A fairy tale that is both familiar and new.
Plot: Casiopea is living with her grumpy sexist grandfather, timid mother and hostile cousin in effective slavery because her and her mother had no where else to go when her father died. One day she stumbles on a large wooden box. In opening it, she releases a Mayan god, trapped in captivity for decades, and he wants revenge. One problem, she’s now his power source. Shenanigans ensue.
I don’t remember quite which review sold me on this book but the pitch was that this was a unique take on the Beauty and the Beast story. By that logic, any story that has a dutiful daughter and an asshole powerful man who softens over the course of the book is a take on beauty and the beast. This story very much stands on its own.
We follow Casiopea going out on her own, sort of, for the first time in her life. We see her being exposed to new experiences, seeing a future for herself in a way she could barely imagine before, and being transformed by it.
We also follow the god Hun-Kamé as he races to recover the power necessary to defeat his brother, and in the process gaining a unique appreciation for the inner lives of mere humans.
Finally, we also follow Casiopea’s cousin as he chases them across the continent. He’s the minor baddy of the story, carrying out the god Vucub-Kamé’s bidding like a goon, and it would be so easy to flatten him out into a superficial bad guy, but we get to see inside his head, at how he came to be so timid but cruel, such an entitled bully so terrified of everything outside his small town. It in no way excuses his behaviour, simply seeks to help the reader understand how he came to be. Indeed, we even get insight into Vucub-Kamé’s mind and history. Moreno-Garcia very much wants us to understand that bullies are made, not born.
One note for citizens of Romancelandia, this is billed as a romance, and it has romance in it, but this is not A romance, so don’t go in expecting a traditional HEA.