Bookish and the Beast by Ashley Poston

DESCRIPTION:(From Netgalley)

A tale as old as time is made new in Ashley Poston's fresh, geeky retelling of Beauty and the Beast.
 
Rosie Thorne is feeling stuck—on her college application essays, in her small town, and on that mysterious General Sond cosplayer she met at ExcelsiCon. Most of all, she’s stuck in her grief over her mother’s death. Her only solace was her late mother’s library of rare Starfield novels, but even that disappeared when they sold it to pay off hospital bills.
 
On the other hand, Vance Reigns has been Hollywood royalty for as long as he can remember—with all the privilege and scrutiny that entails. When a tabloid scandal catches up to him, he's forced to hide out somewhere the paparazzi would never expect to find him: Small Town USA. At least there’s a library in the house. Too bad he doesn’t read.
 
When Rosie and Vance’s paths collide and a rare book is accidentally destroyed, Rosie finds herself working to repay the debt. And while most Starfield superfans would jump at the chance to work in close proximity to the Vance Reigns, Rosie has discovered something about Vance: he’s a jerk, and she can’t stand him. The feeling is mutual. 
 
But as Vance and Rosie begrudgingly get to know each other, their careful masks come off—and they may just find that there’s more risk in shutting each other out than in opening their hearts.

WHAT I LIKED:

I enjoy a good fairytale retelling. I enjoyed that aspect of the book. I enjoyed how Rosie and Vance's relationship developed. How she tamed the beast and how they became friends.

 I also enjoyed Rosie's friends. They had her back when things got sticky. I loved the way they were willing to give up their own enjoyment in order to comfort and console their friend. 

Garrett, the Gaston nemesis was perfect! Such a jerk! 

And Rosie's dad was entertaining and kind of a fun guy. 

WHAT I DISLIKED:

It seemed like the author was quite bent on getting in all of the politically correct sexual orientations that are present. Rosie's dad is bi-sexual. Even Vance has dabbled in relationships with same sex partners. And then there is Rosie's friend Quinn. I have to admit this character confused me the most at first. The character was constantly referred to as "them, they, they're, etc. etc." and I couldn't figure out at first if there were two of them! At first I thought well maybe this is a "space" book where Quinn is an android of some kind and they have 2 heads, or 2 personalities. Then finally Quinn was referred to as "nonbinary" now, I had no clue what that meant at first. I lead a pretty sheltered life. But it finally dawned on me that Quinn has not chosen whether to be a male or a female or has chosen to be neither. Ooookkkkkaaaaayyyyy...and that's all I'm going to say about that. I also found a couple of times that both Rosie and Vance's "ah-ha" moments where they had inner dialogue in their heads was kind of boring and had me thinking to myself(inside my head!), "blah blah blah blah blah!" 

WRAP UP:

For the most part I enjoyed this book. Unfortunately it wasn't my favorite retelling of Beauty and the Beast, but it had interesting characters and an endearing ending. 

**Thanks to Netgalley for my copy of the book. All opinions are my own**