Book Review: The Rose Gate: A Retelling of Beauty and the Beast

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

A fun and sassy Beauty and the Beast retelling with a contemporary twist.

Isobel is a very practical young woman from a broken family, who's eager to leave for university and get on with her life as soon as the summer holidays are over. The days spent at the library reading fairy tales out loud to little kids are practically the only thing she has going in the small little town her family moved into. That, as well as her books and the solitude of the woods.

Not that I would love her type of storytelling, if I may be honest here, because her tales are the very practical kind.

"Once upon a time, there was a beautiful princess. ... She was also resourceful, creative and very good at math."
And she expects the prince and princess to get married ONLY AFTER they got to know each other properly and she went to university for at least four years to complete a bachelor's.

Tales aside however, our practical Isobel is real fun to be around. She loves going for walks in the woods and finding sunny rocks to read on, like a lizard, and she's perfectly content with being a healthy happy hermit.
Until the day she's caught out in the forest after dark and pursued by a disturbingly intelligent pack of wolves, only to be rescued by a grumpy grizzly bear and find herself waking up in a fairytale like castle with a big beast of a man hovering over her.
With half his face sliced with old scars from top to bottom, the left eye fully gone and a mane of tangled hair full of twigs and dirt, he was quite a shocking sight. But it was the talking racoon berating him that made our Isobel completely loose it, in such a way that her shrieking startled even the beastly man.

And that is how Isobel's very own practical contemporary tale begins. With a castle full of talking animals and a grumpy bear man who turns out to be a cursed fae prince.
Trapped by the wolves at the prince’s home in Faerie, Isobel tries to unravel the mystery behind the surly prince’s scars. Because time is running out for the castle’s inhabitants, and the prince's plans are downright terrible. He obviously need a better one and Isobel is determined to find it.

She'll find a way to break the spell and save the prince from the Unseelie Queen, not only because she's grown to love the furry little inhabitants of the castle, but because loosing her grumpy bear is an absolutely unacceptable option.



Sweet, fun and sassy, light and fluffy, this beauty and the beast retelling is one you won't be able to set down. It captures the heart of the original tale and gives it an original contemporary spin that is bound to take any reader by surprise.
Beautiful wordbuilding and a narrative that's a pleasure to read, a slow-burn romance as sweet as it gets, snarky retorts, fun-filled moments and downright adorable characters -this tale has it all.
If a racoon bustling won't make your lips quirk up in a smile, the interactions between our Bel and her bear are bound to do the trick.

"Where are you going?!" he bellowed. "Sit down!"
I bristled at his tone. "No."
"We're having a nice dinner. I shaved!"
"And your cheekbones are fantastic. Have a lovely evening!" - she retorts while snagging an extra pastry from the table and rushing out of the room. :D

A scarred fae prince -half his face the ruin he believed himself to be and a sassy beauty determined to save her sorrowful grizzly bear by breaking the curse he's under. Because she knows he needs her more than he'd ever admit it. Family, friendship, love and a lot of sass, all of it and more in a light and fluffy read for the heart.

I absolutely adored it and highly recommend it to all fairy tale fans out there.

"Stories change a little every time they're told. They can't help it."

This one here is MAGICAL!

Happy reading everyone
and always remember:

'It's never too late to decide who you want to be.'

Check out this book and more of Hanna Sandvig over at http://hannasandvig.com