Monday, April 21, 2014

Mini Review: Cruel Beauty

ISBN: 0062224735
Pages: 342
Source: Library
Appearance:
15839984

Summary:
Based on the classic fairy tale Beauty and the Beast, Cruel Beauty is a dazzling love story about our deepest desires and their power to change our destiny.
Since birth, Nyx has been betrothed to the evil ruler of her kingdom-all because of a foolish bargain struck by her father. And since birth, she has been in training to kill him.
With no choice but to fulfill her duty, Nyx resents her family for never trying to save her and hates herself for wanting to escape her fate. Still, on her seventeenth birthday, Nyx abandons everything she's ever known to marry the all-powerful, immortal Ignifex. Her plan? Seduce him, destroy his enchanted castle, and break the nine-hundred-year-old curse he put on her people.
But Ignifex is not at all what Nyx expected. The strangely charming lord beguiles her, and his castle-a shifting maze of magical rooms-enthralls her.
As Nyx searches for a way to free her homeland by uncovering Ignifex's secrets, she finds herself unwillingly drawn to him. Even if she could bring herself to love her sworn enemy, how can she refuse her duty to kill him? With time running out, Nyx must decide what is more important: the future of her kingdom, or the man she was never supposed to love.


 Hello everybody!! Today I've got my little mini review of Cruel Beauty by Rosamund Hodge which is a retelling of short of Beauty and the Beast.

First thing's first, that cover is freaking gorgeous! I think the first thing that drew me to this book was the cover, I mean come on! It's so beautiful! Okay, moving on...I personally did not think this story really followed the story of Beauty and the Beast. I mean it did, but this story reminded a lot more of the Scarletti Curse by Christine Feehan with a evil lord whom our heroine is forced to marry. When we are first introduced to Nyx, we're hit with an array of emotions from our MC. She hates what her father has done, she resents her sister because she doesn't have to go marry the demon lord, and she resents her aunt because she's in love with her dad. I was a bit concerned that we would have a whiny MC, but she quickly proved me wrong. Nyx is definitely a little ball of fire. She's not afraid, correction, she's not that afraid of Ignifex and their arguments and bantering was definitely entertaining. Ignifex has a servant name Shade who in the daytime is a shadow but at night solidifies to look like Ignifex. There's this strange little love triangle that doesn't really develop between Ignifex, Shade, and Nyx. It sort of appears and then disappears? It's a bit confusing. Anyway, one of my biggest problems with this book was how confusing it was. I had to reread the ending/last 1/4 of the book twice to sort of understand what was going on. Right now, I'm still confused as to what exactly happened at the end. I feel like Cruel Beauty has a very interesting and complex story that wasn't really developed to its fullness. There are so many questions that I still have because you only get a small glimpse of the history of Ignifex and how he came to power. Overall, I did enjoy Cruel Beauty, but like I said I have so many questions that were left unanswered. I feel like, since this is a stand alone novel, the "world" could have been written a bit better. With that said, I do recommend it because it's a pretty interesting story and the characters are definitely likable, but be prepared to be a bit confused. :)


3.5/5 stars

Foreverly Obsessed,
Riv




No comments:

Post a Comment