Reviews with content warning for Violence - The Beautiful

Let's start with dislikes first: There was an excessive use of the word 'murderess'. I was also frustrated that the main characters neglected to have important conversations and communicate because they were horny on main.
Things that I liked: I really appreciated the banter in this book. There were some clever lines. On top of that, I adored the use of different languages and accents. I was enthralled the gruesome crime scenes and the magic that is New Orleans. Last but not least, I stan Arjun and Odette.

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shorts_family's review against another edition

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mysterious reflective tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

I would consider this story to be pretty middle-of-the-road as far as vampire novels go. It wasn't so bad that I couldn't finish it, but it also wasn't so enrapturing I couldn't put it down. I think my main issue is with how slow the pacing is, I feel like there were several chapters that could've been removed altogether and it wouldn't have altered any significant part of the story. No spoilers, but there was one good twist/reveal and two twists/reveals that I felt had absolutely no buildup to them whatsoever, so they didn't feel satisfying at all, unfortunately. I loved the dynamic between Celine and Bastien, and there were moments of the book that were genuinely funny, but overall I wanted to be pulled into the book more.

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h_reads98's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.5

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ok7a's review against another edition

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dark mysterious slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

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midnightrose_reads's review against another edition

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adventurous dark mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes

4.0

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emma2578's review against another edition

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adventurous dark mysterious relaxing medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

I absolutely loved the atmosphere of New Orleans, the author did an amazing job of romanticizing the city through description. Celine was an amazing strong headed lead character, I often found myself admiring her wits throughout the novel. As for the romance, I prefer Micheal over Bastien, but I can see why so many people would disagree. The antagonist was compelling, and left me shocked during his reveal. Overall I really enjoyed this book, and look forward to reading the next book in the series.

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stormywolf's review against another edition

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dark hopeful mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

Audiobook Read by Lauren Ezzo
Unabridged Length: 13.2 Hours
Listened at 2x Speed

Read my full review at The Wolf's Den

Overall, I have no complaints. A stellar narration, nailing tons of accents and emotions, was enough to put this production in my recommendations, to say nothing of its value as a pronunciation guide. With the emoting, especially in horror and action scenes, the volume and speed of reading does go up a bit, so that's something to keep in mind if you're not reading along, or at an increased playback speed. But if you're looking for an audio that offers a solid voice performance, this one should definitely be on your short list.

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ana24gs's review against another edition

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reflective slow-paced

Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

“A goddess did not concern herself with the triflings of men”

I really liked the book. Although I think that it could have been a little longer, that way it would be much better. It met some of my expectations, it did not meet others, but it remains in my mind as a good memory.

I really like the premise of the book, Celine is a girl with a dark secret that forces her to escape from Paris, to move to New Orleans and start a new life leaving the tragedy in her past, but tragedy follows her to New Orleans where she is immersed in a world of dark creatures.

As I already mentioned, I liked the book, from the premise to the characters it seemed very solid, but I did not believe the relationships between the characters, specifically any that involved my beloved Sébastien Saint Germain. And that's my biggest problem, the book should have been longer and I think there would have been more time to show Bastien's relationship with his “family” (La Cour des Lions).

Celine, the main character, seemed very interesting, I liked her very much. She is a girl who wants to live life to the fullest, she doesn't want to be limited. And in this book we see her moving toward accepting and understanding her past.

But we return with my last comments against this book, I did not like how the conflict was resolved in the end, neither of the two conflicts was resolved as I would have liked, but well. I guess that's the magic of reading a book, sometimes things don't work out the way we'd like.

⚠️SPOILERS⚠️

Sébastien Saint Germain: Aka, the reason why I got forty heart attacks while reading the book. He had me at his feet from the moment I read his name, and then I saw his attitude, and fcgvhbjnkml, what can I say, what a man really, what a man. As I said at the beginning, it is unfortunate that being a character with so much potential I felt that Renée did not take advantage of it, the relationship that I liked the most where he was involved, apart from the one he has with Celine, is the one he has with Odette, I felt that sibling relationship. The lack of depth in his other relationships made me care very little if another member of the order died and that Nigel's betrayal felt very neh. I must also say that I feel somewhat dumb because throughout the book I thought that Sébastien was a vampire, only to find out at the end that he was not, and I don't know if that's how it was supposed to be or I'm just very clueless when reading (what is most likely). I swear that when he almost dies, I die.

Celine: I think what I like the most about her is that I empathize with her discomfort, she killed a man, and obviously killing is not right, but that man was going to hurt her and she had every right to fight at any cost. Her internal monologue seems very interesting to me, not only because of her thoughts of whether it was okay to kill him or not, but also her desire to have power, to be able to generate a desire of respect for her in people just by standing in front of them and I think that I feel the same in that regard.

I proceed to complain about the final reveal:

I hope you know that I liked when Nigel capture Celine and Bastien came looking for her, a lot. But the reveal that came with that part was disappointing, I honestly thought Michael was the bad guy, and I guess maybe it was a very obvious choice and Renée wanted to do something unexpected, but I don't know, I feel like it was very out of nowhere. Perhaps in the second book I understand the sister's intentions better, because I still do not fully understand her motivations for doing everything she did.

The final deal:

I hate, I HATE, when one of the protagonists loses his memory, I hate it, I don't like it at all. And now, I will have to read the second book to see how Celine either recovers her memories in a mystical way, or falls in love again with Sébastien. I really refuse to read her relationship with Michael (he does not seem like a bad guy, but he is very insistent).

Although there are things that I did not love, I do not consider it a bad book, so I plan to continue reading those that follow, although I know what the third one is going to be about and it demotivates me a bit, but let's see how the second goes.

“We forget our dreams, but nightmares linger with us evermore”

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