I can still remember reading The Wrath and The Dawn for the first time, and how much the beautiful world, and incredible romance affected me. Today I’m gushing about Renee’s new book about vampires in 19th century New Orleans! The best part of it is, she doesn’t stick strictly to vampires, at all, nor the normal glittering, sometimes scary vampires we’re used to today! Ahdieh takes the vampire mythos and shapes it into something all her own, making it beautiful and lush and terrifying. But even without the vampires, our protagonist, Celine, is a french girl with passions and whims considered inappropriate for a girl of any age, let alone a young girl trying to find a proper husband. But truthfully, Celine comes to New Orleans to flee from a dark secret in her very near past, and from herself too. Celine is an incredibly interesting and complex protagonist that demands your love even as she pushes everyone away, because you the reader are the only one that knows her thoughts and can see beyond her actions. Sebastian is a powerhouse of a love interest, and when we do get a point-of-view chapter from him, he just continues to baffle and break hearts, but in more depressing ways. These two together make for an incredibly frustrating slow burn that grabbed me by the throat and didn’t let up. I also had no idea where the story was going to go. Ahdieh managed to keep me in the dark about many things, and that was perfect because it meant I was able to dive in further and really dig for clues and such. This all made The Beautiful an incredibly enchanting read that kept me on my toes the entire time and absolutely delivered on a delicious romance set in a New Orleans ruled by the supernatural.
The Beautiful by Renée Ahdieh, (List Price: $5.99, Nancy Paulsen, 9781524738198, August 2021)
Reviewed by Caitlyn Vanorder, Bookmarks in Winston-Salem, North Carolina