Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Beauty and the Beast, Now with 100% Less Stockholm

Lord of Scoundrels by Loretta Chase

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I’ll say that this is probably more of a 2.5 book that I am rounding up because I liked it but also kept wincing until near to the end (if not the end), which is not a reaction I want to have with these types of books. I believe this was a Beauty and the Beast retelling I stumbled upon after reading When Beauty Tamed the Beast and deciding that this would be a vein I’d pursue in some more detail. If it weren’t for the fact […]

How many Beauty and the Beast retellings can I get through? Many

When Beauty Tamed the Beast by Eloisa James

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I enjoy these fairy tale retellings quite a bit! There’s something very Georgette Heyer about the way that Eloisa James writes dialogue, in the exact vein of my favorite works of hers (The Grand Sophy*, Cotillion). All heroines are sparkling wits (and may or may not be beauties) who clash verbal swords with broody male leads and/or secondary characters (conservative ladies who hold the keys to Almack’s, clearly unsuited secondary male leads). Not everything is the same, of course–both of these novels take place in foreboding castles far […]

Tale As Old As Time? Gimme Gimme

A Curse So Dark and Lonely by Brigid Kemmerer

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This is a 3.5 star book, rounded up because I definitely enjoyed it quite a bit. Recommended here by Siskel101, I was always going to be in the mood for a Beauty and the Beast retelling. Belle remains my jam, Disney weirdness aside (did you know she’s apparently 17? What would have been lost in the storytelling if she had been 27? Nothing, that’s right. Kids don’t understand the difference between 17 and 27, they’re both Old). This was definitely not as good as Robin McKinley‘s […]

All I Want is My Own Cinnamon Roll Monster Boyfriend

Bitterburn by Ann Aguirre

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Ann Aguirre is starting a new series of gothic fairytale retellings. In Bitterburn, she is retelling Beauty and the Beast, but has added in some elements of Bluebeard. I received an arc from the author in exchange for an honest review. If you don’t know, a cinnamon roll is a love interest who is warm, sweet, supportive and gooey on the inside. They might also be a lot of other things, but their support for their love is unqualified. Njal is the Beast of Bitterburn, a […]

“If you spy a naked man among the pines, you must run as if the Devil were after you.”

The Bloody Chamber by Angela Carter

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Never have truer words been spoken! This collection of short stories crept around my periphery for some time, and I am both overjoyed to have finally given in to it and disappointed in myself for not biting earlier. I came across it originally on a list of fairy-tale retellings on Autostraddle, and when it popped up again in the employee recommendations section of one of my favorite booksellers (Crow Bookshop in Burlington, what’s up!) I knew that it was meant to be. Still, it sat […]

My Favorite Version of Beauty and the Beast Yet …

As Old as Time by Liz Braswell

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Given my love of reading, it always felt like I should like Belle and Beauty and the Beast much more than I did.  Maybe it was timing, since I saw it when I had started transitioning to life action mostly and didn’t want to watch kids’ stuff.  Maybe it’s simply that I hated the color yellow at that age.  Either way, it’s never been one of my favorite Disney stories or even fairy tales. However! I was surprised to find that I enjoyed this one […]



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