Inaugural Meeting & Sci-Why Sparkle Skins
Today we had the inaugural meeting of Twilight SL! Sunday’s are reserved for general discussions. We will begin our in-depth discussion of the first chapter on Monday at 7PM at the Long Discussion House, sLiterary.
We covered a range of topics, but the one I found interesting was the digression on why vampires in Meyer’s mythos have shiny skins. Ji Ni mentioned it might be similar to how shark skin sparkles. Shark skin is a helical network of flexible collagenous fibers - basically skin-bone arranged to work as both muscle and protection; although shark skin might look smooth, they’re actually made up of a network of dermal denticles - or flattened scales - which also helps to further toughen the skin. Meyer vampires, like many other mythos, have skin that regular weapons can’t cut or penetrate. (But, apparently, the teeth of shapeshifting werewolves can - more on that much later.) One possible scientific explanation for why Meyer vampire’s skins sparkle in sunlight is that the (presumably) diamond shape of their dermal denticle is so fine, it can only be revealed in sunlight (and perhaps you can see that shiny alchemical vampire substance through the cracks in the denticles?).
Of course, Meyer’s anecdote for shiny sparkly skins would be that that was the dream she had to inspire her to write the entire series. It’s also used as a literary device for explaining for why these vampires who don’t burn in the sunlight don’t go out in public in the sunlight–their inhumanness would be way too clearly betrayed.
Im so dissapointed that I missed this yesterday! Darn super bowl! I can;t wait for the next meeting. Clever idea!