REVIEW: Eclipse: The Twilight Saga, Book 3 by Stephenie Meyer

My Rating: 8 out of 10 stars

This is the third of four books in Stephenie Meyer's Twilight series, one of several series which has helped push vampires and the paranormal into the mainstream. I've been a fan and avid reader of the paranormal & urban fantasy genre long before Twilight and True Blood came to the silver screen however, so by the time I finally got around to reading this particular series--which had been languishing on my TBR shelf for several years--I had lots to compare it to.

If you read my review for Twilight, the first book in the series, you'll see that I didn't care for it all that much. A bit too much romance for my taste and Bella's character seemed really superficial and shallow. However, by the 2nd book, New Moon, I was beginning to understand why that was and I liked that one a bit better than the first. By book 3, I was really starting to get into it and liked it even better than the first two, so much so that when I finished Eclipse, I immediately picked up Breaking Dawn, the 4th and final book in the series because I couldn't wait to see how it ended.

Bella is still torn between her love for Edward and her deeply-rooted friendship with Jacob. But now several new dynamics have come into play which make things even more difficult for her. The vampire Victoria--the mate of James whom Edward killed in the book 1--is still stalking Bella in an attempt to end her life, the same way Edward ended the life of her mate. And up north in Seattle, what appears to be a crazed serial killer is running around the city leaving a trail of brutal murders in their wake. The murders are ruthless enough to suggest vampire killings but who could possibly be behind it? With the deadline imposed by the Volturi Vampire Council looming over her head, Bella knows her life will be coming to an end one way or another; her only hope is that she gets to choose how she wants to die....

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