The Beautiful Ones
From the New York Times bestselling author of Mexican Gothic comes a tale of love and betrayal set in a world where scandal is a razor-sharp weapon.
They’re called the Beautiful Ones.
Loisail’s most notable socialites: the wealthy, powerful, beloved.
This spring is Nina’s last chance to join their ranks, but the Grand Season has just begun and Nina’s debut has already gone disastrously awry. Neighbors call her the Witch of Oldhouse—the haphazard manifestations of her powers making her the subject of malicious gossip.
So when entertainer and fellow telekinetic Hector Auvray arrives to town, Nina is dazzled. He’s traveled the world performing his talents for admiring audiences. And he sees Nina not as a witch, but as something more. With Hector’s help, Nina’s talent blossoms, as does her love for him.
But great romances are just for fairytales. In the glittering, gossip-laden world of Loisail, where everyone conceals secrets, can their courtship survive?
Praise
Moreno-Garcia fills her fantastic novel of manners with sumptuous language and plausible romantic complications in a setting that appears to be based on 19th-century France and is lightly garnished with minor magic…Readers who enjoyed Mary Robinette Kowal’s Glamourist Histories magical Regency series will be particularly enthralled by the genuine emotions evoked in the course of the unsustainable love triangle.
—Publishers Weekly
This novel of manners presents carefully crafted characters with nuanced motivations to rival any Thomas Hardy classic. Moreno-Garcia adeptly captures the ecstatic highs of first love and the bitter disappointments of first heartbreak. Hints of the paranormal and dashes of adventure and feminism are subtly interwoven, making for an unforgettable work.
—School Library Journal
The talented author of Certain Dark Things and Signal to Noise returns with a novel that is light on fantasy but overflowing with delicious melodrama … a great fit for fans of the 18th-century French classic Les Liaisons Dangereuses.
—Library Journal
This elegant tale of hidden desires and misplaced amour will appeal to fans of historical fantasy.
—Booklist
Though it may depart in setting and subgenre, The Beautiful Ones demonstrates Moreno-Garcia’s smart and colorful writing, with descriptions both sensory and sumptuous, and characters you will root for, even in their worst moments.
—B&N Blog
The Beautiful Ones is an elegantly paced novel that moves its characters into place with ease, with careful attention paid to ways a word or a moment can change an entire life.
— Book Page
Many of Moreno-Garcia’s characters do terrible, despicable things to hurt each other and profit personally in this book, but that’s what keeps them and the narrative interesting. It’s a slow-burn, stately novel about the magic of what it means to love, and love truly.
—Tor.com
Readers who enjoy light speculative elements, historical fantasy, romance, and beautiful prose will find a trove. Straddling several genres with elegant intelligence, The Beautiful Ones is both an easy read and a fulfilling one.
—Locus
This is the third novel I read by Silvia Moreno-Garcia and I loved all of them in different ways: each in a different genre by a chameleon writer with incredible writing skills.
—Kirkus
The Beautiful Ones is a hauntingly lovely book, romantic and crushing by turns, touched with magic on every level.
—Vancouver Sun
If you’ve ever thought that what Dangerous Liaisons really needed was more Force Adepts, this may very well be the book you’ve been waiting for.
—James Nicoll Reviews
The whole book is a magnificent tangle of unspoken words and feelings. Nothing is tepid; everything, even the absence of feelings, is charged with danger and heartache.
—Strange Horizons
Certain people in the world of The Beautiful Ones have telekinetic abilities, but while these abilities do play an important part in the story, this is not a story of magic unless it’s the magic of the human heart.
—FantasyLiterature.com
Whatever genre you call it, the story is compelling. I read it with the same rabid avidity with which I eat a bag of chips.
—Smart Bitches, Trashy Books