Bitterburn by Ann Aguirre

Bitterburn by Ann Aguirre
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Read as part of my Kindle Unlimited subscription

Part 1 of the Gothic Fairy Tales series

Finished 13 Dec 2020

Synopsis (from Goodreads): 

Amarrah Brewer is desperate and grief-stricken.
For ages, the town of Bitterburn has sent tribute to the Keep at the End of the World, but a harsh winter leaves them unable to pay the toll that keeps the Beast at bay. Amarrah volunteers to brave what no one has before—to end the threat or die trying.

The Beast of Bitterburn has lost all hope.
One way or another, Njål has been a prisoner for his entire life. A monstrous evil has left him trapped and lonely, and he believes that will never change. There is only darkness in his endless exile, never light. Never warmth. Until she arrives.

It's a tale as old as time... where Beauty goes to confront the Beast and falls in love instead.

The tone of the book was more sinister than what I usually read, but Ann Aguirre has a way with words that made it enjoyable. Her prose had a lilting fairy tale quality that made me want to read the words out loud. This was totally different from the other Aguirre book that I read -- Strange Love -- but it was fitting for this type of story. It helped me keep going because, outside the hero and heroine, the nicest characters in this book were the goats. Njal's caretakers were awful and Amarrah's father and stepmother were indifferent, which can be its own kind of awful.

Although some would say this is a romance, to me the hero Njal wasn’t fleshed out enough to put it in that category. The real story for me was about Amarrah throwing off the shackles of her previous life and coming into her own power. This was underscored by the fact that the entire book was written in the third person from Amarrah's point of view. I know this was to maintain some of the mystery that is expected in a gothic-style novel, but I have become so accustomed to romances where the point of view alternates between the hero and the heroine that I felt like I was missing something by only getting Amarrah's side. 

The love scenes in this book are "open door" but the writing isn't as explicit as many novels I've read. Aguirre makes it plain as far as who put what where -- no flowering buds like in 1980s romances -- but they weren't exactly working their way through The Joy of Sex. I think I could hand it to my adult daughter or a maiden aunt without blushing.

I would recommend this book to my fantasy-loving friends who think romance gets in the way of a good story because it does take a back seat here. This story is the Disney version's goth cousin, so be aware of that, as well.

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