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Binding: Hardcover
EAN: 9780316067928
Edition: 1st
ISBN: 031606792X
Label: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Manufacturer: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 756
Publication Date: August 02, 2008
Publisher: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Reading Level: Young Adult
Release Date: August 02, 2008
Studio: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
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Editorial Review:
Amazon.com Review:
Great love stories thrive on sacrifice. Throughout The Twilight Saga (Twilight, New Moon, and Eclipse), Stephenie Meyer has emulated great love stories--Romeo and Juliet, Wuthering Heights--with the fated, yet perpetually doomed love of Bella (the human girl) and Edward (the vampire who feeds on animals instead of humans). In Breaking Dawn, the fourth and final installment in the series, Bella’s story plays out in some unexpected ways. The ongoing conflicts that made this series so compelling--a human girl in love with a vampire, a werewolf in love with a human girl, the generations-long feud between werewolves and vampires--resolve pretty quickly, apparently so that Meyer could focus on Bella’s latest opportunity for self-sacrifice: giving her life for someone she loves even more than Edward. How close she comes to actually making that sacrifice is questionable, which is a big shift from the earlier books. Even though you knew Bella would make it through somehow, the threats to her life, and to her relationship with Edward, had previously always felt real. It’s as if Meyer was afraid of hurting her characters too much, which is unfortunate, because the pain Bella suffered at losing Edward in New Moon, and the pain Jacob suffered at losing Bella again and again, are the fire and the heart that drive the whole series. Diehard fans will stick with Bella, Edward, and Jacob for as many twists and turns as possible, but after most of the characters get what they want with little sacrifice, some readers may have a harder time caring what happens next. (Ages 12 and up) --Heidi Broadhead
Product Description:
When you loved the one who was killing you, it left you no options. How could you run, how could you fight, when doing so would hurt that beloved one? If your life was all you had to give, how could you not give it? If it was someone you truly loved?
To be irrevocably in love with a vampire is both fantasy and nightmare woven into a dangerously heightened reality for Bella Swan. Pulled in one direction by her intense passion for Edward Cullen, and in another by her profound connection to werewolf Jacob Black, a tumultuous year of temptation, loss, and strife have led her to the ultimate turning point. Her imminent choice to either join the dark but seductive world of immortals or to pursue a fully human life has become the thread from which the fates of two tribes hangs.
Now that Bella has made her decision, a startling chain of unprecedented events is about to unfold with potentially devastating, and unfathomable, consequences. Just when the frayed strands of Bella's life--first discovered in Twilight, then scattered and torn in New Moon and Eclipse--seem ready to heal and knit together, could they be destroyed... forever?
The astonishing, breathlessly anticipated conclusion to the Twilight Saga, Breaking Dawn illuminates the secrets and mysteries of this spellbinding romantic epic that has entranced millions.
Average Rating: 
Rating:  -
This is a great product, shipped quickly and in the shape it was described. Great buy!
Rating:  -
Breaking Dawn picks up not long after Eclipse left off: erstwhile heroine Bella Swan has chosen Edward Cullen as her suitor, and rival Jacob Black has taken off to parts unknown in his grief.
The first third of the book is in Bella's voice, and details the events leading up to her nuptials and honeymoon with Edward. For folks who are reading these for the vampire/human star-crossed romance, this is likely to be the highlight of the book. You all might want to stop at the honeymoon night and pretend the rest of the book doesn't exist. For this reader, the creepy ending to Part One was an unexpectedly spooky delight.
Part Two is in Jacob's voice, and follows his growing suspicion that something weird is afoot at the Cullen mansion, and that it's centered around his beloved Bella. Jacob is absolutely correct, though his initial guesses are pretty far off the mark. He grows determined to save her, no matter what it takes. At first, skipping to Jacob's point of view was a bit frustrating because the story left off from quite a suspenseful moment, but I came to enjoy his perspective so much that I was disappointed when it ended. I came to enjoy this series primarily because of this character -- I'd read Twilight and could take it or leave it, but friends told me to stick with the books for the growing role of Jacob Black, and they were right. As other readers have noted, Edward comes across as a grown man with control issues, but Jacob seems more like a real teenage boy. He loves Bella, he really does, but that's not going to stop him from doing whatever he has to do to get into her sleeping bag. The juxtaposition between these characters kept me enthralled through New Moon and Eclipse. Part Two of Breaking Dawn sees Jacob forming new relationships to the people in his life and ends with a wrinkle that is, frankly, less delightfully creepy than it is just plain creepy.
Part Three is back to Bella's perspective, and it is a very new perspective for her. It took me a while to enjoy it. I found her outrageous flavor amusing in the previous books, but in this part, (spoilers ahoy!) she has become powerful enough to cause physical damage to others, and she proceeds to do just that. I wanted to thrash her for a goodly portion of this part, much more so than usual. Eventually, though, she is forced to face a challenge that taxes her inner resources, which has always been when her character is most interesting to me. The monster at the end of this book is vampire politics, and between them, and Kate and Garrett, it made for a pretty decent final part. Seriously, if Meyer wants to write the romance of Kate and Garrett, I'm in.
All in all, this book touched on the tensions and relationships that made the middle two books in this series entertaining to me, just enough to keep me reading through to the end. I won't be making permanent space for it on my bookcase, but I'm not sorry I read it, either. Amazon's handling of the order was as competent as it usually is, so no complaints there. Still, if you're on the fence about reading this one, you might want to pick it up in the library first.
Rating:  -
I don't have many new thoughts to describe how dissapointing Breaking Dawn was... the other reviewers did just fine. I wish the person who recommended these books to me would have suggested to stop reading after the third enstallment (Eclipse) and imagine my own ending. The author seems to go out of her way to involve the mythology of Jacobs tribe, including the ancestors who's souls would leave thier bodies... I thought that tidbit of a story line was leading to something monumental. Wouldn't it have been incredible if somehow Jacob was killed (maybe he couldn't live without Bella's love so HE jumps from 'the' cliff) and his soul is released from his body but his essence still cannot be without Bella. The author kept noting over and over how Edward didn't have a soul... Maybe Jacob could've given Edward what he seemed to want~ his humanity~ and in the end Jacob could still be with Bella (in a sense) by giving Edward his soul. Bella would have both Edward and Jacob... Edward would become human again rather than Bella becoming a vampire. That would have been more interesting to read than what was truly written. I guess my only hope left is for the movie. Hopefully the author will have enough guts to let the fans get what they want through the movie rather than her marshmellow unrealistically happy ending.
Rating: -
Okay so I have to add my 2 cents . . .
I'm a 31 year old woman and I loved the first three books. The story of Edward and Bella's blossoming love in Twilight was wonderful and sucked me right in despite a few flaws in the book. The heartbreak of New Moon was real and absolutely in character for our stubborn Edward and over dramatic Bella. The emotional war in Eclipse was understated but fascinating. And then, I was hugely disappointed with Breaking Dawn.
I will try here to put my finger on why. SPOILERS TO FOLLOW.
The actual plot of the book and what happens doesn't bother me as much as how the author explains it to us. I think that I could have dealt with the pointless honeymoon, the horrible birth, the weird baby, Bella's easy transition into vampire life, and the anti-climactic confrontation with the Volturi, if the book had continued to explore Edward and Bella (and even Jacob) in a meaningful way. As other reviewers have mentioned, it seems like this book was written with the plot driving the characters rather than the characters driving the plot, as with the other books.
So here's what I didn't like:
Bella's embarrassment over her new car was cute but her hatred of the wedding was getting old. I do understand the fear of attention and her outwardly harsh statements about all the fuss, but internally, between the reader and Bella, there should have been more complex feelings about why she is doing this and feeling this way. A glimmer of understanding that she is being a bit silly even though she cannot overcome her fear and act according to the social norm. But she just whines with seemingly no concern for what it does to Edward.
The wedding itself was fine, I'm not bothered by her lack of description. I was prepared to deal with her mediocre writing skills and fill in with my imagination because, usually, her characters make up for it. Jacobs showing up was interesting and a dramatic foreshadowing to the drama ends up happening with the sex and baby.
The honeymoon night was terribly disappointing and not because she did not give us a sex scene. We didn't need to "see" the sex (the painful details) but this moment between them should have been a reflection of all of the yearning and torture that they had suffered. It should have been a kind of culmination of everything that they'd been through, but instead it was insulting. Bella doesn't even remember what happened. She just knows that her body liked it and that she felt no pain. It sounds like she blocked it out of her memory because it was frightening. The author should have given us a poignant summary through Bella's thoughts without describing the act because HOW they made love for the first time is important. Did Edward start out tender and then lose control slowly? Did he just snap and throw her on the bed to ravish her with barely restrained violence? And here's a crazy thought (I know we women like to be taken but. . .) why not have Bella take charge while Edward concentrates on staying in control? It seems like an awful lot to ask of him to let go and remain in command of himself at the same time. But no, we get nothing but more of Edward's self-loathing and Bella's irritation that he can't just get over it. Bella doesn't even try to understand how hard it must have been for him. But then again, she wasn't even paying attention apparently.
Bella getting pregnant did not bother me. I have no problem with the liberties that the author took with vampire lore. All a vampire needs is some way to transfer his essence to the woman so that her body can do the rest. Strict biology aside, this is not hard to imagine this in the world of fantasy. What did bother me was the needless torture heaped upon Edward again. How much does this boy have to suffer anyway? He already hates himself for bruising Bella during sex even though a little rough sex hardly makes him a monster, but then he has to deal with this horrifying baby killing the woman he just married. Is it any wonder he went crazy in this book?
And here we come to another problem. While I enjoyed hearing Jacob's voice, I think that the perspective hurt the characters of Bella and Edward. I get that Edward did not show his frenzied state to Bella so only Jake could tell us about that but Jake doesn't spend an awful lot of time dwelling on what Ed's going through like Bella would have, so we lose Ed in this section. Jake tries to tell us that Ed is absolutely insane at this point, which is why Ed suggests offering Jake as a stud, but the depth of his despair is lost on many readers and they think Ed's request is out of character. I think that readers were expected (rightly or wrongly) to really get into Ed's head by themselves in order to understand his perspective. Relying solely on Jake's words and thoughts is a mistake but one which author ... Read More
Rating: -
If you simply must know how it all ends, read Breaking Dawn. Otherwise, forget it. Amateur writing and plot twists that don't sync with the characters or the first three books.
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