A fractured Beauty & the Beast retelling (Crowns of the Twelve Book 1)

The Subtle Beauty is a unique retelling of beauty and the beast. She mixes a few literary pieces (seven deadly sins, for example) with a Celtic back drop and throws in a vain and hard to like heroine. I love the use of the Celtic phrases and thought it resonated well with her poetic style of writing. I found her world easy to envision and her characters real and deep. Though her prologue runs a little long, I did not find it distracting from the story and probably wouldn’t have particularly noticed if not pointed out. I wish this book had run a little longer and was sad that it ended. This is Ann’s first book and has some minor grammatical errors and some areas that need a little polishing, but this is a charming retelling for any fairytale lover. I look forward to reading her next novel. I gave her four stars only because it wasn't polished as finely as I think it could be.

*Note: review is a little spoilerish*
I was drawn to this book because it’s a BatB retelling. BatB is my favourite fairy tale and I’m usually eager to read any retellings that I can get my hands on. On the one hand, this is a positive thing for The Subtle Beauty as it led me to purchase the book. On the other hand, however, it is not at all in its favour as it means that I’ve got a lot to compare it with.

When held up against the likes of Juliet Marillier’s Heart's Blood and Stacey Jay’s Of Beast and Beauty I’m afraid that this book falls flat. It’s certainly got some good ideas, with the story based on a form of Celtic mythology, but it still feels very unpolished. For one, the prologue takes up a whole 25% of the story. It’s incredibly long and I personally found it boring as I didn’t want to get caught up in that particular character.

At this point questions are already starting to crop up that don’t get resolved: why would Xander go to the warlock for help then immediately threaten him? Why do the men suddenly decide to invade Xander’s keep and threaten his wife? Why introduce the mythological creatures? After all, they have no particular role in the story beyond simply existing and could easily have been written out of it entirely. How does Xander manage to shake off the influence of the sword? It’s like a drug, fundamentally changing him, but he somehow goes from being dependant on the blade to just not – How? Where did that come from? These are just the first of many unanswered questions that pile up throughout the story culminating in what happened to Xander? It goes from him being King of his realm to Eoghan being King with no mention of Xander’s fate. I get the feeling that the author was still too caught up in the story in her head and forgot that the reader doesn’t have access to all her knowledge.

Furthermore, the style is still a bit on the basic side. It often felt like I was reading a list of actions rather than a narrative. For example: “Rhun slowed, no longer sure of his footing. Xander swatted a mosquito nuzzling the vein in his neck. Rhun nickered warily. Xander patted his shoulder to reassure him.”

There was a tendency to over exaggerate each character as well. This story’s Beauty is one of seven royal sisters, with each sister representing one of the seven deadly sins. The portrayal of each sister’s sin felt somewhat over the top, though, and it just served to place another wedge between me and the story.

Beauty’s sin is pride, meaning she’s very vain and convinced the sun worships her. It certainly made for a unique spin on the age old fairy tale but it also meant that Beauty’s personality repulsed me. When I’m reading a book, I need to be able to connect with the main character on some level. That wasn’t the case here. I couldn’t understand why Eoghan, who is cursed for his father’s sins, caught in the body of a gryphon, would be interested in this vain creature, why he would keep making overtures, giving her yet another chance, given the way she treated him. I admire the author’s guts, choosing to make her character so unlikeable but, for me, the story didn’t have that flair that would have allowed it to carry off such a feat.

As a final note, there’s some Gallic used in the story with a numbered reference that shows the translation in English on the last page of the Kindle edition. While a good idea in essence, it’s not really very practical. I’m not going to faff about flicking to the back of the book for a translation each time; it’s not something I enjoy doing on the Kindle. In the end, I ignored all the contributions in Gallic. It might have been a better idea to include English repetitions of the Gallic terms, certainly in a digitally published novel.

I really wanted to like this book...but.. The story spent more time on the obscure plot and on Glory's annoying family and hardly any time on the main characters.. Non-romantic and irritating. Too many plots that leave you hanging.. Skipped through most although I just should have stopped reading. Total let-down. Better books out there.

The subtle Beauty, Wow! When sleep is a necessary burden, just one more page, one more page. This Medieval tale flows imaginatively through the twelve kingdoms with a lilt, & celtic flair.
A heroine who starts out as a vain little beast becomes as beautiful on the inside as well as lovely in appearance. Her love interest Colin's courage and tenacity gives the book substance. Xander turning from good to evil stands as a warning to us all. Characters who teach morals, courage, and love give one the ability to suspend our disbelief, slipping to a realm of fantasy and intrigue.
I judge books by vocab, new, unknown, and obscure words. How many times I need a dictionary. I loved the Irish words, the unusual names, the feeling of flowing back in time to my own Irish roots. This articulate piece drew me back to my youth lying in a field reading Shakespeare, E.A.Poe, Avalon, Old World lit. & Poetry.
Ann artfully weaves a tale of innocent romance, time honored morals,adventure and fantasy.

I honestly couldn't force myself through the first 20 pages, which is rare for me. In that short time, the author made several very noticeable and sloppy mistakes. *SPOILERS BELOW*
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First, prince goes out to seek a favor from a man described as evil so he can have more land to give his unborn son...after he intimidates the location out of his wife's old nanny. Very cliche. I got past that until...

Horse and rider are navigating a bog described to be disgusting, muddy, and acidic smelling. When they stop, she mentions that the horse drops its head to graze. Wait, what? WTF is the horse going to graze on in an acidic muddy disgusting bog? Magic mushrooms? Ok...I can deal with that I guess. Then...

Princey poo ends up bringing just his dagger to talk to a man described as evil. Not the best of ideas, but I'm guessing by now that this guy is just royally stupid (no pun intended). He strikes up a brief conversation with blue robed evil wizard guy, wizard guy says he doesn't care about Princey poo's motives for being there, and what does Princey do? He lunges at wizard guy with his pathetic little dagger! For no reason whatsoever.

All in the first chapter! Yup, I put it down after that. It's sloppy writing, poor plot development, and the few characters I "met" seemed about as dumb as a sack of hammers.

Beauty and The Beast was one of my favourite Disney films so when I saw that this book was a retelling of this classic my interest was piqued, and the blurb made me think I would really enjoy this book, but sadly this was not the case. The premise of the story was perfect; a curse, magical creatures, royalty, many things that would intrigue me in a story. However, I almost didn't read it all because the prologue was really long and I kept losing interest, and if this is happening at the beginning of the book it can't be good. The prologue took us to the past to see just how the Prince came to be deformed and cursed, but it was just too drawn out.

I just felt like the whole book needed some more developments; you never really get a chance to feel the love between Glory and Eoghan, it felt rushed and I was routing for Colin most of the time anyway, the guy she was in love with before being betrothed to the Prince. There also are parts that don't add anything to the story and were just irrelevant really, like that the Princess is one of seven and each ones is linked to being one of the seven sins. I also found that I had a lot of unanswered questions; Queen Aowyn has a vision at the start of the book, where did the visions come from and why? Why did her maid tell the King about an evil man he could get help from knowing it would end badly? How did the King get out from under the grip of his evil sword?

I felt like this book could have been so much more, the writer is not a bad writer I just felt like the book came across as if she was rushed to finish it. I'm also not good with a book that is hard to understand, and it came across like she sat with a Thesaurus and picked the most complex, unknown words and I spent a lot of time just checking what they actually meant. It's definitely a unique take on the classic and although it didn't do it for me, that doesn't mean it wasn't a great read for many others.

** spoiler alert ** I would have liked to give this a higher score because my over all feeling was that this was a great read and a good retelling of beauty and the beast. It was also well written (avoiding the typical gaffs of first time self published writers) and managed to be quite a page turner. What stopped me from awarding four stars was the presence of several large plot holes. The recognition and reversal and the resolution all came to a head quite suddenly. There was then a large period of lag time in which Glory goes from vain and selfish beauty to essentially wiser but still selfish beauty in mourning. In my opinion I'm not sure Colin was needed at all except as a stalking horse to force Glory's father's hand at the beginning. It would have made more sense to me if he had looked at his sack of coins made a token effort to go after her and then met a nice girl who was pretty enough and above all kind, then settled down with her. While the magic blades are wonderful and I did enjoy the gaelic (it's rare I get to read any anymore) I felt that no one was really responsible for their actions; it was the swords' warping power; it was the warlock in the swamp; it was the secret base desire all men carry; it was the nature of young girls to be blind to the feelings of others and intrinsically selfish.

Reading that back it sounds very harsh, and actually I really liked this book. There were things to admire about Glory from the start - deeply buried though they were. I would have liked more time to get to know Eoghan and more time for the couple to fall in love. Having made him a duel narrative character, Colin is disposed of in a callous way by the author as well as Bawrn - it was a bit of a shock.

Ultimately I bought this on a whim and read it in a few hours. Couldn't put it down and am still thinking about the character plot holes and all. This is a writer to watch - she's going to be really good. And this is a fun book. If you like beuty and the beast or fairytale re-tellings definitely give it a go.

The Subtle Beauty is loosely based on the classic fairy tale Beauty and the Beast.

Glory the youngest, prettiest and vainest princess of King Xander. She believes herself in love with Colin the royal falconer who is besotted with her. Her plans to run away with him are cruelly thwarted by her sisters and she is taken to her betrothed in a far away realm.

Colin decided to follow her and rescue her from the 'evil' Prince Eoghan but as with all plans they go awry and then there are all sort of twists and turns.

Does Glory get her happy ever after?

The Subtle Beauty is a Celtic influenced reworking of Beauty and the Beast in the style of a medieval fairy tale with the seven deadly sins tossed in for good measure. There's nothing subtle about Glory, the beauty and she is hard to sympathize with. Eoghan, the Beast, is much more relatable and I kind of felt he deserved better. The characters, likeable or not, are all well written but the action is uneven with some parts awkwardly told and others quite involving. Overall it's an interesting take on an old fairytale.

I received this book in exchange for a fair and honest review.

The Subtle Beauty (Book Review)

So, after the new promotional pic made the rounds on the interwebs, I became acquainted with another gryphon author. Ann Hunter. She pointed me in the direction of the book, and I couldn’t help but to check it out.

Really, I’m a sucker for gryphons.

So. her book. Here is a cover pic.

((Image))

According to Goodreads, The Subtle Beauty tells the story of:

A cursed prince. A vain beauty. Glory is the seventh daughter of Balthazar, High King of the Twelve Kingdoms. Glory hopes that – of all her sisters – she can escape the fate of a loveless marriage. But on the night she plans to elope with the royal falconer, her world comes crashing down: Her father announces Glory’s betrothal to Eoghan of the Blood Realm – a prince no one has ever seen. The prince is said to be a recluse, cursed and deformed by the gods for the sins of his power-hungry father. Yet when Glory is trapped in Blackthorn Keep she discovers that not everything is what she expected. An insulting gryphon, a persistent ghost, and a secret plan to usurp the prince keep Glory reeling.

In this retelling of BEAUTY & THE BEAST, can Glory overcome her vanity to learn that what she wants isn’t what she needs—and save the cursed prince?

Definitely sounds interesting. I’ve never delved into fairy tale retellings, but throw in a gryphon and some celtic stuff…totally sold.

I’m going to say a short little blurb here, before I do my in-depth review. That way people who don’t want spoilers wont get any. :)

This book is great. I loved it, though there were a couple of times I got a little confused. My only real complaint was for the kindle edition. The author uses non-english words and has a link to a translation. That all worked fine, but I had to check my location first, and then go all the way back to it, which made me less inclined to look up translations. But that’s more of a software irritation, not really the author’s fault.

Anyway, this is a fantastic short (well, not really short, but shorter than the other books I’ve been reading lately) story. The characters are intriguing and Hunter puts a nice twist on an old story. It is definitely worth the relatively inexpensive price. I loved reading it and will be sure to read it again, as well as other works by Ann Hunter.

Okay, on to my more in-depth review.

WARNING. HERE THERE BE SPOILERS

Which means unless you want some stuff spoiled, please don’t read any further.

Okay, so the story starts out telling us a tale that at times seems unrelated to the whole “beauty and the beast” bit. I was actually very confused at first, wondering how it was all going to tie in together. What I didn’t realize (but did later) was that it was laying the groundwork for why Eoghan (the “deformed” prince) is cursed. I was also confused when the mother sacrificed herself to the gods to save her son from his father’s sins, but the baby still ended up being cursed. Maybe I read that part wrong?

Edit (Response from Ann Hunter): Aowyn sacrifices herself to save Xander’s life, but Eoghan is cursed because of what Xander has already done.

Aside from being confused by this, I felt the whole prologue stretched a bit long. It was very good, but I was mostly just wondering when the gryphon was going to enter the picture. This isn’t any fault of the author, mostly just me being goofy and impatient.

Then the story pics up with the vain MC, Glory. Ann Hunter does a magnificent job writing this character. There are times when I really dislike her, which is good.

The story builds and the plot thickens until our Glory finds herself “kidnapped” (I use this term loosely since she went willingly, she was just confused as to the identity of the person on the horse) and taken to a dark land with an old rundown castle like place and a gryphon.

Yay! Gryphons! XD Finally!

(I know, I know. I have issues, lol).

So, the idea is that the gryphon actually -is- the prince. This confused me because in the prologue the prince Eoghan was born deformed (twisted spine, club foot, etc.). So how, or why, did he go from being a deformed human to a gryphon? This is explained briefly, but I would have liked something a bit more in depth.

Edit (Response from Ann Hunter): There’s hints in the prologue that he’s actually born with some undeveloped gryphon features (fuzzy/downy, hard black nose– later beak, his spine proturding in a tail-like manner). I wanted to hint without giving it away.

Looks like I’m a bit daft and took some of the hints too literally. XD

Eventually Glory fell in love with him. I feel this part is rushed, and would have liked to see more evidence to her warming to the gryphon. In every action she is ridiculously rude to him, and is disgusted by him. Then he saves her life and tells her that he is Eoghan. After that she seems much less disgusted by him, which bothers me. Why should a name change her entire outlook? I realized that most of the old tales involve such fast-paced love stories, but I’d like to see things drawn out just a little, before they rush into saying the L word.

This was actually a struggle for me in Gryphon’s Prophecy. A friend/Beta Reader pointed out that my very first rough draft had the characters falling in love in like, one chapter. That it was unrealistic and needed to be fixed. So I went back and fixed that. The characters now connect over many chapters, getting to actually know each other and fall in love in a more realistic way.

Edit (Response from Ann Hunter): I know it seems rushed, but by the time she realizes she has any feelings for him that are not unkind (and indeed that she NEEDS him in her life to help her be a better person), it’s too late. So she spends the next year pining over what might have been. Their love story doesn’t start to develop until the last page.

Despite the few confusions and complains I had, the book was very worth it! I enjoyed reading it and could hardly put it down (I actually had a late time clock punch because I was reading on my lunch break). I really enjoyed the story, and it is probably one I will read again. I definitely recommend it to anyone who is looking for a good, but shorter story that has a beautifully happy ending (even if gryphon-less). I look forward to reading Ann Hunter’s other books as well, in the future.

I received this book free from Story Cartel for my honest review.

The book did not hold my attention as well as I typically like however it did have some interesting twists and moral conundrums. I did not fall in love with the main character even though she began to redeem herself near the end. I like the descriptions of griffins and the otherworldly (as well as how they were created in this world). I do really like the cover art!

This was extremely hard to get intrested in and I really could not make it past the first 6 pages. It is not something I would want to read , I am more of a crime and mystery reader . Just not my cup of tea #crownsofthetwelve The Subtle Beauty (Crowns of the Twelve Book 1)

The Subtle Beauty: A fractured Beauty & the Beast retelling (Crowns of the Twelve Book 1)Great story, really enjoy it.

The story starts with Xander and his wife, a Celtic Princess, Aowyn. They are very much in love and excited about the baby that will soon be born. The gods show Aowyn the baby in a vision. They show her “Eoghan, prince of the future Crown Realm”. She tells Xander that he will have a son. Because his wife is a princess his son will be a prince. He’s consumed with finding a way to give his son a better inheritance. He want to provide more than the small, decrepit Blackthorn Keep as his son only inheritance. Xander believes a prince should have “provinces to govern and kingdoms to rule.”

He has nothing to offer for an arrange marriage with one of the 12 Kingdoms Kings, or incentives to make allies. Xander goes to Sylas Mortas, an evil warlock. He procures Idegwaed. Xander’s compulsion destroys kingdoms, his wife, and curses his son.

Idegwaed ends in a burst of shards that shoot out in twelve directions (kingdoms?).

High King of the Twelve Kingdoms has seven daughters, the youngest is Glory. Her six sisters have had arranged engagements/marriages and they constantly complain how unhappy they are. Glory wants to marry for love, unlike her sisters.

Since she was a young child Glory has had Colin as friend and playmate. She uses the “Princess” card to get him to do what she wants. They played together, explored together, and got into childish trouble together. As they get older Colin and Glory believe they are in love.

She and Colin have planned for a while to elope and live happy ever after. During Lucullia’s wedding they agree to meet at midnight to elope. It is at the wedding her father announces the betrothal of Princess Glory to Prince Eoghan. Glory does run away but not quite according to her plan.

Glory’s beauty has been sung throughout all the kingdoms. She is very vain!

When Glory arrives at Blackthorn she meets a gryphon who tells Xander to send her back. The gryphon is rude and insulting; he tells her not to confuse beauty with vanity.

She is led by a ghost for her to overheard Xander and the gryphon talking. One of these conversations she believes what she hears is a plot to take the High King’s throne.

Colin is obsessed with getting Glory back, even after being told she did not love him anymore; even if murder is the only way.

Why was Mortas willing to give Xander Idegwaed? What was the relationship between Xander and Idegwaed? Why exactly was Eoghan cursed? Could there be a correlation between, Ilyndiil, the blade Colin’s father gave him, and Idegwaed? Why does Glory come to see Colin as a monster? What happened after Colin attacks the gryphon?