Jennifer Lange asked:

There, I said it.

His name is Edward Cullen and he’s the lead character in the book Twilight, the first in a series of four books (five if you count the most recent partial transcript posted online) written by Stephanie Meyer.

The story goes something like this – Bella Swan, a Plain Jane high school student whose parents are divorced, moves to Forks, Washington to live with her dad. At Forks High School, she meets Edward Cullen, a beyond gorgeous fellow high schooler with pale skin, extraordinary physical capabilities and a slew of weird behaviors nobody can explain.

Readers of Twilight soon learn:

1. Edward is a human-friendly vampire who “feeds” only on animals.
2. He’s never been more attracted to anyone’s smell than Bella’s.
3. He can read everyone’s mind but hers.
4. He desperately wants to be with Bella but is utterly afraid he’ll hurt her, both physically and emotionally.
5. He must protect Bella from non-human-friendly vampires, one who is particularly evil and will stop at nothing to kill her.

I’m embarrassed to admit I’m obsessed with the Twilight series. Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that I’m a 38-year-old married mother of three and that Stephanie’s books were written for the under-18 set, of which I am not officially a part. Or that I’ve been able to get nothing done around the house with my nose jammed in a Twilight series book for the past month. Or that I’m planning a night out with a host of girlfriends to see the Twilight movie premier on November 21st, while wearing a t-shirt that says “Bite Me”.

What in God’s name has gotten into me? Apparently, the same thing that’s gotten into the rest of the worldwide female population I suppose…young and (ahem) old alike.

I hear the millions of visitors to Entertainment Tonight Online, upon seeing the Twilight movie teaser broadcast, subsequently crashed the popular entertainment show’s website due to an influx of online traffic in the hours following the broadcast.

Everywhere you look and listen – on TV, on the radio, in print and on the Internet, it’s all about Twilight. Up until a few days ago, the movie’s promo people were busy running full-blown, full-page Twilight ads on the home page of MySpace.

In just three short weeks since posting Twilight Layouts to SpaceGravy.com, a social networking design website, they’ve become the most popularly-downloaded designs the company has offered in its three-year history.

Many of my friends, who are also in the over-30-married-with-children crowd, have read every book, are heading to the movie premier on the 21st and have fantasized on more than one occasion about falling “unconditionally and irrevocably in love” with Edward.

So what gives?

Is Twilight so popular because it’s all about angst-ridden forbidden love? God knows how enticing angst-ridden forbidden love can be.

Are women just generally obsessed with a dark and profoundly romantic love story?

Is Edward’s appeal so appealing we can’t get seem to get enough?

Do we secretly wish to be damsels in distress, waiting for our knight in shining hemoglobin to swoop in and rescue us?

Have we used our fantasies about Bella and Edward (Edward in particular) to escape our otherwise uneventful lives?

Does Edward’s love for nondescript, run-of-the-mill Bella make other nondescript, run-of-the-mill ladies believe there’s a remote chance someone like Edward could fall in love with them too?

Or is the seemingly unattainable love between Bella and Edward so magnetic, we can’t seem to tear our page-turning selves away from what happens next?

Who knows?

All I know is that I love Edward the Vampire. And in my warped little desperate housewife mind, he loves me too.

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