New Moon Chapter 15 – We’re in New Moon Country now.

Previously: Stephenie Meyer was a jerk about facial scars.
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Catherine: We open yet another chapter with Bella waking up in the morning. I know Meyer didn’t actually invent that shitty writing shortcut or anything, and it’s possible she didn’t even notice she was doing it so often, but does she not understand how fucking annoying it is to read? EVERY CHAPTER Bella is waking up for the morning and EVERY CHAPTER she goes to bed at the end. And it’s not like this is an intentional motif or anything.

I’m not even sure this complaint is making sense. This book is sapping my will to make sense.

Kirsti: The only thing the book isn’t sapping my will on is drinking. So. 

Catherine: At least we have still have you, booze. Anyway, Bella wakes up and it’s Monday and spring break. She’s worried about Victoria.

“Last spring break, I’d been hunted by a vampire, too. I hoped this wasn’t some kind of tradition forming.”

Well, yes it is, Bella. That and your abuse of commas are definitely a tradition in this book. If by ‘tradition’ you mean ‘punishment for the Snark ladies’.

Marines: I thought it was pretty brave of Steph to point out to the reader that she’s essentially recycling her own “plot.” Same season, different supernatural bad boy!

Annie: I guess she figured that she introduced the plot so late in the game in the last book, no one would actually remember enough of it anyway.

Catherine: Bella says that she’s worried about Jacob since the wolves are on ‘red alert’ looking for Victoria and that now when they walk on the beach together they hold hands. (Bella and Jacob, I mean, not Victoria and the wolves.) (Oh man! ‘Victoria And The Wolves’ would be a kickass band name.)

Jacob wanting to hold Bella’s hand makes her brood about what Jared said about Bella being Jake’s girlfriend. She figures that it probably does look like they’re dating to the wolves and it wouldn’t bother her except she knows that Jacob would actually like to be dating. She then immediately tells us in the next sentence that his hands are warm and nice. It goes from, ‘Jacob wants to date me’, to ‘he has warm hands’. IDK what that means.

K: That she plans on using him as a walking hand warmer? She also tells us that he’s shirtless AGAIN. Doesn’t Charlie think it’s super fucking weird that this kid walks around without a shirt on 9000% of the time?? 

Mari: I guess it makes it easier for Jacob to WOLFSPLODE but it doesn’t make it any less awkward. Also, I think Bella doesn’t like Jacob, but she’s so used to having to hug a popsicle that she doesn’t know how to quit warm skin.

Catherine: Tuesday afternoon, Bella goes to work and Jake follows her on his bike to make sure she doesn’t get highway robbed, I guess. I’m so glad she found another stalker; I was really worried there for a second.

Mike notices that Jake is stalking Bella now and he asks her if they’re dating. She tells him no, that Jake is her best friend. Meyer uses words like ‘resentful’ to let us know that Mike isn’t happy about this because he was hoping HE’D be the one to pester Bella into loving him. Darn, too bad, Mike. You’ll just have to bother someone else now? (M: Maybe try for someone who likes you…! #SnarkLadyAdvice) (C: It’s solid advice, Mike.)

What’s that you say? I’m being too tough on Mike? Fuck you, don’t doubt me. Look:

“Mike’s eyes narrowed shrewdly, “Don’t kid yourself, Bella. That guy’s head over heels for you.”
“I know,” I sighed. “Life is complicated.”
“And girls are cruel,” Mike said under his breath.”

I always forget how much I hate Mike ’till he shows up. Hey Mike? Fuck you. Her not wanting to date you doesn’t make her ‘cruel’. And all girls aren’t anything.

K: I had half a thought that Bella was being a sassy little shit with that “life is complicated” comment, and I almost liked her. Then I remembered EVERYTHING ELSE SHE’S EVER DONE.

Catherine: I like that you had that faith for a moment though. This book hasn’t yet killed your inner child! Yay! 

Later on that night, they all go to the Black’s house and Charlie likes the happy fun time gang now because Leah made him a cake. (M: ‘s a good strategy for a nefariously fantastic good gang: cake.) As the adults are eating, Bella and Jake sneak out to the garage to talk about their feelings.

Bella asks him some stuff about being a wolf and he tells her that he can now heal faster, he runs a 109 temperature all the time and he’s really tall and that’s all part of being a werewolf.

Jake also says that Quil has come down with the wolf sickness and he’s probably gonna turn soon, too. He tells her that sometimes being really angry or upset at the right time can trigger the transition from little boy to little boy werewolf. But he doesn’t know what triggered his because he was super happy all the time before because there was a possibility of seeing Bella’s boobs. Or he thought there was.

But he says he’s happier now that she knows about the wolfy thing but he’s also worried because his temper could get out of control and he could slash her fucking face off.

Um?

Apparently that’s what happened to Emily.

“Sam lost control of his temper for just one second…and she was standing too close. And now there’s nothing he can ever do to put it right again.”

So… what kind of metaphor is Meyer trying to build here? Is this accidental on her part or…?

K: It’s also super icky because it basically implies that Sam’s only with Emily because he feels guilty about making her so ugly that no one can ever look at her again without cringing. 

Catherine: There are so many disgusting layers in this book that I think it technically qualifies as a fruitcake.

Annie: Yeah. This whole thing with Emily is the woooorst.

Although, this dangerous werewolf business is GOOD NEWS for Jacob, because we all know that Bella is sexually attracted to boys who could accidentally (or purposefully) murder her. So there is that.

Catherine: That’s true. He’s just has to start creepily watching her sleep and he’s in. 

Jake tells Bella that it’s easier for him to shift back and forth because of who his grandparents were. And Bella’s like, who? And he says Ephram Black and Quil Ateara. And Bella’s like, QUIL’S YOUR GRANDFATHER. ‘Cause she’s had too many head injuries.

Jake tells her that, no the 15 year-old kid he’s friends with is not, in fact, his grandfather. But Quil is his second cousin. They had the same great-grandfather.

Having these two guys as grandfathers is a big deal for Jake because they were part of the last pack that existed. They were the ones that made the deal with the Cullens in the poofy shirt days.

K: Thank you for reminding me of that image where they all look like they don’t know what hands are, and also a little bit like they’re all trying to poop in the woods but with their pants on.

Mari: I can see now why Jacob is such an awesome wolf. Those sepia tones are intense.

Catherine: It does paint quite the picture. 

Jake asks Bella to tell him stuff he doesn’t know about the vampires. Bella tells him about how James bit her and Edward sucked the vampire venom out and she almost died. Jacob gets so mad that he starts shaking and almost transmogrifies. He urges Bella to distract him by telling him more stuff about the vampires.

Hey, remember when Bella almost got assaulted in Port Angeles in the last book and Edward save/kidnapped her and then demanded that she distract him with other stuff so he wouldn’t go back and murder the creepy rapist guys? At that point, Edward told Bella to ‘prattle on about something unimportant’ and this time Jake tells her to, ‘Give him something else to think about’. Admittedly, Jake’s is a lot less douchy.

But what does it say about Meyer that she keeps putting Bella into situations where she has to calm down men from getting so angry that they want to go out and kill something? And writing it as romantic in a book marketed toward young girls?

Someone else unpack this. I’m too sad now.

Mari: It’s too much to fully unpack and could really be taken in so many directions. What stands out the most to me is this idea of loss of control. There is a big theme of “we cannot control our actions” with Steph in general, and we’ve seen that said by Bella a few times now. “Love means being irrational.” This story is very far removed from the idea of responsibility for your actions and that is most demonstrated in the main love interests. I don’t even think Stephenie did it purposefully, but it speaks volumes that both of Bella’s love interests are boys who have the capability of very seriously harming her, but they wouldn’t be able to help themselves.

From there, we reach this place where Bella takes on the onus of diffusing the situation or else she takes on the fault. Her blood is too smelly, her decisions too dumb, her boyfriend too vampire-y for Jacob and her best friend too werewolf-y for Edward. She has to talk in order to make what the males “can’t control” her responsibility, so that if she fails, it’s her fault. If she succeeds, she’s controlling the uncontrollable and it’s lol love forever.

What does it say about Meyer? That she’s got some bat crap notions of masculinity and femininity. That she probably finds romance in this idea of a man super capable of hurting you, but not, because love. Not because, you know, PEOPLE SHOULDN’T HURT OTHER PEOPLE, but because true love. That she’s created a story that oozes all of these really weird notions in spite of itself and it makes me scared for her and for everyone who read this book and went, “yep. Win.”

NOW I’M SAD TOO. I HOPE YOU ARE HAPPY.

Catherine: NONE OF US ARE HAPPY THIS IS NEW MOON COUNTRY NOW.

Annie: Where’s Leah with a cake when we need her.

Catherine: A+ putting the awful into words though, Mari.

Jacob starts asking about the ‘extra stuff’ that the vampires could do. Besides the mind reading that Edward could do. Bella says she feels like a ‘spy’ for telling him but she does it anyway. Because she’s worried if she doesn’t he’s gonna hurt her.

No, really.

“So I spoke quickly, the image of Emily’s ruined face in my mind, and the hair rising on my arms. I couldn’t imagine how the russet wolf would fit inside the Rabbit—Jacob would tear the whole garage apart if he changed now.”

Remember that ‘the Rabbit’ is Jacob’s car. But, like…wouldn’t you just get the fuck out of there? They’re parked. Instead of doing that, Bella tells Jacob about Jasper’s emotion control power and Alice’s visions.

K: Personally, I’d be like “Hey, how about you get OUT of the tiny car and go far away and I stay inside and we have this conversation over the phone, just in case you DO wolf out?” But apparently that’s just me.

Catherine: Or like, text me. Don’t kill me. Send a fucking email with this shit.

Talking about the Cullens makes Bella’s hole hurt again.

“My head started to spin –I couldn’t seem to pull in enough oxygen from the air. No lungs.”

Bella goes into a freak out now and luckily Jacob’s calmed down enough to not murder her at the first opportunity. (A: SUCH a double standard, Bella. Only vampires may murder me!) She hunches over into a ball to protect her hole and Jacob asks her why she always does that. She tells him all about her vampire hole and he promises not to talk about them anymore because he can see that it hurts her so much.

Spoiler alert: he still talks about them a lot after this. (M: LOL.)

They agree that it’s good that they still have each other.

Over the next few days, Bella has trouble being on her own (SHOCKING) while Jacob is out hunting Victoria. She tries staying the day with Emily, but Sam stops by and they’re all in love and it depresses Bella so she takes off.

K: This part actually made me super ragey because Bella’s all “Emily did a million and one chores, and “I drifted behind her” and “it was fun until Sam turned up.” So basically, poor Emily had to put up with some whiny white girl moping around behind her while she tried to do housework and make awkward small talk. Fuck you, Bella. Go home.

Mari: Not pictured: Emily calling Sam and being like, “just let the vampire have her, please.”

Catherine: It’s like Bella is a pale ghost that is haunting these people.

She ends up wandering the beach alone everyday, which I guess is supposed to be less depressing? #Bellalogic

One day Jake finds her out there curled up in a Bellaball of sadness because of her achy hole.

He cheers her up by telling her that he’ll skip hunting tomorrow and take her to do something fun, like the cliff diving that he promised to teach her.

“The dark water did not look inviting, and, from this angle, the cliffs looked even higher than before. But it had been days since I’d heard Edward’s voice. That was probably part of the problem. I was addicted to the sound of my delusions. It made things worse if I went too long without them. Jumping off a cliff was sure to remedy that situation.”

Phew! A logical, sensible remedy for your depression. Wouldn’t want to do anything icky like talk to a therapist or start taking medication. No, no, just jump of a fucking cliff.

After a section break, Bella is waking up the next morning. * deep sigh *

She sneaks out of the house, since she knows that Charlie won’t approve of her plan to jump off a cliff because her delusions told her to. That asshole.

Bella heads over to Jacob’s house but Billy tells her that the wolves found a fresh vampire trail (which I assume would just be… like… shoe prints? Right?) and they’re old CSI Forks-ing that shit.

Mari: Maybe it’s skateboard trails or left over slip and slide plastic.

Catherine: Totally radical, dude!

K: Meanwhile, I was distracted by the fact that Billy is “at the kitchen table, eating cold cereal.” COLD CEREAL. As opposed to a piping hot bowl of Lucky Charms?? (I refuse to call porridge ‘cereal’. I don’t even know why she needs to clarify the temperature of his food. Just say he’s eating breakfast. Fuck.)

Annie: But the details! Ohhhh, the details. What would we do without them? This damn book would be eight chapters long.

Catherine: Bella gets upset that one of them might actually find Victoria and get killed. Billy agrees that it’s a tricky situation and she thinks that his ‘ancient eyes’ are hard to read. I like how there’s such a stunning ageist motif in these books. It really pairs nicely with the racism and sexism.

Billy comforts her by saying that the wolves take their job seriously and know how to kill vampires. But she’s still sulking as she flops down on the couch and starts flipping through the channels on the TV. Then she gets frustrated and grumps that she will be at the beach and leaves. I’m sure that Billy really gives a rat’s ass where you’re going, Bella.

Annie: He’s probably glad to get this whiney, mopey, disrespectful teenager out of his damn house.

Catherine: You just know he is.

Bella gets to the beach and then regrets going because she has nothing to do there. All she can do is worry about Jacob.

“Argh!” I groaned, and jumped off the log. I couldn’t sit still; it was worse than pacing.”

Nothing NOTHING is worse than when an author writes out a groan or a moan phonetically. Just… don’t do that. She groaned. We get it. You said that too and that’s enough to cover it.

K: It’s also terrible because it makes me think of all Ana Steele’s pirate orgasms. So. 

Mari: Yep.

Catherine: Everything is worse now, thanks. 

Bella is frustrated because she’d been counting on Edward’s voice to make it bearable to ‘live through the day.‘ (Her words not mine.) She also says, ‘the hole had been festering lately‘ and ‘the edges burned‘.

Ew, bitch. Go to a doctor. We don’t want to hear about your festering hole.

Bella looks up at the cliffs and thinks about diving off of them. Not in a suicidal way, of course, since that would be something she might have to get help for. But in a fun way.

She imagines how Edward’s voice would sound in her head if she did that and she calls it, ‘furious velvet’ again. So she decides to jump off the cliff by herself because she’s worried about Jacob getting hurt while he’s out looking for her… or something. I can’t make more sense of it than that.

Of course, she can’t find her way down to the lower jump off point that Jacob was going to show her so she decides to jump from the top, which he said was very dangerous. Because sure.

Also, the weather is bad and the sea is choppy because a storm is rolling in. So prime cliff diving time.

“I knew that this was the stupidest, most reckless thing I had done yet. The thought made me smile. The pain was already easing, as if my body knew that Edward’s voice was just seconds away…”

Jesus. I can’t even…ugh. You get it. By now you get it.

K: GIRL. SEEK PSYCHOLOGICAL HELP IMMEDIATELY.

Catherine: This book should come with a few self-help pamphlets with resource numbers. Every sentence in this part is so incredibly eye-roll worthy and stupid. Meyer basically just lists reason after reason why this is a really stupid idea to do at all let alone on a cold, stormy day. But of course, smart girl Bella is still gonna do it because she’s too codependent on her ex-boyfriend to stop herself.

The sad thing is, I would feel more sympathy if this was a genuine suicide attempt. Like, all joke aside. Bella’s standing on the edge of the cliff looking down and knowing she might get hurt and if she was just trying to end it all I would think that was some heavy shit but still very sad and heartbreaking. But no. She doesn’t want to kill herself. She’s literally just doing this to hear Edward’s voice. That’s it. She assumes she’ll just jump, swim to the beach, I guess and be fine.

Mari: Along those same lines, if she were doing it as an ill-advised way to feel something, that would also be different than literally just doing anything to hear Edward’s voice. It becomes very confusing for us readers when her mental health is wrapped up in her codependency this way. Also, because Meyer refuses to acknowledge anything besides her absolute need for Edward.

Catherine: Just as she’s about to jump she hears Edward’s angry velour voice. So points to Bella for being able to successfully predict her hallucinations. Seek help. The points are made of therapy.

He says her name and she answers in her head.

“It was only when he was disapproving like this that I could hear the true memory of his voice—the velvet texture and the musical intonation that made up the most perfect of all voices.”

Mari: Girl, WHAT. The true memory of you boyfriend comes when he’s mad at you? That’s his true self?

Annie: If I recall anything from the last book, I’d say that yeah, that’s a fairly accurate representation of his true self. See also: NOT A RELATIONSHIP WE SHOULD BE ROMANTICIZING FOR YOUNG ADULTS. But, hey. It’s a love story. And love is irrational. 

Catherine: Love is apparently an asshole, too. 

He pleads with her not to jump and she thinks at him that he wanted her to be human and that’s what she’s doing. By jumping off a cliff? I guess? Not a lot of this makes sense, guys. He says please and she says, ‘but you won’t stay with me any other way‘.

Okay, does Bella understand that she’s having a hallucination or not? He’s not with her now. She’s imagining him. And I thought she understood that but now not so much.

What is happening!?

She prepares to jump. He shouts at her and apparently his anger is ‘lovely.’ She jumps and screams in ‘exhilaration’ on the way down. She hits the water and it’s fucking freezing but ‘the chill only added to the high‘. She’s high on LIFE!

Once she’s in the water she’s thinking that was super easy and no big deal and then the current catches her and takes her under.

“I’d been so preoccupied by the size of the cliffs, by the obvious danger of their high, sheer faces, that I hadn’t worried at all about the dark water waiting.”

Yeah, she jumped off a cliff into the sea without thinking about the water that she was jumping into. Makes perfect sense. Bella’s smart. Also, she has no change of clothes after this. She’s not wearing a swimsuit.

K: I’m wondering if SMeyer knows how hard it is to stay afloat in wet denim and multiple layers of clothing. Because it’s REALLY EFFING HARD. Even in a swimming pool. It’s way worse if you’re stuck in a freaking rip during a storm.

Catherine: Please, that would involve research. 

Bella starts drowning and we get a very lengthy description of her possibly drowning but not really because we’re only halfway through the book so she’s obviously gonna be fine.

“It didn’t surprise me that my delusion of Edward was there. He owed me that much, considering that I was dying. I was surprised by how sure that knowledge was. I was going to drown. I was drowning.”

Bella’s REAL smart. No wonder she doesn’t need college.

Edward tells her to “keep swimming!”

But Bella’s like ‘where’ and he’s all ‘stop that! Don’t give up!’ because, as a delusion in her mind, he can finally read her mind. Because she’s crazy pants. Deep.

She does try a bit longer but then get’s too tired and drowny to keep going and starts to realize how peaceful of a death this is as opposed to curling up into a ball on the forest floor and letting the woodland animals sing you to sleep.

She thinks about how she’s luckier than most gross dying people because instead of seeing her life flash before her eyes she gets to see Edward’s pale ass visage.

“My subconscious had stored Edward away in flawless detail, saving him for this final moment. I could see his perfect face as if he were really there; the exact shade of his icy skin, the shape of his lips, the line of his jaw, the gold glinting in his furious eyes. He was angry, naturally, that I was giving up. His teeth were clenched and his nostrils flared with rage.”

Hot.

K: So…what SMeyer is telling us is that Edward looks like the human version of this right now?

Huh. Funny that.

Catherine: Oooh, yeah. So sexy. I just love when something looks like it’s totally gonna kill me and I should definitely run for my life.

Ghost Edward tells Bella to fight some more but she thinks about how she’s finally happy again and she almost forgot what happiness felt like.

“Happiness. It made the whole dying thing pretty much bearable.”

I just…

Mari: Bella + Edward: Basically feels like happy drowning.

Annie: I don’t know, I’m feeling pretty happy about it right now.

Catherine: The current shoves her against a rock and knocks the rest of her breath out of her and she starts to sink while thinking ‘Goodbye, I love you’.

This is how it looked in the movie:

In case you can’t hallucinate it along with Bella.

Next time on New Moon: SOMEONE refuses to die in Chapter 16.