Unseen Beauty by Amity Thompson, 2019

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Claudette polishes furniture and scrubs floors. She doesn't do hearts.

When a stranger happens upon the cursed castle, parlormaid Claudette leaves her post to take a peek. After all, he won't see her. She's invisible.
Curiosity lands her as witness to Beast raging at the housekeeper over the stranger's fate. Now the monster knows Claudette's name... And the housekeeper knows her pawn.
Unable to resist magical commands, Claudette must end the curse. By any means. No matter who it hurts.

(352 pages)

You may or may not have been able to tell from the content of my recent reviews that I'm on a bit of a fairytale retelling streak right now. To be honest, this streak has been going for about a year ever since I fell down a very deep rabbit hole on Kindle Unlimited in lockdown. By the time I found Unseen Beauty I'd grown heartily tired of the Beauty and the Beast retellings that I swear take up a good 25% chunk of the genre.

So when I found this book, it was a breath of fresh air. The premise - making the main character one of the invisible servants cursed to serve the prince - is a genius innovation on a very well-trodden story. By sticking to the skeleton of the classic tale, and having Claudette act as Belle's handmaid, Thompson manages the seemingly impossible task of paying homage to the original tale while also completely breaking it apart from its core.

This innovation only works if the story is well-told, and that it is here. It's not hard for the reader to fall in love with Claudette, whose practicality and sense of humour combine to make her a very endearing character I enjoyed following. The worldbuilding is detailed and intriguing, as we learn about the lives of the invisible servants from the original story. We see how the servants are magically forced to obey any direct order from a superior, and how they are made immortal for the life of the curse (to the point where someone is mentioned having failed off-screen self-harm attempts). Belle is pretty much the character from the original tale, who I already loved, and the added personality given to her sisters adds an extra layer to the tale.

My biggest pet peeve with fairytale retellings is the insta-love that seems to permeate the genre. That's the other reason I had such a good time with the book: the characters' interactions are so genuine and organic that nothing ever feels cloying. And everyone stays consistent throughout the story, never doing something stupid just for the sake of keeping the story going.

All in all, this is a very fun Beauty and the Beast retelling that I'm glad I had the chance to read and which I'll definitely be revisiting again in the future. I highly recommend it if you're in the mood for this sort of book.

The Little Selkie by K.M. Shea, 2015

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Dylan—a selkie—makes a terrible mistake when she brashly chases an evil sea witch onto land. Captured and stripped of her pelt—leaving her unable to return to the sea in her sea lion body—Dylan’s only chance of survival is to serve as the sea witch’s tool. Instead of allowing the sea witch to use her selkie ability to control water, Dylan asks a wandering enchantress to seal her voice, rendering her unable to use her selkie magic. Stranded—with no allies and no way to contact her family—Dylan fears she will never successfully steal her pelt back.
Luckily, Dylan is not alone. She is befriended by Prince Callan, a kind, human prince whose country is being pulverized by the sea witch. Combining the strength of humans and the intelligence of the selkies, the pair unites to save their people.
But when the storm is over will Dylan choose to stay with Callan, or return to the sea and leave him behind…forever?

(274 pages)

Despite my love for fairytale retellings, and my penchant for devouring Shea's books, it's taken me a while to get through this series. It's probably because I've read so many retellings by this point that I've gotten pretty picky, and I got frustrated by a couple books feeling a bit too predictable and cheesy. Whatever the reason, I seem to have mostly gotten over it: I downloaded a bunch of these books onto my phone with Kindle Unlimited and have been gobbling them up like potato chips all week.

Why am I reviewing The Little Selkie, out of all of the books in this series? Simple: because I love Dylan. I love how foreign she feels throughout the book, the way it's impossible to ever forget that she's a magical, inhuman sea being. She has no frame of reference for human behaviour, and even when she's been on land for a while she still holds onto this unique essence. I loved the way she genuinely didn't care about fancy clothes, and completely ignored the catty remarks from the mean girls at court. Her obsession with food is endearing, and I chuckled every time Callan held his hand out to her and she frantically searched her surroundings for a present to put into it. Overall, she's just a really fun character to follow around.

As for Callan, he's a pretty bog-standard fairytale prince. I liked his sense of humour, and the way he delights in Dylan exactly the way she is. It was cute watching him trick her into wardrobe fittings by feeding her a steady stream of new human foods which kept her utterly distracted. I didn't get much out of the scenes told from his point of view, though, and to be honest I kind of felt like most of his feelings and decisions were just whatever was best from a plot perspective.

The other two main characters are Callan's best friends: a flamboyant member of the nobility and his very beleaguered assistant. I already returned the book so I can't look up their names, which is a shame because they were a really fun part of the story. They're not-so-secretly in love with each other, but class differences make the assistant hesitant to admit her feelings for him. So he spends the entire story making over-dramatic romantic gestures, which are invariably met with an admonishment about his irresponsible spending habits. They make a cute couple and I hope I get to see more of them in another book.

All in all, it's a cute book which definitely has its flaws but is a fun read nonetheless. I'm a sucker for Little Mermaid retellings, and this one is no exception. What is your favourite retelling of The Little Mermaid?

Rivers of Gold by S. R. Nulton, 2021

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Midas made his daughter into an icon, a relic of living gold enshrined in a golden temple, fiercely defended, and ruthlessly isolated. She's the perfect, spoiled princess. Or is she?

Amy lives in a gilded cage, and she knows it. Her father ensured that when she was only eight. Whoever decided it was smart to give a king the ability to turn anything he touched into gold was a fool. She may not be a statue anymore, but she's just as trapped as she ever was. It turns out gold is just as hard to escape as iron.
Her last—well, only hope is the same man who saved her all those years ago. King Midas made the deal out of desperation, Amy's life for her hand in marriage, and the time has finally come to marry the river god.
But what happens when your prince comes for you, and your father won't let you go?

(207 pages)

Fair warning, this is the ninth in a series of interconnected fairytale retellings and I don't really remember most of the earlier books. All I remember is a few truly genius innovations on some otherwise pretty played-out fairytale tropes (my favorite was her Beauty and the Beast), a few incredibly bizarre retellings (The Salamander Prince is definitely . . . memorable), and a couple of the more recent books which left me rather bored.

So I picked up Rivers of Gold out of boredom, more than anything. I've only read one or two other retellings of the Midas story, and I was vaguely curious to see how Nulton would twist it.

I have to say, this definitely wasn't as fun as many of the other books in the series. But I suppose it does match some of the darker themes in earlier books, where abusive family members have been all too prevalent. It isn't necessarily a fun book, but I like it. I like that Nulton went down a more realistic path of domestic abuse, showing us the vile manipulation tactics Amy's father uses against her and the toll they take on her. Amy is not the unflappable, quippy heroine from Nulton's other books. She's not particularly strong, physically or emotionally, and her entire life has been controlled by her evil father.

The more I think about it, the more I like the approach Nulton took. It reminds me of the debates people have about the original Cinderella tale: is it a bad story for little girls because it shows a woman allowing herself to be abused for years until a man rescues her? Or is it an empowering story about a woman who found the strength to survive years of abuse until she could find a way out? Personally, I suspect both sides may be reading a bit too deeply into a bedtime story. But I think that these sorts of questions could be explored more deeply with a book like Rivers of Gold, where Amy is a character who needs help from others because she has been raised in a golden cage and has no idea how to help herself (especially not without seeing the people around her tortured in retribution).

As for the characters themselves, I really like most of them. Amy is a bit bland, but that's part of her story: she hasn't had the space to find her identity yet. Zale is a bit more fleshed out, though to be honest I don't really care particularly for him. He's a pretty standard character - funny, charismatic, moral, etc. He's also a sailor, which seems to pop up in a lot of these fairytale retellings. I don't know what's so romantic about all these men who want to whisk people away to a smelly boat, but I guess it works for people. The king is suitably evil and manipulative (though to be honest, I wish he'd been a bit subtler at times when he'd manipulate Amy), and the other characters were all interesting in their own rights. I won't go into detail, though, since they don't really come into focus until later in the book.

All in all, an interesting read that I got sucked into more than I expected to. It's a very solid addition to the series, and probably the best Midas retelling that I've read (not that this means much, considering how sparse the competition is). If you're interested, give it a go. And if you know of any other Midas retellings, let me know! I'm always looking to find new retellings.

That Weekend by Kara Thomas, 2021

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Three best friends, a lake house, a secret trip - what could go wrong?
It was supposed to be the perfect prom weekend getaway. But it's clear something terrible happened when Claire wakes up alone and bloodied on a hiking trail with no memory of the past forty-eight hours.
Three went up the mountain, but only one came back.
Now everyone wants answers - most of all, Claire. She remembers Friday night, but after that... nothing. And now Kat and Jesse - her best friends - are missing.
That weekend changes everything.
What happened on the mountain? And where are Kat and Jesse? Claire knows the answers are buried somewhere in her memory, but as she's learning, everyone has secrets - even her best friends. And she's pretty sure she's not going to like what she remembers.

(336 pages)

I just set down That Weekend and I'm speechless. It's stirred up a lot of emotions and bad memories, that's for sure. When I was a college freshman, a classmate of mine disappeared on a night out drinking with friends. I helped the searchers for a while, distributing flyers and giving food and drink to the search and rescue people. It was a terrible time, and I'm still haunted sometimes by those memories.

That's why the first half of this book hit me really hard. Claire's desperation when she realizes her friends are missing, and the frenzied ever-shifting search effort to find them, hit too close to home. The crazy conspiracy theories, the stacks of "missing" posters. The latching on to every shred of evidence that might lead somewhere. I was less invested in the mystery portions, just because they didn't strike that nerve quite as much (plus I was more just frustrated with the authority figures more than anything), but I think they were still well done. And overall the early part of the story just hits a very true-to-life desperate, chaotic energy.

I can't speak first-hand to Claire's mental health struggles after the accident, but they seemed pretty realistic to me at least. The smaller touches, like the way she lashes out at her mother when she's most frustrated and the way she obsessively googles every aspect of the case every single day, are exactly the sort of things I think I'd do in her situation.

The narrative shifts in the second half of the book as things pick up speed again. Not gonna lie, I was less invested in the second half. And in many ways it felt a bit less grounded and realistic as it went along. But things definitely stayed interesting, and I genuinely never had any idea what was going to happen next.

I think if I could change one thing about this book, I would get rid of at least one love interest for Claire. It feels like every single guy in Claire's life either is, or used to be, an object of romantic infatuation. After a while it just got a bit distracting.

This is definitely not a book for the faint of heart. Most of the plot twists are deeply disturbing, and that's on top of a baseline level of foul language and references to teenagers having sex. I can't discuss the rest of the mature content without getting close to spoilers, but I can say that the last few chapters make me a bit nauseous. I can tell That Weekend is going to stay with me for at least a few days, and not necessarily in a good way.

If this is a genre you're into, then I recommend this book. I think it's a good book. It just isn't necessarily for everyone and you have to be aware of that going in.

War Bound by Tara Grayce, 2020

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Marriage to an elf is complicated…especially bringing him home to meet the family.
Princess Elspeth of Escarland married the elf prince and achieved peace between the elves and her human people. But after a recent ambush by the trolls, it is clear the trolls are trying to start a war between the elves and humans once again. To keep their peoples at peace, Essie and Farrendel travel to meet Essie’s family and negotiate peace.
Yet in Escarland, not everyone is happy with peace. Traitors lurk in both Escarland and Tarenhiel, and it will be up to Essie and Farrendel to flush them out. The consequences of failure might be more personal and deadly than they fear.

(326 pages)

I recently reviewed the first book in this series, Fierce Heart, where I waxed poetic about how much I love this series and all of the characters in it. I also mentioned I've reread all three published books in the series several times since I discovered it about six months ago.

All of this gushing holds true for War Bound, and then some. Frankly, this is the one I've reread the most. It's just such a delightful book.

There are two big changes to the story this time around. The first is the addition of chapters from Farrendel's POV. While we lose the advantage of viewing the world solely through Essie's head - getting to know Farrendel alongside her - this is more than made up for by the joy of entire scenes from his point of view, where we not only get to see him internally fawn over Essie but we also get a deeper understanding of his thought process, culture, and psychology. A great example of this is the scene where Farrendel, Essie, and Farrendel's sister Jalissa are playing a board game on their way to Escarland. The elves have an interaction that Essie doesn't even notice. When Jalissa silently laughs at Farrendel for how much he is staring at Essie (a breach of elven propriety), he shrugs her off, reasoning that "as Essie would probably curl up and fall asleep on his shoulder once she wound down for a nap, Farrendel being unable to take his eyes off Essie would not be the worst offense against propriety."

The second big change is the change in scenery! This time around our couple is visiting Essie's family in the human country of Escarland. They're there to stop a war, but to be honest I must admit I mostly skim the political parts. What I don't skip? All the scenes with Essie's family! Continuing the long list of things I have in common with Essie, I also come from a large, close-knit family. So I especially loved getting to know her three brothers, her mother, and even her sister-in-law and nephews. Their initial coldness toward Farrendel, and rather bumpy road to getting to know him, is a lot of fun to read.

This book really shines when Essie and Farrendel are dealing with their demons, getting to know each other better (after all, they really haven't been married for that long), and exploring their cultural differences. The part where they go to the market and Essie introduces him to hot chocolate, and they start joking around, may be my absolute favorite scene from the entire series so far.

Before ending this review I should address the negative aspects of the book, because of course no book is completely perfect. I really wasn't interested in the political aspects of the story, beyond the impact of looming war on our protagonists. I didn't really keep track of the politicians, so the plot twist at the end didn't do much for me. Also when I reread the book I always stop a couple chapters early because it gets super stressful right at the end. Be warned that there's a particularly painful cliffhanger at the end of this book, so you should have ready access to Death Wind before you finish War Bound. Finally, while I love Essie and Farrendel's relationship, there were one or two places where I felt its development could have been a bit subtler. They'd be doing something together and then everything would stop for a couple paragraphs while Essie internally processed a realization about how "this is love - not just the big moments, but the small ones like right now." On one hand, I feel like those realizations weren't really necessary: we can already tell their relationship is developing! On the other, not gonna lie, those passages do still make me smile every time I read them so I really can't complain too forcefully.

At the end of the day, War Bound is great because it's got fun characters, a sweet story, and clean romance without ever getting too cloying. I've binged a lot of romance novels over my six months of living alone, and this is the one series I return to the most. Highly recommend for when you need a pick-me-up.