Host Epilogue

So Eve starts off telling us things we already know. That this was her first ‘rebirth’ into the same planet and that it was weird being in a new body. Um, yeah. We know. You just spent the last thousand pages going over all that. Believe it or not even your dumbest fans are walking away with that impression in spite of the bunker thick skulls they posses.

And she whines about her the former owner’s memories of a mother who she is mourning. She wonders if that means joy has to be balanced with pain. No, because if it were, Otis would be covered in open sores and leper’s herpes.

Oh and this new body is weak so people have to do things for her. Wow, I mean just wow. So she went from mostly useless to completely. Of course the other characters don’t mind now. This means they can send her away to go write terrible alien poetry in the corner.

It also turns out that no one can hate her now. Sharon and Maggie just don’t hate her as much if at all and children are no longer afraid of her. Gee, her transformation was nothing like Bella’s at all was it? She went from being barely tolerable, if incredibly annoying, to extremely irritating author avatar with absolutely no redeeming qualities. Plus it also means that Jackie Otis is just not as good because she’s not the protagonist. On an irritating note, Eve’s new body lived all of it’s life in Seattle. Gragghh!

The healer remembered her name and all of her ‘training’ and now their ‘hospital’ is a place of ‘miracles’. And why is that? Do all of the other characters keep coming down with rare diseases a la House? ‘Oh no! Jimmy is having a heart attack.’ ‘That’s no heart attack. It’s Johnson’s-Cracktail disease. It presents the exact same symptoms except that when they try to treat him he’ll get worse and I’ll have to intervene.’

Blah blah blah. For some reason Ian hasn’t kissed Eve since she got put I the new body six months ago. Yeah, he’s having body snatcher’s remorse. It’s okay though. In a few months they’ll go grab another one and try again. Maybe he’ll get a cute girl from Central America this time.

They end up alone through some incredibly contrived circumstances. They snuggle and talk. Ian was trying to give her time to get over Jared. Man, it’s a good thing no one ever talks to one another. Otherwise we couldn’t have these wacky sitcom style misunderstandings. And Otis feels the need to use ‘nonplatonic’ and ‘unplatonic’ so close to each other that the universe should implode due to the chain reaction of retarded.

They kiss and then we skip forward when they go on a raid. Eve says her new body is perfect for only one thing now and that’s raiding. Yes, I can see how a weak body incapable of the most menial task is just perfect for going out into danger. That way she can’t carry a weapon to defend herself nor could she run if the circumstances called for it.

And boom, there’s a bunch of ‘seekers’. Eve starts whining, again, about this being the end. Oh, woe is me. I done walked into a trap. Was that happily ever after ending all a farce designed to lull us in to a false sense of security?

No because as it turns out they’re regular humans too. And there’s twenty some odd of them. Not around just in their little outpost. Plus they know a whole bunch of others. Well now they can have a survivor Tupperware party. I’ll bring a hot dish, of lead. Served piping hot and perforating every dumbstruck idiot who says ‘But Eve is a good alien.’

These humans also have their own pet alien. Eve likes his use of the phrase ‘gone native’ and the sort of nod to each other in the same knowing way. And the book ends with them agreeing that Earth is the strangest place. And that’s it.

Huh? ‘Earth is strange.’ ‘The strangest.’ That’s one of the most what the? Endings I’ve ever encountered. Why not just have a fire-breathing badger fly through the scene, yell something in the unknown tongue of Babaganoosh, and spin the world like a top? That makes about as much sense.

I think it’s because she sincerely doesn’t know how to end stuff. She just kept writing and writing and her editor just picked a spot and said, ‘to hell with it’. ‘Where does this go, Stephanie?’ ‘Well things really pick up after Eve’s third kid when…’ ‘I’m just going to end it…here, okay?’ ‘What was that? I got distracted by this sparkly thing here.’ ‘Oh sweet zombie Jesus, what is that?’ ‘It’s a dil…’ ‘I know what it is! Why are you waving it at me?’ ‘I thought it was neat. Though Edward’s wouldn’t be this soft.’

So the pathetic attempt at an alien novel ends with all the grace of a one legged hippopotamus after dropping LSD. And to think, she wants to do at least two more of these. And this has been optioned for a movie. Maybe they’ll hand out amphetamines to keep the audience awake? Cause this thing could be used as an OTC sleep aid.