By the Book: A Meant to Be Novel | 
pickI love Jasmine Guillory. And I love Beauty and the Beast. And Guillory nailed her retelling, setting it in the publishing industry, keeping the heart of the story alive with so many little nods to the original & the Disney movie. Yet, it was still classic Guillory with humour & good food & smart, strong women. Just so good!
pickFairy tale retelling? Check. Diverse cast of characters? Check. Would I recommend to others? Check.
pickThis Beauty and the Beast retelling is a slow burn romance, building the relationship between Izzy and Beau in a manner that allows them to get to know each other, and get to know themselves. Also can we talk about all the food references! Baking and breakfast and that amazing SNACK CABINET! This book was a lot of fun and a definite must read for romance readers. Pack this one in your beach bag (along with some snacks) and get whisked away!!!
pickI absolutely love her books and this one was no exception!! A brilliant and modern retelling of beauty and the beast that had me smiling the whole time!! ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
pick⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️The newest in the Meant To Be collection - a group of romances inspired by Disney stories - this is the “Beauty and the Beast” story, and I loved it! I appreciated that it wasn‘t a full retelling, & it was fun seeing the little nods to my fav princess. Sarah Hollis was a very enthusiastic audiobook narrator, and I enjoyed what she brought to my reading of the book. Guillory is a must read author for me, and this is no exception.
When there‘s a new Jasmine Guillory book out, it‘s time to drop everything and read!
My latest blog post for Books-A-Million just dropped and I would really appreciate it if y‘all could click on the link and hit the love button at the top of the article. Enjoy my recommendations and yay books!!! Thank you in advance!!
https://bit.ly/3sZRwgK
Ok, this one was not starting out as strong as the last Meant To Be novel but, at the start of chapter four our female protagonist admits to hating food that jiggles. Finally, someone understands!!! Jell-o, flan, pudding, custard— if it moves on it‘s own and is no longer alive is disturbing. I feel seen.
pickWhat a sweet story❤️❤️❤️❤️ Izzy and Beau were just perfect together and I loved all the nods to Beauty and the Beast🙂
pickLoved this Beauty and the Beast retelling. Izzy and Beau were fun to read about. Enjoyed how Izzy grew more herself as she helped Beau find his voice and write his memoir. Hard call, but might be my new favorite Guillory, and she‘s written some good books!
When other girls dreamed about the prince, I was definitely fantasizing about that library!
“She‘d gone to the library with her parents, once a week, every week, when she was a little girl. It had felt like a magic place to her, full of books just waiting to be read—on shelves, in stacks, in every corner. She‘d fantasized about having a place like that in her own imaginary future home, with shelves and shelves of books, wherever you looked.”
Book haul from gift cards and just spoiling myself for my birthday. 🥰 The tagged in one I‘m really looking forward to. Skandar and the unicorn thief came with an enamel pin! 😍The 10th Kingdom is from that mini series in the late 90s so I‘m pretty excited about it too! 😍💛🥰 Happy reading everyone!
pickThis author is among my many auto-read authors. I enjoy reading what‘s inside the head of her characters. While this B&B redo isn‘t my favorite of her books, it‘s still a pick. I was intrigued about her MC as a new lone black female at the publishing co, Tale as Old as Time (lol). The point of the story is what‘s happening at the ‘castle‘ in Santa Barbara, but my favorite parts happened when Izzy (vs Belle) was in her offices in NYC. ↓
New books and some white wine for a lovely Saturday night 😊
beauty and the beast retelling. Beau is shut up in his mansion not writing the book he said he would, so Isabelle shows up at his house to give him some pep talks and prove her worth at her job at the publishing house, but they do not get off on the right foot. this book was sweet and the reveal at the end to get her to come back was just everything.
My April reading went much better than expected once I realized how much easier it is to listen to an audiobook while feeding a baby.
#bookspinbingo
pickLots of rom-coms are retellings of some sort but I'm enjoying this Meant To Be series by various authors. This one imitates Beauty & The Beast in an writers/editors POV in a one sided enemies to lovers trope. Closed door romance with a lovable assistant and best friend. Need to go scout out what the third book will be about and who is writing it.
pickDisclaimer: Belle is my favorite princess. She loves books, I love books. We‘re basically the same. Which meant I was expecting a lot of a modern retelling of Beauty and the Beast by one of my favorite authors. By the Book was a tale as old as time full of little Easter eggs that had me giggling with joy. In public. Izzy works hard to uncover the prince of a fellow hidden beneath Beaus‘s gruff personality.
Thank you Hyperion Avenue for the ARC!
pick4/5
I was so excited to see Jasmine Guillory's take on Beauty and the Beast in this series of Disney fairy tales adapted to contemporary romances. Izzy is an assistant at a publishing house and one of her tasks is emailing the reclusive celebrity Beau Towers for updates about he very late memoir, which are always ignored. Izzy goes to Beau's home in Southern California to try to finally find out what's going on, but ends up staying to help Beau.
1. By the Book by Jasmine Guillory and Queen's Hope by E. K. Johnston
2. A Proposal They Can't Refuse by Natalie Cana
3. The Emma Project by Sonali Dev
#weekendreads @rachelsbrittain
Isabelle Marlowe smiled at the world as she walked down the bustling, crowded Manhattan street. She couldn‘t help it.
#FirstLineFridays @ShyBookOwl
I put together my April #bookspinbingo even though I think I'll be lucky to finish 4 books next month, including the two I'm currently reading.
#bookspin #doublebookspin @TheAromaofBooks
pickA sweet and charming Beauty and the Beast retelling. Thought she did a great job of making the story contemporary. #ARC #Netgalley
When you get approved for an ARC and now have to throw out your whole TBR.
Okay really just rework it but I like to be dramatic.
pickCute! But also, if you‘re looking for any heat at all, Thai is not the book for you. It was pretty chaste tbh. That said, I enjoyed this retelling almost as much as I enjoyed book 1 of this series; a very slow burn here.
