I was very impressed by The Host. The setup for the novel, that of an invading alien trying its best to figure out what it is to be human, is fantastic. As far as science fiction goes, it's light, but I'm a sucker for alien invasion stories. 
 The character development for the most part is great. My only complaints fall along two lines. 1) Another love triangle. This plot line took a long time to play itself out, but then, I'm not Meyer's target audience with this kind of stuff. I wanted more violence. 2) Meyer seems to have a hard time having anything truly bad happen to her characters. Oh, she puts them in jeopardy, but never actually deals any of the blows. I was half-way through the novel when I realized that I didn't really believe that anything bad was going to happen. You don't want a reader to think that. If not for item # 2, I would have given this a five star rating. 
 I recommend it.