Book Review and Giveaway: "The Host" by Stephenie Meyer

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I was more than pleasantly surprised and shocked while reading this book. I have the first three books of the Twilight series and I will admit that I am not really a fan of them. The writing in those books is not very well done, plus I have problems with the storyline and the characters in general. Plus with all the hype surrounding them, it just makes the reading seem more tedious. Therefore I approached The Host with rather low expectations and prepared myself for another Twilight except with aliens. Boy was I in for a shocker.

When I started reading, I was amazed at how I got sucked into the book. I really didn't expect to, because my experiences at reading Twilight had been more like let's get the book over with quickly. This time I found myself drawn into the story, wanting to savor every word. I didn't speed through this book like I normally would, instead I read the book in snippets every day. It's not the type of book to rush through as it pull you in and you find yourself engrossed into the story. I found the storyline very interesting and I'm not a sci-fi or fantasy fan at all. The invasion of aliens on Earth, the takeover of human bodies as hosts and the struggle for the remaining humans for survival was believable and not done in a cheesy sort of way. It's a plot that one could see actually happening and the underground network of humans very much like a bomb shelter plot line.

The relationship between Wanda and Melanie is very unique because it's like having a two headed monster, without the second head. At first Wanda is kind of unlikable because she is doing things the way her species is used to, by taking control of everything with no regard for their human hosts. However as the story progresses she soon learns more about the human species and even falls in love with one of them. The whole love triangle bit was a bit weird and took a while to comprehend, but it's written very well. It's more developed dare I say than the Bella/Edward/Jacob storyline.

There are just two qualms I have with this book. The first is that I didn't really like the way of how both Melanie's and Wanda's thoughts are in the same italicized font. It would have been better if Melanie's thoughts had just been italicized or if Wanda's had been put in a different font. As it stands, it gets confusing when the two are "talking" to each other and there's no distinction between the two voices. My other qualm was that I felt the ending to be rather disappointing. I felt that the story had built up to an intense level and then just dropped off. I'm not sure if this is because there is going to be a sequel to the book or what, but it felt like a cop out at the end of the story.

Still I will say that I really enjoyed reading this book. For a change it wasn't a fast read for me. Instead I had a savor it, a little bit at a time each day. Thus it took me longer to finish this book than I normally would. However, I felt that this was the best way to read the book as it's not one to devour in a span of a few hours. If Stephenie Meyer continues writing in this fashion, I will definitely start picking up her books now.

The Host by Stephenie Meyer is published by Little Brown and Company (2008)