Tale As Old as Time

As Old As Time by Liz Braswell

5 stars

Beauty and the Beast is my favorite princess movie of all time. So it was only logical that when I found a retelling of the story I wanted to read it right away. I was skeptical going into this book because retellings tend to dramatically change the story and I end up liking the original more. However, in this Disney Twisted Tales series, although a plot twist is added to make the story more interesting, in the end the story tends to follow the same pattern as the original. So overall, I feel in love with this book.

As Old as Time is the third book in a new YA line that reimagines classic Disney stories in surprising new ways. In this book we follow the premise What if Belle's mother cursed the Beast?

Like I said I was a bit skeptical at first with this book, I was scared that my favorite princess movie was going to be ruined, however, I ended up loving what the author did to the story. The overall plot is very similar to the original film, however, it’s the little details and extra plot twist that make this book so amazing.

In this book we get a deep exploration of the magic system that rules this land, we get to see Belle´s mother, and the lengths she took in order to “protect” her loved ones. The first twisted tale I read was the one inspired by Peter Pan, and my problem with that one was that the main character wasn’t Peter Pan. So when I started reading As Old as Time I loved that Belled continued to be our main character in this story.

Belle has always been my favorite princess, I love how smart, capable and overall lovely person she is and I really appreciated how that didn’t change in this book. The other characters are great as well, the beast was also a favorite of mine. Reading about how he grows and turns into an overall better human being was so heartwarming. As with the movie, my favorite characters will forever be the castle servants, they are the real MVP, I love how we get a much more deep and detailed exploration into their lives before the curse (especially Mrs. Potts) and I deeply enjoyed reading about them.

Now, talking about what is different from the movie, the twisted tale, the twist if you will. I was a huge fan of what the author managed to do with the story, all the talk about magic, magical people, curses and extra characters the author added made this book a much more rich and detailed retelling of Beauty and the Beast. I did guess some of the plot twists of this book, however, I am not mad about this because I didn’t guess it because it was obvious, I guessed it because the author did such a great job leaving us with little clues along the way.

However, I did not in any shape, way or form guessed what the ending was going to be like. I still don’t know how I feel about the ending (kind of love it kind of hate it), but I have come to the conclusion that I can create an ending of my own after the book ended, so I guess I am okay with the ending (I respect the risk the author took).

Overall, As Old as Time is a twisted retelling of the Beauty and the Beast, exploring how far someone is willing to go to protect the people they love, and how we always end up fearing what we don’t know. I can´t wait to continue on with the series because so far I am obsessed with the ones I have read.