Twilight

For a first novel, the story is amazingly well-plotted. Stephenie Meyer seems to have an instinctive sense for how to entice the reader into turning those pages, revealing just enough to keep us absorbed. Without leaking too much of the plot.

So, can love conquer all? It's triumphed over many things - jealousy, envy, spite, circumstances...but how about when the other person literally wants your blood?

Isabella (Bella) Swan has always been an unusual girl, more the grown-up than either her mother or father (who have been separated for years). After her flighty mother's re-marriage, she chooses to go live with her father in the gloomy town of Forks so her mother can spend more time with Phil. Charlie, her father, is a lot like his daughter: quiet, a little taciturn, and used to being alone.

Things are a little different in tiny Forks from Phoenix. For one, Bella finds herself dealing with unexpected popularity. She can't understand why there are three...and perhaps four...boys that have a decidedly more than friendly interest in her. In fact, she finds it rather annoying.

The one boy she'd really like to learn more about, Edward Cullen, seems to alternate between hating her and being fascinated by her. But when he saves her life (Tyler's pick up truck hits a bad icy patch in the school parking lot), they start to get to know each other, whether Edward wants to or not.

Bella discovers that Edward and his entire family are vampires, but relatively un-dangerous ones as they live only on animal blood and do not hunt humans. But the more she learns about them and grows to love Edward, the more her life - and that of her father and mother - are in danger.

Can true love survive against all of that? Can Edward conquer his own deadly impulses? Will his family accept his love for Bella? There are a lot of questions to ask yourself here...and the joy is in finding out the answers.