Published: November 19, 2008 08:10 pm            

‘Twilight’ fans will be sinking teeth into book-based movie Friday

PRINCETON — As Harry Potter and his friends ride off into the literary sunset, a young girl and a vampire in love have set off a new round of parties and eagerly anticipated books and movies.

“Twilight,” a movie based on the novel by Stephenie Myers, opens Friday in local theaters. The tale of teenage girl Bella and Edward, the handsome vampire who loves her, has found a wide audience beyond the young adult category. Local libraries have long waiting lists of readers who want to borrow the four book series.

“We had three copies of each of them, and I just bought a fourth copy because the waiting list was so long,” said Director Connie Shumate of the Princeton Public Library. “I don’t think even Harry Potter matched this. Harry Potter was basically young adult reading, but this is everybody. This is all age groups.”

The Princeton Public Library has scheduled a “Twilight” party for Thursday, Dec. 4 at 6 p.m., Shumate said.

In Bluefield, long waiting lists for “Twilight” are also the rule. The Craft Memorial Library’s party is scheduled for 5 p.m. Friday. People who wish to attend should call the library by Friday, said Suzette Sims, program services coordinator.

Sims wanted to read the books for herself, but they had been checked out.

“I had to go buy the series to read it because I couldn’t get it to read before the party,” she said.

Only the Harry Potter series and the fantasy novel “Eragon” have matched the interest generated by “Twilight,” Sims added.

“The first ones (Harry Potter and “Eragon”) are for younger kids, but this is the first time I’ve seen teens really excited, especially girls,” she said.

During the last several years, romance novels featuring vampires, werewolves and other supernatural beings as love interests have grown in popularity. In novels like “Twilight,” young women find “you just have this perfect immortal man who wants to see to your every whim,” Sims said.

Why do vampires make good love interests?

“Probably something to do with the ultimate bad boy, because the girl always likes the bad boy. She wants to be able to redeem him,” Sims said.

Area bookstores are seeing the interest level among fans who want their own copies of the series. The books were first popular among young women, but then all age groups became interested, said Wilma Bury, co-owner of Hearthside Books in Bluefield. A yearning for life beyond everyday events helps fuel the enthusiasm.

“People need something out of the ordinary. People just like to think of something different beyond their ordinary lives,” Bury said.

One reader, 24-year-old Traci Tilley of Maybeury, said the tale has a good love story.

“It’s so interesting and it’s kind of unconventional. It’s not a story you would expect about vampires,” she said. “I just heard a lot of good things about it.”

Her husband John Tilley, who manages Marquee Cinemas in Welch, has been hearing about “Twilight,” too. For three weeks fans from as far away as Beckley have called about the availability of seats for midnight shows.

“It’s been hectic. I couldn’t believe it,” he said. “We’re expecting a big crowd. ‘The Dark Knight’ was huge in the summer and we had 60 come out (for midnight), but we’re expecting this to be big. It’s as big as Harry Potter. It’s like Harry Potter with teenage girls.”

        

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