The Little Book Spy: The Beautiful by Renée Ahdieh

Hello bookish friends! Today, I’ll be reviewing The Beautiful by Renée Ahdieh. When this book was first talked about in 2019, I had seen a lot of hype surrounding this book over on book twitter. So for Christmas last year, I bought myself the first two books in the series and decided to give them a chance and see if they were really worth the hype.

About the Book:

Title: The Beautiful

Author: Renée Ahdieh

Release Date: October 9, 2019

Series: The Beautiful #1

Genre: Fantasy

Pages: 448

My Rating: 3.5/5 ⭐

Summary:

In 1872, New Orleans is a city ruled by the dead. But to seventeen-year-old Celine Rousseau, New Orleans is a safe haven after she's forced to flee her life as a dressmaker in Paris. Taken in by the sisters of the Ursuline convent in the middle of the carnival season, Celine is quickly enraptured by the vibrant city, from its music to its fancy soirées and even its danger. She becomes embroiled in the city's glitzy underworld, known as La Cour des Lions, after catching the eye of the group's enigmatic leader, Sébastien Saint Germain.

When the body of one of the girls from the convent is found in Sébastien's own lair--the second dead girl to turn up in recent weeks--Celine battles her attraction to Sébastien and suspicions about his guilt along with the shame of her own horrible secret.

After a third murder, New Orleans becomes gripped by the terror of a serial killer on the loose--one who has now set Celine in his sights. As the murderer stalks her, Celine finally takes matters into her own hands, only to find herself caught in the midst of an age-old feud between the darkest creatures of the night, where the price of forbidden love is her life.

My Thoughts:

When it comes to books that bite, I'm kind of "iffy" on them. Personally, I prefer witches and witchcraft compared to vampires and blood, but I thought it would be good to go out of my comfort zone and pick up The Beautiful and see what everyone was raving about. I absolutely loved the atmosphere and the mysterious air the book gave me. The setting takes place in the late 1800s New Orleans where the nights are always active with people and music, while danger lurks in the shadows. I loved the setting, being able to see New Orleans during the 19th century, which was different than most books I've read that take place in most of the same popular locations. While reading, I did noticed that there was a lot of detail and description. At times, I felt like it was a little too much and it kind of took away from the story and on occasion it felt overly wordy, which distracted me from the situation that was occurring with the characters. I think one of the reoccurring things that Celine mentioned throughout the book was how she was potentially a murderess, over and over again... After the first few times it was mentioned, I understood where the character was coming from, being the century she was supposed to living in and what would lead people to think this, but it got kind of old when it was constantly brought up.

This book flips between first person for some chapters and is mainly third person for most of the story as the reader observes the perspective of both Celine and Sébastien. There's also a first person POV of a mysterious killer that's stalking the streets of New Orleans that I found intriguing too. One of the things that I, sadly, disliked was when the author had her characters speaking in different languages in order to keep certain conversations private. For example, some of the characters would speak in Spanish or French and there was no English translation for the reader who was viewing the scene from a third person perspective. I though they would let the reader understand what was being said, like if they were to italicize what they said in English, but when they didn't it was challenging to know what was going on. I didn't want to stop reading every so often to try to translate what was being said, so I might have missed vital information in the book.

When it comes to romance in books, I loved the forbidden romantic relationship between Celine and Sébastien, it had a little bit of spice to the book and it definitely kept me hooked to see if they could end up together. Overall, I think The Beautiful had good potential to the start of a new series and I did enjoy it, even if I did have a few negatives about some small things. I can't wait to see what happens next in book two, The Damned, I'm so interested to see where things go after that ending that has left me with some questions that I need answered.

If you’re interested in checking out Renée's pages, the links are below along with places you can get The Beautiful.

Thank you all so much for reading. I hope you enjoyed my review/suggestion. Until next time!