Camellia Beauregard is a Belle. In the opulent world of Orléans, Belles are revered, for they control Beauty, and Beauty is a commodity coveted above all else. In Orléans, the people are born gray, they are born damned, and only with the help of a Belle and her talents can they transform and be made beautiful.

But it’s not enough for Camellia to be just a Belle. She wants to be the favorite—the Belle chosen by the Queen of Orléans to live in the royal palace, to tend to the royal family and their court, to be recognized as the most talented Belle in the land. But once Camellia and her Belle sisters arrive at court, it becomes clear that being the favorite is not everything she always dreamed it would be. Behind the gilded palace walls live dark secrets, and Camellia soon learns that the very essence of her existence is a lie—that her powers are far greater, and could be more dangerous, than she ever imagined. And when the queen asks Camellia to risk her own life and help the ailing princess by using Belle powers in unintended ways, Camellia now faces an impossible decision.

With the future of Orléans and its people at stake, Camellia must decide—save herself and her sisters and the way of the Belles—or resuscitate the princess, risk her own life, and change the ways of her world forever.
 

- Goodreads -

The Belles was a book that I've had my eye on since like the end of the 2017 summer. I did only hear great things so I went in with medium hope for this book and came out on the bright side. I did really enjoy this book even those it does have the theme of a 'group of people competing against each other' but that was just a part of this book for me.

I did have a few problems with this book but not every book is perfect and there is always things people aren't going to agree with. But at the end of the day just because you liked and enjoyed a book, doesn't mean you agree with everything that had happened in that book.
Camellia is the lead character, who's smart, caring and a bit sassy at times; and a bit of a poor sense of judgment. Who at times can be a perfectionist, which doesn't bother me, I am the kind of people who like things one way and always try my hardest and get's worked up when it doesn't go the way I feel it should. (So, I understand that.)

The romance was a push and pull for me and I'm not sure how I feel about. That's all I'm going to say about it.

I did have a fear about how this book would go about the theme of beauty and how it matters in this world but the author did a great job of balancing it. It went about covering how it doesn't matter without leaving the story behind. I enjoyed the different types of beauty. From skin, shape, hair texture, gender and how it doesn't matter that a person can go from dark skin to light skin, with no problems, that people won't look down on them for their skin, hair or body types.
There were quite a lot more mysteries min-plots that what I thought there was going to be. For me, this felt list a story of min-plots twisted into one main plot.

Overall, I know that this book does have it's problems but at the end of the day, this was a book that I read in one day because of drama, writing style, and the Belles history and what they can do may for an interesting read.

I received a NetGalley ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review. This doesn't in any way influence my opinion on it. So, this is a 100% honest review by me.