Marvelous

So this is another historical novel based on actual people—do you see a theme here?

Marvelous is also set in Europe during the Renaissance, and it focuses on a Beauty and the Beast-style story. Pedro Gonzalez is a curiosity at court, being covered in hair. He’s married to the young and lovely Catherine, and the novel explores how the two of them come to care for each other. The couple and their children are treated as not quite human, and their story is both tragic and inspiring.

This novel by the author of two remarkable Jane Austen spinoffs tackles the real-life couple whose story became the basis of Beauty and the Beast.

Petrus Gonsalvus was born with a rare condition that caused hair to grow all over his body. Brought to the Renaissance court of Henry II of France in 1547, he became the king’s ward and eventually married Catherine, the beautiful sixteen-year-old daughter of a merchant who had fallen on hard times. Whatever Catherine expected from the marriage, it wasn’t a guy who looked like Chewbacca, yet somehow they made it work.

Greeley’s writing is… show more.