Breaking Dawn by Stephenie Meyer (unabridged audiobook read by Ilyana Kadushin and Matt Walters): This final book of the Twilight series opens with Bella and Edward’s wedding and subsequent honeymoon, and covers the first six months or so of their life together. There’s a bit of drama here and there, but by and large it’s not nearly as suspenseful as the earlier books – and those were pretty tame. As I’d expected, imprinting was used as a convenient solution to the love triangle. The idea is that when a werewolf meets his soulmate, he “imprints” on them and suddenly has eyes for no one else. Bella can’t be with Edward without breaking Jacob’s heart? Simple: Jacob imprints on somebody else and ceases being interested in Bella all together. Problem solved. Pretty cheap, if you ask me, but hardly unexpected. It’s not like I ever thought Jacob ever had a chance with Bella, even when Edward was out of the picture in New Moon.

And you know, I was okay with the invulnerability to sunlight and the extra-sensory powers and even the sparkling, but vampire pregnancy is something I can’t quite wrap my head around. I mean, they’re supposed to be physically dead – or at least permanently unchanging – right? Your body – male and female alike – has to be doing something inside there if you’re going to be able to make babies. That said, I still have to give props to Meyer for the hilarious dichotomy between the teen romance and the graphic horror. I just could not stop laughing at the ridiculousness of it all. I also enjoyed Jacob as a temporary narrator; even when he’s being angstful he’s amusing. Oh, and for the record: Renesmee is a terrible name, and Nessie is a really unintuitive nickname.

The ending is happy, of course, and thorough to the point of absurdity. Everyone finds love, peace, and joy, untainted by regret or danger or even, in most cases, mortality. It’s also a fanfiction gold mine: loads of new characters (and creatures) introduced with only the barest of backstories. A talented fanfic writer could really go to town here. As for me, I felt a profound and somewhat embarrassing sense of freedom as I finished this book. The Twilight universe has devoured my brain for the past few months, but now it’s done, and I am free at last. It’s a very sudden, very weird sensation. I don’t even feel a desire to reread any of the books. I’ll see the movies, though I’m not in any particular hurry anymore. I enjoyed the story, laughed more than was probably appropriate (oh come on, these books are silly), and now I’m on to the next one. Rock on.