By The Book – Jasmine Guillory

I’m surprised that Disney’s Meant To Be series hasn’t made a bigger splash, if I’m honest. It should be like catnip to millennials: delightful, escapist, contemporary re-tellings of the classic Disney fairytales we were raised on. I reviewed the first book in the series, If The Shoe Fits, a while back, and now I’m turning to the next: By The Book.

By The Book is Jasmine Guillory’s take on the story of Beauty And The Beast. She transplants the story to the present(ish)-day publishing industry. The heroine, Isabelle Marlowe, is an assistant at Tale As Old As Time Publishing (terrible branding, yes, but just one of many not-so-subtle nods to the story’s origins). She’s disillusioned with her job, labouring under a hard-nosed boss and undermined at every turn by a patronising mansplainer, with little prospect of promotion. She’s on the brink of leaving the industry altogether, when she takes on a challenge: getting Beau Towers to submit a manuscript.

Beau Towers (the hero, in case you’re not following) is a former child star with a bad reputation. He’s under contract with Tale As Old As Time for his tell-all memoir. It’s way past due, and Isabelle’s boss is at the end of her rope. Isabelle finds herself volunteering to stay with Beau at his luxurious Californian mansion for a few weeks, gradually coaching him in the art of memoir writing (and more), all the while falling in love.

By The Book is very earnest – as you’d expect from anything Disney branded – and a very slow burn. Izzy and Beau don’t even kiss until about two-thirds of the way through.

It’s a very surface-level story, too. Despite Beau being all broody before opening up about his ‘big dark secret’ (that he was rather rude to his mother after taking his dad’s side in their divorce), there were a lot of aspects to both characters that felt unexplored. For example, Beau discovered after his father’s death that his mother basically co-wrote all of his award-winning manuscripts. Why doesn’t that play into his feelings about being coached and edited by a woman he’s falling in love with? Maybe Guillory intended for that to be implied, but in a novel where everything else is so plainly stated, it feels like she simply overlooked it.

I had another bugbear with By The Book that seems small but it drove me nuts: Izzy walks out of the room every time she and Beau have an argument. Once or twice I could understand, but it happens repeatedly. It’s like “leave the room” is the only way she knows to deal with conflict – and yet, the one time he does it to her, she goes full Pikachu face and spirals right off the deep end.

I recognise, as a dyed-in-the-wool cynic, that I’m probably being a bit harsh. By The Book is a quick and easy read, one that you could skate through on a lazy afternoon. It’s a low-stakes romance with no rude bits, and there’s nothing wrong with that if that’s what you’re into.

My favourite Amazon reviews of By The Book:

• “Love the author. Love the premise. Such a bad book. So boring. No romance. Disney’s version is hotter.” – Itvv
• “She TAUGHT this man how to use the dishwasher IN HIS HOME! And laughed. I have no patience for ditzy moron supporting weaponized incompetence.” – sydneydalton81
• “I don’t understand the positive reviews because this is the worst book I’ve ever read in my life. All the main characters do it eat! And kiss!” – Nina