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A review by mybookishdelights
The Beauty and the Beast by Gabrielle-Suzanne de Villeneuve
5.0
First, I want to comment on this specific edition of this story. It is gorgeous! The illustrations have that medieval look to them and the interactive elements are unnecessary, but still fun.
Now to the story itself. Beauty and the Beast is my favorite "fairy tale." I've read so many retellings that it's crazy to me that I'm reading the original for the first time this late in the game. After finishing it, I would say the closest retelling to the original is Beauty by Robin McKinley, at least from what I've read. This definitely was not a very short story even though it's about 200 pages. All the events happened, but with a good chunk of pages left, I wondered what else there was to say. The author used those pages to explain everything that happened from different points of view. First, we got the Beast/Prince's point of view of what happened. Then we got the Fairy's point of view. There is nothing left to question (like the Disney versions) once you are done. Part of me feels like it was overkill, but another part of me appreciates it.
I definitely enjoyed this book. The writing has that feeling of old school fairy tale and after the first 20 pages or so it pulled me right in. However, the story itself was probably a 4 star for me. What bumps it up to 5 is this amazing edition.
Challenges:
2019 Goodreads Challenge
2019 Mount TBR
2019 NEWTs Readathon - Charms: Read a book that you think has a gorgeous cover
Now to the story itself. Beauty and the Beast is my favorite "fairy tale." I've read so many retellings that it's crazy to me that I'm reading the original for the first time this late in the game. After finishing it, I would say the closest retelling to the original is Beauty by Robin McKinley, at least from what I've read. This definitely was not a very short story even though it's about 200 pages. All the events happened, but with a good chunk of pages left, I wondered what else there was to say. The author used those pages to explain everything that happened from different points of view. First, we got the Beast/Prince's point of view of what happened. Then we got the Fairy's point of view. There is nothing left to question (like the Disney versions) once you are done. Part of me feels like it was overkill, but another part of me appreciates it.
I definitely enjoyed this book. The writing has that feeling of old school fairy tale and after the first 20 pages or so it pulled me right in. However, the story itself was probably a 4 star for me. What bumps it up to 5 is this amazing edition.
Challenges:
2019 Goodreads Challenge
2019 Mount TBR
2019 NEWTs Readathon - Charms: Read a book that you think has a gorgeous cover