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Beastly Beauty
*** Listen to an audio excerpt of Beastly Beauty read by Steve West! ***
A gender-swapped retelling of Beauty and the Beast from the bestselling author of Stepsister and Poisoned.
The Story
What makes a girl “beastly?” Is it having too much ambition? Being too proud? Taking up too much space? Or is it just wanting something, anything, too badly?
That’s the problem Arabella faces when she makes her debut in society. Her parents want her to be sweet and compliant so she can marry well, but try as she might, Arabella can’t extinguish the fire burning inside her — the source of her deepest wishes, her wildest dreams.
When an attempt to suppress her emotions tragically backfires, a mysterious figure punishes Arabella with a curse, dooming her and everyone she cares about, trapping them in the castle. As the years pass, Arabella abandons hope. The curse is her fault — after all, there’s nothing more “beastly” than a girl who expresses her anger — and the only way to break it is to find a boy who loves her for her true self: a cruel task for a girl who’s been told she’s impossible to love.
When a handsome thief named Beau makes his way into the castle, the captive servants are thrilled, convinced he is the one to break the curse. But Beau — spooked by the castle’s strange and forbidding ladies-in-waiting, and by the malevolent presence that stalks its corridors at night — only wants to escape. He learned long ago that love is only an illusion. If Beau and Arabella have any hope of breaking the curse, they must learn to trust their wounded hearts, and realize that the cruelest prisons of all are the ones we build for ourselves.
The Inspiration
Beauty and the Beast is a deep, rich, complicated fairytale, and I’ve always wanted to flip its script and see what happens. In the classic version, the beast calls the shots. He rages and yells and breaks things and takes prisoners. And Beauty has to accommodate him. She has to work to understand him, and ultimately help him reveal his better self.
Well, enough of that.
I reversed the story’s power dynamic and wrote the Beast as a woman and Beauty as a man, and ended up with two difficult, flawed creatures who are both angry and wary and in a good deal of emotional pain, and then I watched them as they worked upon each other, got under each other’s skin, or fur, to reveal—and hopefully heal—the wounds beneath that pain.
Beastly Beauty is a story about two damaged people learning to love and forgive, but it’s also about how we all get trapped in prisons of our own making – and how we need to learn how to tear down walls and build bridges if we’re ever going to escape from those prisons.
And that’s the big takeaway from this story—that we all ultimately hold the key to our freedom and happiness in our own hands, and that no Beast or Beauty or King or Princess can save us or doom us because we, ourselves, each and every one of us – we are the ones we’ve been waiting for.
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Hello!
I’m really looking forward to reading this book. Has a Brazilian publisher contacted you about publishing it?
I’d love to work on it with my students, as I did with the other works.
Your books are incredible, reflective and transformative, as they teach us about love, new beginnings, belonging and self-knowledge.
Thanks for the lovely note, Deivid! I have not heard if it’s going to be published in Brazil yet, but once I do, I’ll share the news! 🗝️❤️
I loved stepsisters and poisoned. I can’t wait to get my hands on this book.
Hope you enjoy it!! 🗝️🕰️❤️
I finished Beastly Beauty in 3 HOURS! Great work as always! LOVE IT! My favourite characters were Beau, Arabella, Valmont, Percival and Philippe! Also I made some connections to Stepsister and Poisoned which leads me to my question: Are any of the characters in Beastly Beauty connected to the other fairy tale recreations? Because I know in both Stepsister and Poisoned you used the fairy queen, Tanaquill. And I recognized the name Matti was also used both Beastly Beauty and Poisoned, which in Beastly Beauty, it’s Beau’s brother and in Poisoned it’s the name of Arno’s son, so I thought maybe there was a connection. Though I know authors can use the same name for multiple different characters as well so I’m just curious. I also saw an anonymous comment that suggests bringing all the characters together which sounds like a really cool concept as you said. Also I love how you take emotions and things like life and death and personify them! It is such a cool concept. I’ve done that before too, and I think personifying things like that allows us to see the deeper side of those emotions and concepts. I someday hope to finish a book, and if I ever do, you’ll likely be in my acknowledgements or a dedication or something because you really inspire me with all your stories you write and I think your stories are phenomenal!
Thanks for these lovely comments! It would be interesting to get all these characters together for a reunion — I wonder what they’d say to one another? Who’d dress up … or dress down? Who’d be jealous of whom?
Who’d behave and who’d get out of line … 🤔
Jennifer, you have an impeccable and breathtaking writing style, I believe this work will be magnificent. I hope it doesn’t take too long to be translated in Brazil, because I want to work on it with my students, as I did with Stepsister and Poisoned.
Once again, I thank you for being a light in our darkness, because through such profound words you elevate our humanity, making us better.
I love you!
I hope it will make it to Brazil one day soon, too!! 🤞
Oh my goodness! I love your twisted princess stories such as ” Poisoned “, ” Stepsister “, and ” Beauty and the beast lost in a book “. I am so excited for this one! Could you in the future make a little red riding hood and a princess and the frog twisted stories? I think you could be awesome at accomplishing every princess story and making them twisted in your own way. I love your twisted books. Keep up the twisted-ness <3
Thank you, Kailye!! ❤️ Wow, you’ve given me a lot to do!! 😉
I loved Stepsister and Poisoned and cannot wait for this third companion book!
Thank you! I can’t wait either – I hope you enjoy it! (PS – My publisher just released the video we shot about the book … here’s a preview!)
I’ve been looking forward to this new book for a while – I loved Lost In A Book and can’t wait to see how this retelling differs to it!!! (the flipping of genders is an amazing idea 🤣)
I can’t wait!!
I can’t wait either — I’m SO excited to bring Beastly Beauty into the world. Stay tuned — I’ll share more news as we get closer to the release date!
This looks fun!! I’ve been waiting for another of these twisted tale novels for a while now – Stepsister and Poisioned were amazing!! (Octavia’s my favourite character so far 🤣)
I can’t wait for this!!
I’m mid reading Stepsister. Just bought Poisoned. Loved Tea Rose series and Molly’s Letter. This new Beastly Beauty looks fun. I’m in!
Great, thank you Tracy!! I hope you love Beastly Beauty, too!! ❤️
I absolutely love Stepsister and Poisoned, and can’t wait for Beastly Beauty! Will there ever be a novel where Isabelle and Sophie (and Arabella too…?) come together?
Hmm … that’s an interesting concept 🤔! I wonder what they’d say to one another! No immediate plans to get them together, but you never know …
Is very interesting that fairy tale reteling . But please write and a sleeping beauty one . From the side of the prince
🤔 Maybe one day, George!