From New York Times bestselling, award-winning author Jennifer Donnelly comes a revolutionary, gender-swapped retelling of Beauty and the Beast that will forever change how you think about beauty, power, and what it really means to follow your heart.
What makes a girl "beastly?" Is it having too much ambition? Being too proud? Taking up too much space? Or is it just wanting something, anything , too badly?
That's the problem Arabella faces when she makes her debut in society. Her parents want her to be sweet and compliant so she can marry well, but try as she might, Arabella can't extinguish the fire burning inside her -- the source of her deepest wishes, her wildest dreams.
When an attempt to suppress her emotions tragically backfires, a mysterious figure punishes Arabella with a curse, dooming her and everyone she cares about, trapping them in the castle.
As the years pass, Arabella abandons hope. The curse is her fault -- after all, there's nothing more "beastly" than a girl who expresses her anger -- and the only way to break it is to find a boy who loves her for her true a cruel task for a girl who's been told she's impossible to love.
When a handsome thief named Beau makes his way into the castle, the captive servants are thrilled, convinced he is the one to break the curse. But Beau -- spooked by the castle's strange and forbidding ladies-in-waiting, and by the malevolent presence that stalks its corridors at night -- only wants to escape. He learned long ago that love is only an illusion.
If Beau and Arabella have any hope of breaking the curse, they must learn to trust their wounded hearts, and realize that the cruelest prisons of all are the ones we build for ourselves.
Hardcover, 324 pages
Published May 7, 2024
by Scholastic Press
4/5 stars
Another Beauty & the Beast retelling, one would think that there are enough of them out in the literary world, but this one comes with a unique twist. Beauty is actually a male character while the beast is female. I was so excited to read this book and honestly could not understand the low ratings, especially since I am a fan of Jennifer Donnelly.
A captivating retelling, I found the characters strong, the world building unique and well thought out. They were parts of the story that made me think of Alice in Wonderland while other parts definitely had that beauty and the beast feel. With a nice cast of secondary characters who were just as quirky with their unique personalities as I am familiar with.
Although there might have been a few parts of the story I didn’t totally understand this was a fast paced story. Arabella's dedication to her family and determination kept me reading.
Beastly Beauty isn’t without heartache and consequences.
I haven’t read too many Donnelly fairytale retellings, but her books are some of my favorites. I will continue with her backlist until she has something new coming out.
This book was part of my 2024 reading off my shelf challenge.