Bookish and the Beast

Content warning: grief

Small-town girl Rosie Thorne meets Hollywood actor Vance Reigns.

Small-town girl Rosie Thorne has her share of high school drama plus the grief from losing her mother a year before the book begins. But before you think you're in for a twisty high school drama, let me warn you that this book is about as original as the main character's name. Rosie accidentally ends up in a house inhabited by actor Vance Reigns and is hired to organize the vintage sci-fi books in the library.

Characters from previous Poston's Once Upon a Con series installments show up in this novel. Vance Reigns was the unlikable Hollywood bad boy chosen to star in the Starfield movie's sequel in The Princess and the Fangirl, and the main character Imogen makes a few appearances. Darian Freeman and his girlfriend Elle "Geekerella" Wittimer also appear.

The novel is sold as a retelling of Beauty and the Beast, but Rosie and Belle only have books and the lack of a mother in common. Rosie's love interest is an unlikeable character (Hollywood actor Vance) from The Princess and the Fangirl who is vilified on social media but is secretly a big softie. Oh, and there's a library in a "castle house."

This book focuses a lot less on the Starfield/sci-fi convention known as Excelsicon than previous entries in the series. Rosie mentions attending the previous summer, but the book takes place in small-town North Carolina, not at the Atlanta convention.

Vance is introduced as a character in the previous series installment The Princess and the Fangirl. Vance's name is pronounced "reeg-ins" (with a hard g) in the previous installment and alternates between "reeg-ins" and "rains" in this novel. The book's synopsis says "Reigns," which to me is pronounced "rains." Not knowing the character's actual name is confusing, but I can't comment on what the series looks like in print. Vacillating pronunciation in this installment alone is rather unfortunate, with "rains" cropping up several times.

Ashley Poston studied English at the University of South Carolina before working in publishing. She is a full-time author and lives between South Carolina and New York.

Series: Once Upon a Con, #3

Publisher: Quirk Books (print); Blackstone Publishing (audio)

Narrators: Caitlin Kelly & Curry Whitmire

Running Time: 7 hours, 21 minutes

Length: 288 pages

Release Date: August 4, 2020

Representation: nonbinary side character, bisexual side character, Latine side character

I received an electronic galley copy of this title from the publisher through Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. I also received a digital audio recording of this title from Penguin Random House Audio as a librarian review copy. I read the latter edition.