We're off on a blog tour, and what a book to be talking about! The Beast and the Bethany is a joyful, amusing, touching and sometimes unnerving tale that I read in one sitting. I didn't want to put it down, which tells you straight away the quality of the story and the writing.
The story follows Ebenezer Tweezer, a quirky, almost naive young man, who, from the outside, lives a very blessed and charmed life. He likes the finer things in life, lives in a huge house filled with beautiful things. But, the way he gets these lovely things is very sinister indeed, not to mention our quirky young man is actually approaching his 512th birthday! So, how does he manage to live the way he does? He has a beast living on the 15th floor of his mansion and this beast is hungry... and ordinary food just won't do. The beast sends Ebenezer out to find his latest meal and in return for a successful trip, he keeps Ebenezer in the potion to keep him young along with anything else that Ebenezer would like.
It's from one of these food missions that we're introduced to Bethany, an angry, troublesome orphan, and the answer to Ebenezer's latest quest. Bethany is unruly and loves to misbehave. She doesn't do rules, or friends, or kindness. To begin with she is Ebenezer's solution but slowly the two build a beautiful relationship, bringing out the best in each other, wanting to be better. But what do they do about the beast?
What I loved most about this book is just how funny it was, not just in a child-like way but also subtleties that parents will pick up when reading this book to their kids. All the characters we meet are so well described, each with their own quirks, nasty habits and comic timing but equally just well written and easy to imagine. In the beginning I wasn't sure if I was supposed to like Ebenezer or not but as we follow him I realised he was so childlike himself, that he just needed the right person to steer him in the right direction.
I can't wait to see how well this book will do, I think Jack Meggitt-Phillips is someone we're going to be hearing a lot about, not to mention Ebenezer and Bethany. I look forward to reading their continuing adventures.
Thank you again to Dave at TheWriteReads for including me on this blog tour for such a fantastic book, a definite 5 stars from me.
I received this as an e-book in return for an honest review as part of The Write Reads Ultimate Blog Tour.