Talk:The Host (novel)

Invasion
So, am I the only one who feels she's ripped off Body Snatchers and gotten away with it?

If I were to write a story about a giant Gorilla being worshiped by a tribe on a far off island and call it Primate, would I sell thousands of books and be blasted all over NYT Best Sellers list?

reply: ... Maybe if you told it from King Kong's point of view - that'd be original... This is Invasion of the Body Snatchers from the Body Snatcher's point of view - and thus original. Also, unlike Invasion - this, oddly enough, is romance rather than horror. Don't pick on Meyer just cause of the plague of drooling fan-girls Twightlight gave us. ;)

reply: i agree dont say things about meyer if u dont like her than dont read her books ;P

Yeah, it was the first thing that came to mind: total ripoff of Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Then thinking about it a bit more, it is also reminiscent of Stargate where a parasitic species called the Goa'uld take control of human beings without any regard for the mind of the hosts. Some human hosts can exert a measure of resistance to their "occupants"; there also exists a faction of this species called the Tok'ra who have a truly symbiotic relationship with their hosts instead of "inhabiting" their bodies forcibly. The Tok'ra are also influenced by the personality, ideals, morality and experiences of their hosts.

So...not exactly an original plot for a novel. --Easuter (talk) 02:37, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

reply:

>< I assume you've not read this book. The body snatchers in this plot are downright pleasant. Part of the ongoing conflict in the book is that the aliens, after having taken over the earth, seem to have actually made it a better world: free of violence, and full of brotherly love, as it were. Part of the horror some of the human's must eventually face is that they, not the invaders, are the true monsters. You certainly can't draw comparisons with Stargate's violent egotistical enslaving Goa'uld beyond the fact that they're both parasites that take over the human mind, and that certainly isn't an original idea on Stargate's behalf, having been done in about a million sci-fi plots before then, never mind all the demon-possession horror stories for hundreds of years before we even had the concept of aliens. This book is rare in that, not only are the possessors justified in their actions, but the story is told from the possessors' point of view. I can't think of a sci-fi that's attempted that before (although there likely is one that I've just not heard of - there's nothing truly original under the sun, after all.)

Characters Section
It would be MUCH better if there wasn't a characters section in the article, and probably better if we had a better plot summary than a list of characters. ~ Bella   Swan ? 01:46, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

This book is so fantastic! It is my favorite of Meyer's to date. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.180.185.101 (talk) 01:03, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

I don't see why the characters section is necessarily a bad idea, but I do agree that we need a better plot summary--this one was just taken from the publisher-provided one.I'll get working on the PS! Also, someone created a Spoiler section, and I don't think that IT is necessary. I've just looked into it and, to quote from Novel Style Guidelines, "Spoilers should not under any circumstances be deleted or omitted, as doing so directly contradicts the Wikipedia-wide content disclaimer. In short, Wikipedia contains spoilers; please respect this policy." I'll do a bit of a revamp on this stuff, anyways. DreamHaze (talk) 16:25, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

All right, I've redone the Plot Summary but it i FAR too long--I'll be redoing it again sometime today or tomorrow, probably, but I'm leaving it for a bit so I can get some fresh perspective. I've been sitting for too long. DreamHaze (talk) 17:26, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

{NovelsWikiProject}} —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.173.164.106 (talk) 19:05, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

May I point out that the characters section is rather too long. Do we have to include those cloying physical descriptions of Meyer's, such as "Chocolate brown eyes". Lets just say "Brown eyes" like normal people. And it tends to read like a plot summary. --Pstanton (talk) 05:27, 18 February 2009 (UTC)


 * By all means, trim it down. It could definitely use some cleanup. Andrea  ( talk ) 05:59, 18 February 2009 (UTC)


 * Yeah, I did some initial edits of the character descriptions because they were screaming "Mary Sue" and it was extremely annoying. Some of them are direct quotes from the book so I put them in quotes. But...it still needs trimming down. I'm just not patient enough to swim through the sugar... 86.27.189.195 (talk) 20:48, 22 June 2011 (UTC)Alathaea

Plot Summary
I've made a new plot summary, as I wasn't sure that the one provided on the back cover of the book was exactly adequate. However, it is extraordinarily LONG--if someone would like to cut it down, feel free. I'm planning on extending other sections so it's a bit more proportionate, but until then, do what you will to fix it! Thanks! DreamHaze (talk) 05:00, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Yeah, the character section was removed, but I think someone added it again. It is not needed. It's basically an extension of the plot summary, which we definitly don't need. ~ Bella   Swan ? 01:43, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
 * I agree. I'm adding OTHER sections, is what I meant--things to balance out the proportions of plot summary. Thanks for the help! DreamHaze (talk) 03:28, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

i think the plot summary s too detailed: it could be counted as a spoiler. maybe a warning? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 220.233.68.236 (talk) 11:33, 31 May 2008 (UTC)
 * While I agree that the plot summary is still a bit too long, a spoiler warning hardly seems necessary. Wikipedia is known to contain spoilers as it is an encyclopedia. I mentioned above, actually, that Wikipedia's spoiler policy is that Wikipedia contains spoilers and they aren't supposed to be removed. You can check out the Content Disclaimer as well as Spoiler for more information, but that was my understanding. Good point to bring up though! DreamHaze (talk) 05:44, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

I've deleted the entire plot summary, since not only is it entirely unsourced, but there are copies of it all over the net, and I'm not sure which one came first. If it can be rewritten in encyclopedic language, with sourcing, then it could be salvaged. I haven't yet deleted the characters section, but that could use a good pruning, too. The Mark of the Beast (talk) 03:27, 23 January 2012 (UTC)


 * If you look at the article's history, it seems more likely that other sites actually copied the plot summary from here. You can find similarities between the most recent summary and the revisions that were present in 2009 (possibly even further back, I didn't check that far), though it has clearly evolved bit by bit over time to become quite different—not at all once, as if someone had copy and pasted it from another site. The only source used for it is the book itself, which is probably not ideal but is common for plot summaries even in Featured Articles. I'm in favour of trimming it down (the characters section too), but I don't think it needs to be completely deleted until then. We can work with what is there. Andrea  ( talk ) 04:25, 23 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Some of the wording was word for word copied from the book's website. The Mark of the Beast (talk) 06:07, 23 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Which site, this one? Andrea  ( talk ) 12:05, 23 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Yes. The Mark of the Beast (talk) 18:24, 23 January 2012 (UTC)


 * In that case, I'd like to know exactly what you think was copied; I see nothing in the latest plot summary that looks like it was taken from that synopsis. Andrea  ( talk ) 21:27, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

For some reason, the plot summary was stretching the page. I checked on more than one device, and it was doing it on mobile and tablet browsers as well. Cleared up. 69.244.78.36 (talk) 22:24, 26 March 2013 (UTC)

Characters Page?
There's so many people in this book, should we add a page for the characters? We might even be able to add individual pages, like for Wanda, and Melanie. And if not, we could still make a List of Characters in The Host page, right? I'm not sure if anyone else feels that way. Keyblade Mage (talk) 06:17, 3 August 2008 (UTC)Keyblade Mage


 * A list of characters on this page would be best. :) I don't think any individual character of The Host is notable enough to have the amount background and reception information warranting separate articles. --PeaceNT (talk) 06:56, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

Conetent:

My daughter read the twilight novels; Does this book hav exlicit content, or can she read it?

Plot summary
The plot summary listed on the main page does not appear to have a descrpition of what a soul is, though reading it through implies that it was there. If anybody knows where it's hidden, could you please return it. (and for the person above, wikipedia is not a questiona nd anwser based service, and explicit activity is confined to the last few chapters, though hinted at before) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.132.138.106 (talk) 19:59, 11 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Not just that, it's completely jumbled and in-universe. I can't make head or tails of it. Can someone rewrite it so that people who haven't read the book will understand what's going on? TomorrowTime (talk) 08:36, 26 July 2010 (UTC)

Man of Two Worlds, again
I was about to get this book until I remembered where I saw the theme before -- Man of Two Worlds by Frank and Brian Herbert. This is not a diss on Ms Meyer. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sabinal (talk • contribs) 04:23, 3 September 2012 (UTC)

Plagiarism?
Am i the only person who think "The Host" is a plagiarism of "Hostess" by American writer Isaac Asimov? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hostess_%28short_story%29 <>

Soul description not quite accurate
I just edited the plot summary to better describe what souls do to the original human personality. Without going too far into the plot, the original human personality (needs a better word) is still there but almost always unable to express itself. Loves Macs  (talk) 20:11, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

External links modified
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Really inspired by a movie?
Where does the information come from that the author was inspired by an Italian film from the 60s to create her book? I couldn't find any article or news about it anywhere other than a person on the site Quora linking the information, but it goes from there to here. That is, the only one to talk outside of Wikipedia about it, uses it as a base. I would love to know, thanks in advance -- Historicallyeditor (talk) 20:33, 17 April 2022 (UTC)