higher calibre? you've got to be kidding. just because something sells a lot of copies does not mean it is actually worthy of any literary praise.
Exactly. Twilight is a perfect example of this. I'm not one of those people who saying this book is crap because other people think so, I actually read and I couldn't believe people actually liked. I started the book with an open mind and suspended my belief about the whole vampire concept and began to read. First off, the protagonist was not a good, well-written character she whinged all the time and was one-dimensional and flaky. Also most of the other characters were badly written and I found it very hard to like them.
However, the worst infraction was the writing. To this day, I'm still in awe how Meyers mananged to get a book with such mediocre writing (that I could do a better job at) published.
Kids should read something good in the genre like Anne Rice.
Ooops, just ranted...