Book Review: The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner by Stephenie Meyer

Review: The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner
Series: Twilight Saga – Novella
Author: Stephenie Meyer
No of Pages: 178
Release Date: 5 June 2010

Fans of The Twilight Saga will be enthralled by this riveting story of Bree Tanner, a character first introduced in Eclipse, and the darker side of the newborn vampire world she inhabits.

Bree Tanner can barely remember life before she had uncannily powerful senses, superhuman reflexes and unstoppable physical strength. Life before she had a relentless thirst for blood... life before she became a vampire.

All Bree knows is that living with her fellow newborns has few certainties and even fewer rules: watch your back, don't draw attention to yourself and, above all, make it home by sunrise or die. What she doesn't know: her time as an immortal is quickly running out.

Then Bree finds an unexpected friend in Diego, a newborn just as curious as Bree about their mysterious creator, whom they know only as "her". As they come to realize that the newborns are pawns in a game larger than anything they could have imagined, Bree and Diego must choose sides and decide whom to trust. But when everything you know about vampires is based on a lie, how do you find the truth?

In another irresistible combination of danger, mystery, and romance, Stephenie Meyer tells the devastating story of Bree and the newborn army as they prepare to close in on Bella Swan and the Cullen’s, following their encounter to its unforgettable conclusion.

My Thoughts:

Seeing through the eyes of someone other than Bella was definitely refreshing, but there were still traces of complete and utter stupidity on a woman’s part.

Bree Tanner as we all know dies in Eclipse. This book follows her second life of vampirism before her demise. Bree as a character is quite interesting. She was a runaway before she became a vampire so already had some survival techniques. When she became a vampire she quickly learned to stay out of the way if she wanted to live. She learns to keep a low profile behind Freaky Fred who has some sort of special power making it hard to look at him.

Bree lives in a large nest of very young, very violent vampires. Their leader Riley doesn’t have much control over them, only by way of scare tactics. They believe they are true vampires, burning in the sun, can’t go into holy places type vampires. On a late night hunt with her group Bree and one other know they won’t make it back in time for sun up, so they hide in a cave.

Bree and Diego get talking about their new lives and soon discover that they aren’t as vulnerable as first thought. After an accidental brush with the sun Bree and Diego start questioning if Riley knew all along that it didn’t affect them, and if he did, what else was he lying about.

After some detective work they realise they are part of an army going to take down “the yellow-eyes” a nasty, dangerous coven who keeps a pet human. It becomes a game of whoever kills the human wins.

Bree for being a smart and likeable character seems to have a dramatic change in her intelligence in the final pages of the story. Instead of thinking logically about why Diego has gone missing after talking to Riley, she heads off into battle to save him. A boy. She met four days ago and has had two conversations with. Sound familiar?

After an awesome beginning we fell back into the same old world of Twilight in which a girl who has just met someone who is potentially dangerous, risks her life to save him because she doesn’t want to live without him.

Uh-huh.

Lovely start, cop-out for an ending, but definitely a likable character. Anyone who has read Twilight will want to read this as it shines a normal light onto the world of vampires, well, as normal as you get where Glitter Pixies are concerned.