Beastly by Alex Flinn November 21, 2007

Kyle Kingsbury lives in New York City and has got it all; looks, money, popularity, and also a very pompous attitude towards life.  However,  Kyle’s perfect world slowly crumbles after Kendra, the weird goth girl, puts a curse on him after he plays a nasty trick on her.  In a matter of days Kyle is transformed into a Beast not quite like any animal, but a monster with fur, fangs, and claws.   After his transformation Kendra appears in a mysterious mirror left in Kyle’s room.  Kendra tells Kyle that she’s really a witch and that in order to break the curse he has two years to find true love.  If he fails he will be a Beast forever.  At first Kyle doesn’t believe Kendra, and with his father’s help he searches the world for a cure, with no results.  Ashamed of Kyle’s appearance his father locks him away in a brownstone in Brooklyn with a maid and a blind tutor.  Ironically, the longer Kyle stays a Beast the more human he becomes. He learns to be more empathetic towards others, and even finds beauty in a mousy girl whom he wouldn’t have looked twice at before.   However, will that be enough to help him find true love?

Flinn has a knack for writing an urban fairytale with so much wit, humor, and romance that you’ll keep on reading, even though you know what’s going to happen in the end.  I was also delighted to find a brief history of the “Beast” fairytale in the back, which will be helpful for readers who are not fairytale aficionados.