Thursday, May 28, 2009

Book Review: The Host

Author:       Stephanie Meyer

Publisher:    Little, Brown/Hachette

ISBN:          978-0-316-06804-8

Website:      http://www.stepheniemeyer.com/thehost.html

 Type:         Fiction:Science Fiction

Pages:        619 Hardcover

Purchase:    $14.81 @ Amazon.com (HERE)

The Story

“Melanie Stryder refuses to fade away.”

Our world has been invaded by an unseen enemy. Humans become hosts for these invaders, their minds taken over while their bodies remain intact and continue their lives apparently unchanged. Most of humanity has succumbed.

When Melanie, one of the few remaining “wild” humans is captured, she is certain it is her end. Wanderer, the invading “soul” who has been given Melanie’s body, was warned about the challenges of living inside a human: the overwhelming emotions, the glut of senses, the too vivid memories. But there was one difficulty Wanderer didn’t expect: the former tenant of her body refusing to relinquish possession of her mind.

Wanderer probes Melanie’s thoughts, hoping to discover the whereabouts of the remaining human resistance. Instead, Melanie fills Wanderer’s mind with visions of the man Melanie loves—Jared, a human who still lives in hiding. Unable to separate herself from her body’s desires, Wanderer begins to yearn for a man she has been tasked with exposing. When outside forces make Wanderer and Melanie unwilling allies, they set off on a dangerous and uncertain search for the man they both love.”

(Above excerpt is from the inside cover of The Host)

The Review

I must be the only person left in the book review blogging community who didn’t read Stephanie Meyer’s Twilight Series.  However, I’m not sure that I really want to read it as my children have read the series twice, each.  They could most likely recite the story to me.  A little part of me is, however, curious.  When I saw that Hachette was doing a TOUR of The Host, I wanted to get involved.  Well, I didn’t make the tour (but, you should definitely check it out…), but I figtured that maybe I’d find my love for Stephanie Meyer in this book, a non-related entity to the Twilight Series.

Let’s start with the things that I liked about this 600+ page novel… There were some great creative ideas in this book.  The premise of the story is intriguing and has the makings of a really great movie.  In fact, the book almost reads as if it were an actual movie.  It’s filled with tons of dialogue that carries the story along.  Wanda, the alien within Melanie’s body, has lived on 6 or 7 other planets (I can’t remember which).  This gives Wanda the ability to share lots of great stories of the other planets and their species with the remaining “pod” of humans that she’s living with.  Wanda touches on these planets and experiences as she develops her unique relationship with the humans.  

Another concept that I really liked within the covers of this novel is the one of human love is so unique and different from anything else.  The book suggests that the way humans love one another remains within us, down to the cellular level.  Love is a memory, a feeling, and is irresistible to fight.  Further, the story suggests that the way that humans love their offspring is so completely unmatched in any other species.  I can, most certainly, agree with this!  

What made this novel my “not-so-favorite?”  Well, I truly believe that this book would have presented better had it been condensed.  I think that many aspects of this story could have been introduced in a shorter fashion and the story-line streamlined.  I believe that Meyer could have achieved a stronger piece of literary fiction had she attempted to do this.  Another suggestion that I would have provided as an editor to this book is expanding upon the description of the other worlds and alien species that Wanda was once a participant in.  As a reader, I would have preferred these tales to the overly present verbiage throughout the book.

On Sher’s “Out of Ten Scale:”

Overall, I liked this book.  It may be an interesting read for my twins and they may enjoy it more than I did.  However, I did talk to Lisa’s munchkin about it recently.  I think that she agreed with me that the book was too long.  She seemed to like it.  I also discussed the book with my friend, Danielle.  She old me that she did finish the book, however liked it less than the Twilight Series.  She expressed to me that it was just too “wordy.” 

In summary, this book would make a good sci-fi movie, or made-for-tv-movie (or mini-series).  However, as a read, I think the book needed some improvement.  For the genre Fiction:Science Fiction, I am going to rate this book a 7 OUT OF 10. 

My thanks to my Miriam and Hachette for the engaging book!

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