Cruel Beauty by Rosamund Hodge

TL;DR Beauty and the Beast retelling with lots of Greek mythology influence

(finished 5/6/15)

Oh, man. My friend and I have been talking about guilty pleasure books recently, and up until this point, I thought I didn't have any. 

And now I do. 

I was pretty optimistic going into Cruel Beauty, and I pointedly avoided reading reviews on goodreads because I knew so little about it and I wanted to form my own opinion. (I think I'm finally learning.) I liked the narration almost immediately because it had a very fantasy-like quality to it but it wasn't overbearing to me. I don't know exactly what it is about it, if it's just descriptive enough that it only barely pushes purple prose, or if it's just Nyx's voice, but I liked reading it. 

I can't really talk about the Greek mythology aspects of the book since I'd say 97% of it was stuff I'm unfamiliar with. It didn't take that much of a part in the plot, I don't think, other than the stuff regarding Pandora. Pandora was really the only thing that I had knowledge about and I didn't research any of the other things I assumed were related to the mythology. 

I thought the Beauty and the Beast aspect of the story was pretty cool, though there were some parts in the book where it reminded me a little more of a Rumpelstiltskin cartoon I watched as a kid. I mean, it's not really all that related to the story, but it brought up a memory of watching the movie, and I actually managed to track it down on YouTube! Anyway, my knowledge of Beauty and the Beast really only extends to the Disney movie, so I'd say keep that in mind.  

Surprisingly, I liked the romance aspect of the book a fair amount. I saw the plot twist coming as soon as the love V was set up, and I can agree with the reviews I read (after finishing) that talked about the insta-love. It is pretty insta-lovey and I think I honestly would've hated the love V had I not anticipated the plot twist the entire book. Highlight for the spoiler: it's not actually a love V at all. There's no third love interest. I was so happy once that became clear and not just a kind of "what if" on my part. I don't really know how cliche or obvious the twist really is, though. 

I don't really know how I felt about the last couple chapters, to be honest. I thought it was nice, but I agree with at least one of the reviews I found that said that it completely undid all the character growth the book set up. I think that's true, at least to some extent. 

TL;DR I was in a really good mood when I finished it. I think I'll re-read it sometime in the future to see if my opinion changes, but as of right now it's kind of a not-so-terrible guilty pleasure.