The Beast's Heart by Leife Shallcross

The classic version of Beauty and the Beast as told from the Beast's perspective. What I love about this book, because I do love it, is that this is more like the traditional version of the fairy tale and not Disney's version. Instead of their being an overall villian with an exciting fight scene at the end it's more man vs. self. The internal struggle of Beast fighting with who he perceives himself to be and who he wants to be and adding Beauty (in this case Isabeau) to the mix he wants to be a better person for her all the while trying to show her he's worthy of her love.

The story starts off with Beast in the woods living as an animal would until he's led back to his home and the iron gates lock behind him. Slowly he starts to remember thing and the magic slowly starts to repair the house and gardens. Beast is there so long he loses track of time the enchantment keeping the grounds in an eternal summer. Beast relearns how to dress and act like a man. The details of his curse still remain foggy in his mind all he knows is that a fairy cursed him to be the beast he is inside.

Isabeau comes along quite like she always does, to save her father after he tries to steal a single rose from Beast's gardens after everything else was given freely. In this we see Beast's side of it, when he allowed her father in he was longing for company but changed his mind at the last moment, but he saw into her father's dream a had vision of his youngest daughter. Beast manipulated the situation to bring her to his home; as soon as he did it he felt bad and after she got there he admitted what he did and told her she was free to leave but he was so lonely. So they struck up a deal she stays for a year and keeps Beast company and she will be free to leave after that. Everything else plays out Isabeau has her dreams she keeps to herself but the Beast when he's not with Isabeau is watching her family through his mirror, first out of guilt for what he took from them but then he started to care about them.

Overall, the slow and steady narration of the Beast is wonderful. I loved this version of the original story and I love how she didn't just end it after the curse was broken. Another thing I liked was how Beast didn't know until almost half the year was over that there was a way to break the curse, the details and the why of the curse slowly get revealed to him as he remembers more about his life before the curse. I loved the small details the descriptive narrative was spellbinding, I didn't want to put this book down.