Book Review: The Belles by Dhonielle Clayton

Hey guys, welcome to another book review! This time I’ll be talking about the third book I read during the Biannual Bibliothon: The Belles by Dhonielle Clayton.

Star Rating

4/5

The Summary

This story is set in the fictional kingdom of Orléans, where all the people are born gray—literally. They have gray skin, gray hair, red eyes. Only a Belle has the ability to make people beautiful. Our main character, Camellia, is a Belle, but she doesn’t want to be just any Belle. She wants to be the favorite, the one who serves the royal family. The longer she works, though, the more she discovers that the world is not everything she thought it was. (I feel like all of my summaries in these reviews end with some variation of that line…)

The Review

This book is a good book. I especially appreciated its focus on sisterhood. This is a rare YA book that has (almost) no romance in it, which I really liked. It’s just about Camellia coming into her own, dealing with problems, and leaning on her sisters. As someone who doesn’t have any siblings of her own, I liked the peek into what it’s like to have them.

The magic system in this book is also one of the most unique ones I’ve ever read. The Belles have the ability to control beauty. They can change someone’s body shape, skin tone, eye color, hair color, and so much more. They can make someone look like a completely different person. They also have the ability to do those types of changes to a certain degree on animals and plants.

Overall, I really liked the book, and I am probably going to read the next book in the series when it comes out. My only real problem was that some of the characters’ interactions felt false to me, which got on my nerves.

***

Well, that’s all I’ve got for this review! Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you next time.

-Ariel