A Beauty and the Beast retelling of Trust and Betrayal

Being used to a life of survival on the streets of Washington, D.C., Harper is suddenly sucked into a world full of myth and fantasy. In many attempts to return to her world, Harper learns she has been brought to the magical world of Emberfall to break the curse of its crown prince Rhen. Worst of all? It was accidental and Harper appears to not be the first one tasked with breaking the curse that has befallen on the prince and his land. Not being the prince’s and his crown guard’s first choice, Harper instead is set on returning to DC and her old life. Unintentionally causing chaos and new hope in Emberfall, Harper discovers the prince’s curse runs deep. The only way to break it and give her a way back to her normal life might just be the unexpected, unplanned, strange and frustrating connection between the prince and herself.

A Curse So Dark and Lonely is a dual-pov fantasy retelling of ‘The Beauty and the Beast’ by Brigid Kemmerer. The first book in the trilogy was the second book chosen by my book club when we talked about the theme of retellings. I’m generally a big fan of authors who take on ‘The Beauty and the Beast’. The fairy tale has a lot of potential to rewrite and inspire new tales and in modern day has a nice message: do not judge by outside appearances and love grows slowly with trust and communication.

That same message does get across with Kemmerer’s version of the fairy tale. Harper and Rhen grow towards each other slowly and do so through talking and letting their guard down around each other. Both characters are very similar in that they feel guilty for not protecting the people they love enough and being very careful who they trust. A positive note and reason why I like the slowly blooming relationship between Harper and Rhen is that these two characters believe in and support each other so well. They have smaller moments where they just talk and are comfortable in each other’s presence. I did like their chemistry more and more as the story went on. This dynamic did tear the book club in two sides as often happens when an author introduces two love interests.

I’m going into the spoiler zone here by saying I did understand why Grey was a love interest for Harper because there needed to be this ambiguity around the curse and if Harper’s affection for Rhen was enough to break it. That still remains a question at the end and while I wasn’t a big fan of that narrative choice, I did understand why the author did it. In my opinion, I liked Rhen and Harper’s dynamic more than the dynamic between Harper and the character of the crown’s guard Grey. In the end, I’m just not that big of a fan of a female protagonist having to choose between two love interests but Kemmerer did manage to pull it off great because my book club just could not agree over which romantic duo was better written.

In contrast, I did enjoy the friendship between Rhen and Grey as their bond survived the many years the curse remained. If you’re a fan of that one scene in the Disney movie between Mss. Pots and the Beast where she tells him to approach his relationship with Belle gently, you’ll certainly like Rhen and Grey.

The climax of the book is also great. Kemmerer does a great job leading up to it. I would say the last third of the book was my favourite. If you’re also a fan of audiobooks, the voice actor who did Rhen’s pov acts out his chapters phenomenally.

There are a few elements I did think more negatively of. Kemmerer does reuse a lot of expressions like “She studied him.” and “If he did notice he said nothing.”, so much that you do start to notice it after a few chapters.

Kemmerer also throws in a lot of exposition at you at once which did slow down the pacing a few times.

Speaking about pacing, the plot and pacing, to me, were very wonky. There is a constant moving between three story locations, but while there is a constant movement the plot itself develops slowly. If you analyse your stories, like I do, you’ll also notice that there are many repetitions of story beats and it does get a little old sometimes. The story does have its limits and I wanted it to stretch out its wings just a little bit more and have bigger things happen.

If you’re looking for a Beauty and the Beast retelling, A Curse So Dark and Lonely isn’t a bad fantasy. While I have read fantasy books that expanded more on the original story, it’s a comfortable read that questions whether trust is enough to break an age-old curse. I’m unsure whether I’ll read the sequel since it focuses more on the character Grey and the first book in a way already rounded up its main storyline.