I am a sucker for a good fairy tale retelling and Brigid Kemmerer totally brings it in this retelling of the classing Beauty and the Beast Fairy tale, A Curse So Dark and Lonely!
First off, I have to say that I love the way she chose her heroine. Harper is far from perfect. She is edgy and cranky and incredibly sensitive about her limp which is a result of surgeries she has had for her spinabifida. The fact that she struggles to just be and has a rough family life makes her even more appealing to me as a lead female character. The hardships she has gone through, though make her incredibly brave and also make trust hard for her. You see that in every interaction she has with Gray and Rhen.
Rhen is the prince of a realm that has been falling further and further into poverty over the last five years, since his father cut off all trade and communication with neighboring nations. He is also incredibly incredibly cursed. Much like the beast from the classic tale, Rhen is super angry at everything. He doesn't believe anyone would love him enough to break the curse and he also still has a little bit of lingering arrogance. When he meets Harper, he thinks it is futile to try and woo her and he also thinks that she ruined his chances at breaking the curse because she is not who he usually chooses to woo. Harper teaches him a few lessons right away and he learns more in a few short weeks with her than he had in the over 300 seasons he has had to try and break the curse.
Gray is probably my favorite character. He is extremely loyal to Rhen. As the head of his guard he kind of has to be. We first meet Gray as he is kidnapping a girl from a bar in Washington DC. That's where he meets Harper who foils his plans and then gets kidnapped herself. The whole situation to me, while super wrong and you shouldn't kidnap people or drug them into compliance, kind of made me laugh. We had a super old school knight in shining armor kidnapping a young girl and getting his butt kicked by another young girl who is defending the honor of the drugged girl who gets left in an alleyway. As we learn more about Gray and his sense of honor, we realize how out of character something like that is for him. We also learn that his duty to the prince is the only reason he continues to kidnap these girls and bring them back to the castle. He feels responsible for what happened to the prince and has stayed on for as long as he has as a result of that guilt.
One more thing that I really liked about this book was the way this curse works. Rhen goes through a 3 month season and within those three months he is to make a woman fall in love with him to break it. He isn't a beast though in this rendition. at least not at first. He slowly begins to transform into a beast as the time in each season moves forward. The other thing I really loved was that the beast is not always the same. Each time he transforms, the beast is different. Sometimes it has scales, sometimes it has fur and claws, sometimes it has wings and breathes fire. The unpredictability of the beast makes the story a little more rich and interesting.
One more thing I enjoyed was the back story as to how the prince became cursed. The enchantress that created his curse sticks around and taunts him. She doesn't stick around to gauge his progress, she is literally only there to taunt him and harass him and make his life as miserable as possible. That also adds another element to Rhen's character and gives the reader an idea as to why he is such a negative person when it comes to his curse.
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