This luxuriant retelling of the story of the Beauty and the Beast is very different from McKinley's own Beauty (1978). While sticking to the tale's traditional outlines, this version by turns rushes headlong and slows to a stately pace, is full of asides and surprises, and is suffused with obsession for the rose and thorn as flora, metaphor, and symbol. Beauty can make anything grow, especially roses; her memories of her dead mother are always accompanied by her mother's elusive rose scent. The Beast's aroma is also of roses, as is the scent of a sorcerer and a greenwitch. Eroticism, comfort, hard work, and the heart's deep love are all bound in rose imagery, from the curtains and tapestries of the Beast's palace to the Rose Cottage home of Beauty's family. Roses stand for all the many different facets of love (the text is specific on that): Beauty's for her father and her vividly etched sisters Lionheart and Jeweltongue; for a family hearth and safe home; for a puppy named Tea-cosy; and most incredibly but satisfyingly, for the Beast who has haunted her nightmares since childhood. While the story is full of silvery images and quotable lines, it will strike some as overlong and overblown; for others, perhaps those who were bewitched by Donna Jo Napoli's Zel (1996), it is surely the perfect book. (Fiction. 12+)
Pub Date: Sept. 16, 1997
ISBN: 0441005837
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Greenwillow Books
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 1997
In addition to the supernatural elements, Brosgol interweaves some savvy insights about the illusion of perfection and...
A deliciously creepy page-turning gem from first-time writer and illustrator Brosgol finds brooding teenager Anya trying to escape the past—both her own and the ghost haunting her.
Anya feels out of place at her preppy private school; embarrassed by her Russian heritage, she has worked hard to lose her accent and to look more like everyone else. After a particularly frustrating morning at the bus stop, Anya storms off, only to accidentally fall down a well. Down in the dark hole, she meets Emily, a ghost who claims to be a murder victim trapped down in the dank abyss for 90 years. With Emily’s help, Anya manages to escape, though once free, she learns that Emily has traveled out with her. At first, Emily seems like the perfect friend; however, once her motives become clear, Anya learns that “perfect” may only be an illusion. A moodily atmospheric spectrum of grays washes over the clean, tidy panels, setting a distinct stage before the first words appear. Brosgol’s tight storytelling invokes the chilling feeling of Neil Gaiman’s Coraline (2002), though for a decidedly older set.
In addition to the supernatural elements, Brosgol interweaves some savvy insights about the illusion of perfection and outward appearance. (Graphic supernatural fiction. 12 & up)Pub Date: June 7, 2011
ISBN: 978-1-59643-552-0
Page Count: 224
Publisher: First Second
Review Posted Online: April 18, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2011
Both entertaining and well-written; demands and holds readers’ attention.
A duology opener that revisits the world of Divergent (2011).
Beatrice “Tris” Prior is Divergent. But before she can select Dauntless, her Choosing Ceremony is interrupted by a group of factionless rebels, and her good friend is killed. Amid the chaos, Tris sees Evelyn, the wife of Abnegation leader Marcus Eaton—but Evelyn supposedly died years ago. And, shockingly, she’s an Amity woman who’s holding a gun. Tris doesn’t tell anyone, even her father, when he later questions her. Her brother, Caleb, chooses Erudite—the faction that’s most critical toward the Abnegation and their practices—and Tris feels pressured to stay in Abnegation. But when her father tries to erase her memories, she knows she’s unsafe. Tris’ mother helps her escape to the factionless, where Tris meets Four, a Dauntless boy. Their relationship shows her that she was right to leave Abnegation—and that maybe the rebels are correct to want the death of the faction system. As Tris becomes friends with the other “faction failures,” she realizes that no faction is as it seems, and that power is a corrupting influence they can’t escape. This exciting work revisits beloved characters, offering a new understanding of them and of what happens when we stand up and ask questions. Returning fans and those new to this world will appreciate the witty banter, slow-burn romance, and heartache stemming from betrayal and complicated familial love. The leads are cued white.
Both entertaining and well-written; demands and holds readers’ attention. (Dystopian. 13-18)Pub Date: Oct. 6, 2026
ISBN: 9780063462595
Page Count: 528
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Oct. 1, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2026
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