You need to sign in or sign up before continuing.
Take a photo of a barcode or cover
A review by whipcreamsucks
Beauty by Kerascoët, Hubert Boulard
5.0
They've gone and done it again. Hubert and Kerascoët have created another fairytale that descends slowly into hell. It is bloody magnificent, intriguing, and beautiful indeed.
So Coddie is the village buttface. She smells of fish and everybody laments on how repulsive she looks. When it gets to her and drives her to run away, she helps a fairy by chance and is therefore granted a wish. She wishes to be beautiful and... well, she isn't. She is perceived by others as beautiful. In fact, people see her as SO BEAUTIFUL they lose their fucking minds. Kingdoms go to war. Her wish becomes a curse because every man who sees her will become obsessed with possessing her.
Very Helen of Troy, yes? ....well, yes but no. Yes, kingdoms really do fight over Coddie/Beauty, but the story is also not as simple as just that. It goes to very extreme places- sexual harassment, war, adultery so to speak; some Game of Thrones-level stuff.
What I love is how Coddie is complex- she's introduced as your kind-hearted fairytale stock character who's just unlucky in terms of her looks. But as soon as she is granted opportunities simply by suddenly becoming a beauty, she changes. She wants everyone (and boy, EVERYONE) to love her. She wants to be involved in politics, and does so by asking her king to pass a law that will end the poverty, and immediately flounces off to try on her new queen dresses. GOOD. I love how suddenly being beautiful didn't suddenly make her perfect. Hubert and Kerascoët want you to get it into your head that you won't be seeing pure black-and-white characters, and with the theme of literally perceiving beauty throughout the story, 'beautiful' can be applied to every colour there is- the characters are truly not limited to how they look. The beautiful characters do ugly things, and thus black and white are mixed. Look at Claudine, Dagmar, Otto even. And Robert! Peter!
And now finally, I need to talk about the art: Kerascoët's art style changes in this book too- the only way my mind thinks of describing it right now is that the characters look more easily squashed, flexed, and all in all, more susceptible to change. And this cast truly changes a lot- people die left and right, morals are dropped and ideals change because of the influence of beauty and Beauty herself, and it just seems very fairytaleish and is colourful enough for children (but be warned, this IS NOT FOR CHILDREN. At all). But what really keeps it together is that the art style is here to remind you to read this like a fairytale. Keep it in mind.
So Coddie is the village buttface. She smells of fish and everybody laments on how repulsive she looks. When it gets to her and drives her to run away, she helps a fairy by chance and is therefore granted a wish. She wishes to be beautiful and... well, she isn't. She is perceived by others as beautiful. In fact, people see her as SO BEAUTIFUL they lose their fucking minds. Kingdoms go to war. Her wish becomes a curse because every man who sees her will become obsessed with possessing her.
Very Helen of Troy, yes? ....well, yes but no. Yes, kingdoms really do fight over Coddie/Beauty, but the story is also not as simple as just that. It goes to very extreme places- sexual harassment, war, adultery so to speak; some Game of Thrones-level stuff.
What I love is how Coddie is complex- she's introduced as your kind-hearted fairytale stock character who's just unlucky in terms of her looks. But as soon as she is granted opportunities simply by suddenly becoming a beauty, she changes. She wants everyone (and boy, EVERYONE) to love her. She wants to be involved in politics, and does so by asking her king to pass a law that will end the poverty, and immediately flounces off to try on her new queen dresses. GOOD. I love how suddenly being beautiful didn't suddenly make her perfect. Hubert and Kerascoët want you to get it into your head that you won't be seeing pure black-and-white characters, and with the theme of literally perceiving beauty throughout the story, 'beautiful' can be applied to every colour there is- the characters are truly not limited to how they look. The beautiful characters do ugly things, and thus black and white are mixed. Look at Claudine, Dagmar, Otto even. And Robert! Peter!
Spoiler
I loved Peter ;-;And now finally, I need to talk about the art: Kerascoët's art style changes in this book too- the only way my mind thinks of describing it right now is that the characters look more easily squashed, flexed, and all in all, more susceptible to change. And this cast truly changes a lot- people die left and right, morals are dropped and ideals change because of the influence of beauty and Beauty herself, and it just seems very fairytaleish and is colourful enough for children (but be warned, this IS NOT FOR CHILDREN. At all). But what really keeps it together is that the art style is here to remind you to read this like a fairytale. Keep it in mind.