Book: Stephenie Meyer's The Host

I just finished Stephenie Meyer's latest non-Twilight series novel called The Host. This also happens to be her first book written for adults. I waited a couple of months for this one from the library, as Meyer's popularity has grown so much lately that there were about 100 people in queue for it.

The facts are these (said in Pushing Daisies voice over style): The book takes place in the present where the earth has been invaded by a group of aliens (called Souls) that attach themselves as parasites to human hosts, thereby drowning out each person's true soul and taking over his or her life, including memories. There also exists a gang of still-human rebels, hiding in caves in Arizona. Melanie Stryder is a human that has been invaded by a soul, but Melanie herself finds that she can fight back from within. As a result, Melanie and her parasite (Wanda) team up to locate the rebels, and take refuge there. Yeah, it sounds really strange and I am not doing the best job of explaining it. I think I just confused myself...

It was a little hard to get into. But Meyer certainly thinks through all the details of the worlds she creates for her books. I find that often I can predict where things are going, and I managed that a couple of hundred pages before the end of the book, but I was entertained nonetheless. However, don't automatically assume you will like The Host just because you are a Twilight fan. She managed something pretty special with the Bella/Edward relationship that she won't be replicating any time soon.

In addition, I was as annoyed with Wanda as I was with Bella for being so dumb in drawing realistic conclusions. I realize certain things are written to make things not quite so obvious, but if the reader can guess things to come and you characters are supposed to be intelligent, then you would assume they could come to reasonable conclusions, too. But that is forgivable.

I enjoyed Meyer's creation of a fictional earth and alien invasion. But if you have a laundry list of books you are trying to read, make it Twilight before you make it The Host.