The reimagining comes in the form of opposite day. The vast majority of the characters from Twilight were turned into the opposite sex in this book - the main exceptions being Charlie and Renee. Stephenie Meyer explains the "why" in her introduction to the story (which you should not skip since it lays the foundation for what you're about to read).
Okay, so here's my take on the whole shebang. When I first read Twilight, I quickly devoured all four books in less than a week. They read like they were written by somebody very young and inexperienced, but that was half their charm. I loved the story.
Enter the movie. I hated it. Like, really really hated it. Bad Bella. Bad Edward. Weird choices for the rest of the vampires (though I did like the Alice character the most out of the lot). Charlie was probably the best representation of book-to-movie interpretation for me. And while he wasn't "my" Jacob, I thought Taylor Lautner represented pretty well. Hubba Hubba (yeah, totally cougar of me to say).
Even though I figured I wouldn't like them, I tortured myself and watched the rest of the movies, after they were released on dvd (no way I was wasting any more money on seeing the rest in the theater). Torture being the key word. I always held out a little hope...and was always disappointed. So yeah, I thought the movie was crap.
As far as Life and Death goes...I'm on the fence. I will say that the author's writing has really progressed (as one would hope after 10 years). This one didn't sound like it was written by a teen for a teen. But this may have also been its downfall.
I get why she did it. It was a bit of fun. I liked the idea of switching out the characters and looking at it from a new perspective. On its own, it was good. If I hadn't read and enjoyed the original story so much, I may have liked it more. But ultimately, I couldn't NOT compare the two.
I'll say that I never felt the oppression that some felt. Bella was a pretty typical teenage girl. I didn't get the abusive part that apprently so many saw. The love triangle was probably the best part of the whole story...and all of that was sadly lost in the reimagining. As a matter of fact, the Quileutes were lost - and without them, where is the story? I'll admit to being partial to the hot blooded. Shifters and wolves are always my favorites. I am team Jacob. So losing all of this was what made the book less enjoyable for me. Plus, can you really get that from a teenage boy's perspective (which as the mother of a teenage boy, I found pretty inaccurate. I identified more with Bella) anyway?
Life and Death's saving grace was that Beau (the Bella character) liked to cook. Oh wait, there was one more saving grace - Charlie stayed the same.
