spandex/leather. Who's making more sense, Professor X and his "no reason to fear us mutants, except that my best friend wants to kill you all" or Senator Kelly saying "Jesus fuck, there are people who can blow up buildings by blinking, we should do something about it"? Which is one of the key weaknesses of the first movie, as the only way the film can "prove Kelly wrong" is by first invoking the specter of the Holocaust and then by making him an out-and-out racist.
But I digress. Similarly, the problem with BC is that it sets up strawmen enemies for the heroes to insult and embarrass, but never concedes they have some good points. Take this, for instance.
Evil small-minded townies: Lena broke a window with her mind! She's a witch!
Ethan: Don't be absurd! Just listen to yourselves!
Lena: Actually, I am a witch and I did break the window with my mind. But it was an accident, on account of my uncontrollable psychic powers that activate when I get upset.
Ethan: So the only thing standing between this town and wholesale destruction is the emotional well-being of a teenage girl? ...Let's make out!
And later...
Lena: I know the gym kinda blew up, but it wasn't me, it was an evil witch who was out to get me!
Ethan: So you accidentally blow things up and the forces of evil are hunting you with no concern for collateral damage. I still don't see why any parent would object to you going to school with their kids!
Then in the second half of the book it gets really ugly, with everyone who dislikes Lena being ugly or stupid or both. Even the cheerleaders who torture Lena are fug. Let me just turn to a random page...
I could never quite figure out what someone like Marian was doing in a town like Gatlin. "Just because you live in the middle of nowhere," Marian would tell me, over a tuna sandwich with my mom, "doesn't mean you can't know where you live." ...Since the library was pretty much a ghost town, except for the occasional visit from one of the ladies from the DAR checking on questionable genealogy, Marian had free run of the place.
It probably wouldn't rankle so bad if Ethan didn't spend so much time reading the riot act on everyone else for being smug and superior, while he's the one going around thinking "You stupid hicks, I'm the only one who reads!" all the time.
This especially kicks in when Lena occasionally uses her powers to get back at her tormentors. I realize that's a hallmark of the teenage superhero genre, but if you had phenomenal cosmic powers, wouldn't you use them for something better than pranking the Plastics? Hell, one of the story arcs is Lena's worry about becoming an evil witch, so wouldn't that be a great way to explore that? Lena and Ethan are feeling all self-righteous, then there's a town meeting to point out all the shit they've pulled and they realize that if you just take a step to the left, they're the bad guys. Instead, one of Lena's relations shows up and "pwns" all the uppity hillbillies. Except, you know, they're a bunch of stupid dipshits who could probably get pwned by D-Man, so who cares?
I realize Ethan is an unreliable narrator and he'd be pissed at anyone calling out his girlfriend, but the text backs him up way too much. It's like the authors are trying to get a whole novel out of Harry Potter vs. the Dursleys. And come on now, one of the big criticisms of Twilight was how much of a bitch Bella was when everyone in Forks was being welcoming and nice. So if you're telling a similar story, why not do something with that criticism instead of making it worse? It's like if someone was making one of those "Die Hard in an X" kinda movies back in the 90s. Now, if one of the big issues with Die Hard (I'm going to make one up, since Die Hard IS THE PERFECT MOVIE) was that John McClane never said he liked dogs, then wouldn't you make it a priority to have your not!McClane say "I love dogs!" instead of "I hate dogs!"
Besides all that, it clocks in at a little under 600 pages, and there's a seventh inning stretch where pretty much nothing happens except a lot of wangst over the leads' relationship. I imagine this is enthralling to preteen girls, but then a hundred pages later the climax comes and then are about ten different "everything you know is wrong!" revelations stacked right on top of each other. Couldn't those have been spaced out a little? Just a thought.
So if you absolutely must read a story about someone in a town they hate falling for a supernatural creature, I suppose you're better off with this than Twilight.
I mean, they were trying for a Southern Gothic take on Twilight, weren't they? They had to be. It's like this book and Twilight are from different authors filling out the same Mad Libs. "Ethan Wate is a boy who hates living in the sleepy town of Gatlin despite being a popular jock, until he meets a girl named Lena. They're drawn to one another because Ethan is the only person whose mind can be read by Lena. As it turns out, Lena comes from a family of good witches who are in conflict with the evil witches." I haven't read Twilight and even I can see the family resemblance.
The thing is, Beautiful Creatures differs from Twilight in the fantasy it presents. While Twilight is about the fantasy of the perfect guy, and all the problematic issues that entails, BC is more of a persecution fantasy. You know, it's not your fault that no one invites you to their party, it's just that none of them can understand your secret awesomeness. And that's why BC, unusually for a YA novel, has a boy as the narrator, so the reader can swoon over how he defends Lena and her wonderfulness. Nothing wrong with a persecution fantasy, I mean, there's a reason we all loved X-Men when we were teenagers (or when that awesome cartoon was on in the 90s). But if you don't think a persecution fantasy through, you're going to have problems. After all, say you're in the X-Men universe and you're not one of the people with the model physique and the skintight spandex/leather. Who's making more sense, Professor X and his "no reason to fear us mutants, except that my best friend wants to kill you all" or Senator Kelly saying "Jesus fuck, there are people who can blow up buildings by blinking, we should do something about it"? Which is one of the key weaknesses of the first movie, as the only way the film can "prove Kelly wrong" is by first invoking the specter of the Holocaust and then by making him an out-and-out racist.
But I digress. Similarly, the problem with BC is that it sets up strawmen enemies for the heroes to insult and embarrass, but never concedes they have some good points. Take this, for instance.
Evil small-minded townies: Lena broke a window with her mind! She's a witch!
Ethan: Don't be absurd! Just listen to yourselves!
Lena: Actually, I am a witch and I did break the window with my mind. But it was an accident, on account of my uncontrollable psychic powers that activate when I get upset.
Ethan: So the only thing standing between this town and wholesale destruction is the emotional well-being of a teenage girl? ...Let's make out!
And later...
Lena: I know the gym kinda blew up, but it wasn't me, it was an evil witch who was out to get me!
Ethan: So you accidentally blow things up and the forces of evil are hunting you with no concern for collateral damage. I still don't see why any parent would object to you going to school with their kids!
Then in the second half of the book it gets really ugly, with everyone who dislikes Lena being ugly or stupid or both. Even the cheerleaders who torture Lena are fug. Let me just turn to a random page...
I could never quite figure out what someone like Marian was doing in a town like Gatlin. "Just because you live in the middle of nowhere," Marian would tell me, over a tuna sandwich with my mom, "doesn't mean you can't know where you live." ...Since the library was pretty much a ghost town, except for the occasional visit from one of the ladies from the DAR checking on questionable genealogy, Marian had free run of the place.
It probably wouldn't rankle so bad if Ethan didn't spend so much time reading the riot act on everyone else for being smug and superior, while he's the one going around thinking "You stupid hicks, I'm the only one who reads!" all the time.
This especially kicks in when Lena occasionally uses her powers to get back at her tormentors. I realize that's a hallmark of the teenage superhero genre, but if you had phenomenal cosmic powers, wouldn't you use them for something better than pranking the Plastics? Hell, one of the story arcs is Lena's worry about becoming an evil witch, so wouldn't that be a great way to explore that? Lena and Ethan are feeling all self-righteous, then there's a town meeting to point out all the shit they've pulled and they realize that if you just take a step to the left, they're the bad guys. Instead, one of Lena's relations shows up and "pwns" all the uppity hillbillies. Except, you know, they're a bunch of stupid dipshits who could probably get pwned by D-Man, so who cares?
I realize Ethan is an unreliable narrator and he'd be pissed at anyone calling out his girlfriend, but the text backs him up way too much. It's like the authors are trying to get a whole novel out of Harry Potter vs. the Dursleys. And come on now, one of the big criticisms of Twilight was how much of a bitch Bella was when everyone in Forks was being welcoming and nice. So if you're telling a similar story, why not do something with that criticism instead of making it worse? It's like if someone was making one of those "Die Hard in an X" kinda movies back in the 90s. Now, if one of the big issues with Die Hard (I'm going to make one up, since Die Hard IS THE PERFECT MOVIE) was that John McClane never said he liked dogs, then wouldn't you make it a priority to have your not!McClane say "I love dogs!" instead of "I hate dogs!"
Besides all that, it clocks in at a little under 600 pages, and there's a seventh inning stretch where pretty much nothing happens except a lot of wangst over the leads' relationship. I imagine this is enthralling to preteen girls, but then a hundred pages later the climax comes and then are about ten different "everything you know is wrong!" revelations stacked right on top of each other. Couldn't those have been spaced out a little? Just a thought.
So if you absolutely must read a story about someone in a town they hate falling for a supernatural creature, I suppose you're better off with this than Twilight.
