Retellings are a lot of fun and have been very popular, especially when it comes to Beauty and the Beast. Hunted is one of those retellings and released in 2017. I’ve had it on my shelf since then and I finally picked it up to join a group read a friend set up. Today I want to tell you what I thought of this book!

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Beauty knows the Beast’s forest in her bones—and in her blood. Though she grew up with the city’s highest aristocrats, far from her father’s old lodge, she knows that the forest holds secrets and that her father is the only hunter who’s ever come close to discovering them.
So when her father loses his fortune and moves Yeva and her sisters back to the outskirts of town, Yeva is secretly relieved. Out in the wilderness, there’s no pressure to make idle chatter with vapid baronessas…or to submit to marrying a wealthy gentleman. But Yeva’s father’s misfortune may have cost him his mind, and when he goes missing in the woods, Yeva sets her sights on one prey: the creature he’d been obsessively tracking just before his disappearance.
Deaf to her sisters’ protests, Yeva hunts this strange Beast back into his own territory—a cursed valley, a ruined castle, and a world of creatures that Yeva’s only heard about in fairy tales. A world that can bring her ruin or salvation. Who will survive: the Beauty, or the Beast?

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Hunted by Meagan Spooner
Published by HarperTeen on 14/03/2017
Genres: Fantasy
Pages: 376
Format: Hardcover
Goodreads

Review

“In every fairy tale there were rules. Even the monsters could not break them. And where, except in fairy tales, did there exist talking beasts?”

Hunted was a book I was really excited for since I saw the cover. I loved how it looked and who would be disappointed with a cover like this on your shelf? This is definitely a good case of don’t judge a book by its cover.

I did enjoy how this book started off. We started to get to know Yeva a bit more and the setting she was in. It was nice to see that she wasn’t the typical “girl” in this story. She must rather go hunting with her father than sitting down to learn how to be a lady. That’s kind of where my love for her ended though. There was just something about her that rubbed me the wrong way and made it hard to connect with.

“She was so tired, after all – tired of fairy tales and magic and empty castles, tired of wanting so intensely that she didn’t know what she wanted.”

This story progresses slow. We get the elements we know and love from Beauty and the Beast, even if they’re altered just a bit. Yeva is determined to find her father, but ends up captured by the Beast. His part in the story was interesting and I loved the start of each chapter with little glimpses of his thoughts. I needed more of the Beast though. Yeah, we slowly see different sides of him, but it lacked for me at times.

That being said, there is only little development between Yeva and the Beast. Of course, she slowly starts seeing his human side and I liked how the author made us see him as something different than the Beast. I didn’t feel the relationship between them. It did change and they started relating to each other more, but the connection didn’t seem like it was there until Yeva just had to get back to him.

“There’s no such thing as living happily ever after—there’s only living. We make the choice to do it happily.”

Hunted kept me interested enought to continue to the end, but it’s not my favorite Beauty and the Beast retelling. The amazing start was there and I enjoyed the author’s concept, but the execution just didn’t do it for me. I liked that the story was a bit darker though and that Yeva was tough and didn’t just sit back and be hopeless. It was also interesting how the “curse” needed to be broken. I really wish that the author would’ve given us more of that.

All in all, an okay read, but with some aspects I had issues with.

Unfortunately this one just wasn’t it for me. It had some fun elements, but I’ve read better retellings. I would love to know what your favorite retellings are. Let me know in the comments!