Beauty and the Beast Retellings

Beauty and the Beast is one of the most well known fairy tales ever–and, let’s be real, the Disney animated movie is pretty much perfection!

If you're in the mood for a fairy tale read, don't worry! This epic list of Beauty and the Beast retellings is sure to have something you'll love.

My version of Beauty and the Beast is the first book in my series of fairy tale retellings, the Timeless Fairy Tales series, and one of my other books, Curse of Magic, will give you the Enchantress' side of the story!

To start things off here's a list of my favorite Beauty and the Beast retellings:

Beastly by Alex Flinn

Beauty by Robin McKinley

Rose Daughter by Robin McKinley

The Princess and the Hound by Mette Ivie Harrison

Beauty and the Beast by K.M. Shea (Haha, surprise! This is my version of the beloved story where "Beauty" breaks her leg falling through the "Beast's" skylight so she's stuck there until her leg heals. And then the meddling servants make the most of it!)

I asked my reader communities for a "couple" of suggestions and here's the long list they gave me. I did ask for no spice and low language but read the reviews first if that is a concern for you. Now brace yourself because they had a LOT of recommendations!

Ogre Enchanted by Gail Carson Levine

Isabelle and the Beast by Marie Soleil

Before Beauty by Brittany Fichter

Masque by W.R. Gingell

A Tale of Beauty and Beast by Melanie Cellier

Shadow and Thorn by Kenley Davidson

Of Beast and Beauty by Stacey Jay

Rosabel & the Billionaire Beast by Catelyn Meadows

Beauty and the Beast by Jenni James

The Beast and the Beauty by Arisa May

Belle by Cameron Dokey

Falling for the Beast by Victorine E. Lieske

Bryony and Roses by T. Kingfisher

Cruel Beauty by Rosamund Hodge

Dragon Rose by Christine Pope

Of Beast and Beauty by Chanda Hahn

The Rose Gate by Hanna Sandvig

The Unbreakable Curse by Jenna Thatcher

Beauty and the Beast and the Enchantress by Finley Aaron

A Loyal Heart by Jody Hedlund

The Rose and the Mask by Victoria Leybourne

The Beauty’s Beast by E.D. Walker

Beauty and the Beast: Lost in a Book by Jennifer Donnelly

The Enchanted Rose by R.M. ArceJaeger

Stolen Enchantress by Amber Argyle

The Cold King by A. Dorn 

Heart’s Blood by Juliet Marillier

The Curse Girl by Kate Avery Ellison

The Merchant’s Daughter by Melanie Dickerson

Twisted by Kaylin Lee

The Beast by Lindsay Mead

Beast by Donna Jo Napoli

Beauty and the Clockwork Beast by Nancy Campbell Allen

Her Beast of a Billionaire Boss by Lucy McConnell

Beauty and the Baron by Joanna Barker

Finding Beauty in the Beast by Jessilyn Stewart Peaslee

Beauty and Beastly by Melanie Karsak

The Beast of Talesend by Kyle Robert Shultz

Arabella and the Cursed Prince by Chelsey Noelle

Enchanting Fate by Ashley Evercott

The Beast's Magician by Eliza Prokopovits

Beauty's Rose by Rebecca J. Greenwood

Atone by Jessica Grey

The Beast Within by Serena Valentino

Kill the Beast by Serena Valentino

As Old As Time by Liz Braswell

Thorn of Rose by Emily Deady

Once Upon a Rose by Gabrielle Landi

The Winter Prince by Constance Lopez

The Beast and the Enchantress by Camille Peters

Enchantment by Camille Peters

Belle Lied by S.R. Nulton

Rose: An Oregon Ever After Fairy Tale by Morgan Dawson

I hope you (like me!) now have massive fairy tale To Be Read stack, haha! Go forth and happy reading!

And if you're looking for more Disney Princess inspired book recommendations I have a whole series of these blog posts featuring book recommendations for fairy tale retellings. Click here to start reading or use the Book Lists category to filter them.

Curse of Magic Pre-Order

Less than 10 days until Curse of Magic launches, and it’s available for pre-order right now!

Pre-order link: Amazon.com | All other Amazon stores

It’s actually been available on pre-order for a while–something I don’t normally do. And I don’t like to do it because I’m having to use a place holder file right now (since the book is in the final beta read stage right now) and I’ve heard too many horror stories of Amazon delivering the place holder file by accident instead of the final version. I’m crossing my fingers that won’t happen, but just in case it happens to you my place holder file has instructions on how you can request an updated version of the file from Amazon support.

Coincidentally, my tiny place holder file is also the reason why the book is currently showing up in the “Kindle Short Reads” category, which is extremely irritating to me! I promise the final version of the book will be a full length novel! It’s actually longer than the first book. (Ahahaha and all those extra pages were made with sweat, blood, and tears.)

Curse of Magic will feature lots of new scenes from Angelique’s point of view but it will also have spoilers for Beauty and the Beast, Puss in Boots, Wild Swans, and a few more. If you don’t mind spoiling yourself a bit you can probably figure out which additional books overlap by reviewing my Timeless Fairy Tales timeline (click here for the series page). You might also find the series page helpful since it has a map of the continent, and Angelique travels around a LOT.

Before I close let’s take one more look at the cover image:

I just love the background on this cover, it’s so pretty and fits the world so well! Angelique’s core magic obviously isn’t fire but she is able to manipulate it to some extent thanks to her training. 🙂

And that’s all for today! Thank you, Champions, for your support in this series! Apprentice of Magic has been selling amazingly, part of that is due to your loyalty and support. So I raise my sword to you, Champions! 😉

Apprentice of Magic: Baris

Hello Champions! Today we’re going to talk about a topic I’ve been sitting on for years: Baris!

To the new Champions who have only recently joined us, the countries in my fairy tale world are usually inspired loosely by various real-world historical empires. (Usually I try to model my countries after the country of origin of the fairy tales that take place there.) Germany was the inspiration for Mullberg and Arcainia, Trieux and Loire are reminiscent of France, Erlauf is represented by the Austrian-Hungarian Empire, etc.

Baris is a country I designed long ago, even though Apprentice of Magic is the first book I’ve written that officially visits it, and it is loosely molded after the Byzantine Empire and the Ottoman Empire.

It’s a strange country in terms of its geography, so you’ll also see touches of German and French culture the farther north up its coastline you go, and by nature of being inspired by the Byzantine Empire you’ll also see a Roman influence as well, which makes it a bit of a hodgepodge.

The architecture is more reminiscent of the Byzantine Empire–the palace is loosely inspired by the famous Hagia Sophia–a Greek Orthodox Church that currently serves as a museum; it was built in what was Constantinople and is now Istanbul. Additionally, the Baris country color–a specific shade of purple called Tyrian purple– is actually the shade of the Byzantine Emperors. Even the Baris crest–a two-headed phoenix–was inspired by the Byzantine Empire’s symbol, a two headed eagle.

However, if you look at the government, I based it more off the stories I read in One Thousand and One Nights/Arabian Nights. Baris is rather unique in that it has one King, but many “princes” and “princesses” who are usually related to the king and rule over individual cities/territories. This was inspired by the opening text of One Thousand and One Nights as Baris will be the setting for that particular story far, far in the future. (The opening story of Arabian Nights explains why the king–who kills every woman he marries the day after he marries her–fell into that pattern and mentions his brother–a prince whom he gifted one of his territories.)

In geography, Baris became more of a catch all. It’s the only country to have a desert and a volcano, but it also has a great deal of coastline and some forests.

Baris is also known for being the most magic-friendly country in the continent–even back when magic was taboo in the times of the Snow Queen it was considered acceptable in Baris. It also is home to a lot of magical texts and artifacts, which seem to congregate there. I decided to give Baris this particular background as I am well versed in a lot of roman myths and I delight in the tales of One Thousand and One Nights. I thought it was fitting that countries with such rich stories would be the inspiration for the magic-accepting Baris.

And that concludes this look into Baris! Thanks for reading, Champions, and have a lovely weekend!