Beauty

Beauty: A Retelling of the Story of

Beauty and the Beast

Robin McKinley

©1993

256 Pages

Ages 9-12

Summary

This is a marvelous book that gives a wonderful twist to an old story. This is the story of Honour, a girl who never really liked her name. When she was young, she insisted that people call her beauty. Although she never grew into it, the nickname stayed. She was one of three daughters of a wealthy merchant until one day he lost everything. The family was forced to move north to the home of one of the sister's fiance. There they learned about how to work hard. Most importantly, they learned of the existence of magic. Their life seemed to be picking back up. Everything changed when the father stumbled across the mansion of a prince on his way home from a distant city. There he discovered a beast ready to kill him. The father begged the beast to let him go, telling him of his daughters and how he must return to them. The beast let him leave with the promise that he would return one month later with one of his daughters. The father didn't like the idea, but Beauty insisted that she be allowed to return in her father's place. Though the beast was nothing but kind and doting on Beauty, she could not bear to be around him. Every night he asked her to marry him and every night she told him no. Beauty became homesick and pleaded for the beast to let her return home. He let her leave but made her promise that she would only be gone a week because he would die with out her there. She ended up staying home for more than a week, but on the eighth day she had a dream that told her the beast was dying. She hurried back to the castle and found the beast as he lay dying. There she told him that she truly did love him and that she would marry him. There, the enchantment was broken and the beast turned back into a human.

I liked this book mainly because of all the little twists and turns. It is a classic story but with little tweaks that keep it interesting. For instance, there are the servants of the beast who are invisible. Where ever she goes in the castle, the door to her room will follow. Its the little things like that that made me smile and want to keep reading.