book review

The Belles is a fictional fantasy novel (which I would personally describe as dark fictional fantasy, but that is dependent on each individual’s perception of the novel) which is written by former librarian, Dhonielle Clayton. The novel is about a young Belle named Camellia and her several sisters who all possess the powers to make everyone in the land of Orleans and beyond, physically beautiful and as attractive as they desire. The Belles achieve this by harnessing their ‘arcana’ and using their powers to ‘beautify’ everyone by changing skin tones, adjusting hair textures, changing their bone structures and much more - only to have their rich clients come back with more inquiries on the ‘latest looks’ - darker skin tones, dainty hands, enhanced curves for women or slimmer more slender body shapes and so on. Camellia is chosen to be the favourite Belle, which is her dream come true - to become the personal Belle for the royal Princess Sophia and to OBEY HER EVERY COMMAND!!! This is when things spiral out of control and Camellia discovers the true ugliness of the situation and realises that she can’t actually fix it!

The novel is composed well, with a logical structure and easy to follow along. But what I fail to understand is the purpose of the novel and what intentions the author had in mind when writing the novel - the portrayal of women and their beauty as well as attitudes towards finding physical beauty, by completely changing their natural features is ridiculous and simply unnecessary, especially in today’s society!

I have struggled to find a meaningful concept within the novel and therefore cannot comment positively on the message within this novel. I have come to peace with this book by viewing it as a dystopian text - an undesirable, dark reality of our current society, which is reflected accurately through this novel. But that does not mean that I can excuse the fact that the author portrays everyone as being born UGLY! Everyone is born beautiful as they are all beautiful creations of God. This novel portrays the wrong idea about beauty...beauty is not what we see on the outside but rather is found within a person and in their personality as expressed in the following quote “No beauty shines brighter than that of a good heart”. However, what I have understood through this novel, and need to emphasise is that, no matter how enticing or alluring an individual may be, it is impossible to hide the deep ugliness which lies within a person as it is reflected clearly through their evil actions and nasty thoughts.

Despite the fact that I personally disagree with the theme of this particular novel, it should not stop anyone else from reading the novel, since it is extremely engaging and it gives you an opportunity to reflect on how our society perceives beauty, and gain priceless knowledge about what values are held by individuals within our community.

-A Chahal, Year 10