{"id":186,"date":"2008-09-22T21:26:43","date_gmt":"2008-09-23T01:26:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/2008\/09\/22\/review-of-the-host-by-stephenie-meyer\/"},"modified":"2008-10-12T18:37:55","modified_gmt":"2008-10-12T22:37:56","slug":"review-of-the-host-by-stephenie-meyer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/?p=186","title":{"rendered":"Review of The Host, by Stephenie Meyer"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"host1.jpg\"<\/em><\/p>\n

The Host<\/em><\/p>\n

by Stephenie Meyer<\/p>\n

Little, Brown, and Company, 2008.\u00a0 619 pages.<\/p>\n

Starred Review.<\/p>\n

I thoroughly enjoyed The Host, <\/em>liking it even better than Stephenie Meyer’s more famous Twilight <\/em>series.\u00a0 This one was written for adults, so that may be some of why I liked it.\u00a0 But I also thought it was well-written.\u00a0 She didn’t have the whole\u00a0traditional spectrum\u00a0of vampire stories to\u00a0contend with.<\/p>\n

Of course, she did have the noble tradition of body-snatcher stories up against her!\u00a0 But I haven’t read or watched very many of those at all.\u00a0 Her description of what it would be like if mind-stealing aliens tried to take over earth seemed right.\u00a0 <\/em>Of course!\u00a0 That is what would happen.<\/p>\n

Wanderer is an alien who has lived on seven different planets.\u00a0 But when she is put into the body of a human on earth, it doesn’t go as smoothly as with any other host.\u00a0 The host begins by hiding things from Wanderer.\u00a0 Names of people she loves, and where they might be hiding.\u00a0 She doesn’t want Wanderer to tell a Seeker.\u00a0 However, this host, named Melanie, should not still be there at all.<\/p>\n

Melanie’s voice gets stronger.\u00a0 Wanderer is ready to give up, to find a new host and let a Seeker be put into Melanie’s body.\u00a0 But somehow, she can’t bring herself to give up Jared and Jamie.\u00a0 Instead, she goes to find them.<\/p>\n

Can Wanderer, nicknamed Wanda, keep from betraying the humans she now loves as much as Melanie does?\u00a0 Will those humans even give her a chance, since they think of her as the monstrous mind-thief alien who stole Melanie’s body?<\/p>\n

I found myself believing that indeed humans would not just disappear if powerful aliens invaded our planet.\u00a0 Indeed, the aliens might find more than they bargained for.<\/p>\n

The Host <\/em>is a wonderful exploration of life and love and what it means to be human.<\/p>\n

I knew the human exaggeration for sorrow — a <\/em>broken heart.\u00a0 Melanie remembered speaking the phrase herself.\u00a0 But I’d always thought of it as hyperbole, a traditional description for something that had no real physiological link, like a green thumb.\u00a0 So I wasn’t expecting the pain in my chest.\u00a0 The nausea, yes, the swelling in my throat, yes, and, yes, the tears burning in my eyes.\u00a0 But what was the ripping sensation just under my rib cage?\u00a0 It made no logical sense.<\/em><\/p>\n

Buy from Amazon.com<\/font><\/a><\/p>\n

Find this review on the main site at:<\/p>\n

www.sonderbooks.com\/Fiction\/host.html<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Host by Stephenie Meyer Little, Brown, and Company, 2008.\u00a0 619 pages. Starred Review. I thoroughly enjoyed The Host, liking it even better than Stephenie Meyer’s more famous Twilight series.\u00a0 This one was written for adults, so that may be some of why I liked it.\u00a0 But I also thought it was well-written.\u00a0 She didn’t […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,18,42],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-186","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fiction-review","category-science-fiction","category-starred-review"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/186","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=186"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/186\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=186"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=186"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=186"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}