The Host Redux: Chapters 3 and 4

CHAPTER 3
Resisted

I don't know, I think when you can identify more with the villains of a story than either of the two leads, there's something wrong. I'm getting this huge urge right now to rewrite the story from her perspective and make her into a more sympathetic character. It will be like a sci-fi Wicked.

The Healer cut her off. “What is missing?” he asked. “Clearly, you've accessed speech.”
Thanks for stating the obvious.

“This host was part of the human resistance.” There was a hint of excitement in the Seeker's
voice now. “Those humans who were aware of us before insertion are more difficult to subdue.
This one still resists.”
There was a moment of silence while they waited for my response.
Resisting? The host was blocking my access? Again, the heat of my anger surprised me.
Wanderer is SO SLOW on the uptake. She tried to access memories, was blocked, felt anger that wasn't hers, and then the host SPECIFICALLY TALKED TO HER, and she's heard stories of hosts resisting and yet she STILL doesn't think that maybe, just maybe, the host is blocking her access to memories.

I opened them [her eyes] narrowly, keeping my eyelashes feathered over the breach.
This is quite possibly the dumbest and most unnecessary description of keeping your eyes half open that I have ever read in my life.

The walls were light green–a calming color, but also the color of sickness.
Duh, everyone knows BLUE is the calming colour. Green, for me, just calls to mind my great-baba's house. Which also had egg cartons on the ceiling, for whatever reason. But I digress.

“Um, yes.” He cleared his throat. “This was only the soul's second life. He came from Blind
World.”
“Blind World?” I asked, cocking my head to the side reflexively.
“Oh, sorry, you wouldn't know our nicknames. This was one of yours, though, was it not?” He
pulled a device from his pocket, a computer, and scanned quickly. “Yes, your seventh planet. In the eighty-first sector.”
“BlindWorld?” I said again, my voice now disapproving.
“Yes, well, some who have lived there prefer to call it the Singing World.”
I nodded slowly. I liked that better.
She's getting used to a new body, one that might be resisting, WHICH IS EXTREMELY RARE and she flips out about a very mildly possibly politically incorrect term? But I forget: Smeyer has some kind of obsession with making things as pretty and Lisa Frank-esque as possible.

I turned my eyes to her, feeling them narrow as my mind dredged up the appropriate image of
the ugly flying rodent she referred to.
Hey, bats are cute!

So anyway, now the Seeker, or possibly Fords (at this point, I don't really care) is telling Wanderer about a host who took back his body.

Would they think me weak as well?Was I weak, that I could not force this mind to answer my
questions? Weaker still, because her living thoughts had existed in my head where there should be nothing but memory? I'd always thought of myself as strong. This idea of weakness made me flinch. Made me feel shame.
This paragraph is HILARIOUS in light of what's to come. Wanderer, strong? Don't make me laugh.

So Wanderer is telling the Seeker what she knows about Melanie. Melanie is 20 and from New Mexico. She was looking for her cousin Sharon. And she may or may not have left a note. Then Wanderer asks, "Did they find Sharon?" but it was actually Melanie's question. Spooky.

I forgot how utterly tedious this book is.

We find out that the beautiful boy's name is Jared, but he is henceforth referred to as Pedobear because that's what I called him in my first recap and for other reasons that will become apparent.

CHAPTER 4
Dreamed

We're in a Melanie memory. She is hiding and she is hungry. She's stealing food from some Souls.

They keep our habits so perfectly, it's hard to see any difference. Which is how they won in the first place.
And thus we have the question that will haunt me throughout this reading: why travel light years through space and put in all the effort to take over a planet and then PROCEED TO DO THE EXACT SAME THINGS HUMANS WOULD DO? I get doing that while you're trying to remain incognito while in the process of taking over a planet, but after? What's the point? Like, later we have a soul who is a convenience store clerk. Why? I can hardly manage a minimum wage for two months of the summer, never mind travelling so friggin far to do it. Why bother?

I go by feel.
Wouldn't "I go by touch" sound more sophisticated and less amateurish? Oh right, this is Smeyer we're talking about.

“Do it,” I spit through my teeth. “Just do it. I don't want to be a filthy parasite!”
You'll be the host body. Not the parasite. DUH.

This whole part where she gets captured by this guy is so stupid. The guy calls her "clever" but why, I don't know. I guess what passes for "clever" in Smeyer's world is being able to string a few words together in a sentence. And despite the fact that he's trying to figure out whether or not she's a Seeker, and he mentions a trap, she STILL doesn't get it that he's NOT AN ALIEN.

"Feisty for a peace-loving body snatcher, aren't you?"
His words are nonsensical. I thought the aliens were all the same. I guess they have their nut
jobs, too, after all.
I twist and claw, trying to break his hold. My nails catch his arm, but this just makes him
tighten his hold on my throat.
"I will kill you, you worthless body thief. I'm not bluffing."
And she still doesn't get it.

Then he finally realizes that she's a human and he kisses her and she knees him in...the nuts, I'm guessing and I'm totally surprised and I REALLY hate to this say this but I feel I must: It's a little awesome.

But then she still doesn't believe that he's not an alien and I am forced to hate her again.

I can't believe I missed this the first time. She describes his eyes as "liquid sienna." LIQUID SIENNA. Oh, dammit, you guys. I was never really sure what sienna was, but I looked it up and PEDOBEAR'S EYES ARE YELLOW TOO, JUST LIKE EDWARD'S. That's NOT attractive. At all. I don't know WHAT her deal is with yellow eyes, but it's a little disconcerting.

And then he kisses her again. And then Wanderer wakes up from the dream. Wanderer sends an email to the Seeker, telling her about Jamie (Melanie's brother) and Melanie is all mad.