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Type of bind: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.54
EAN num: 9780452281424
ISBN number: 0452281423
Label: Plume
Manufacturer: Plume
Quantity: 1
Page Count: 272
Printing Date: May 01, 1999
Publishing house: Plume
Sale Popularity Level: 7286
Studio: Plume
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Editor's Notes and Comments:
Brief Book Summary:
Rice writing as A. N. Roquelaure.
In the traditional folk tale 'Sleeping Beauty,' the spell cast upon the lovely young princess and everyone in her castle can only be broken by the kiss of a Prince. Anne Rice's retelling of the Beauty story probes the unspoken implications of this lush, suggestive tale by exploring its undeniable connection to sexual desire.
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Rated by buyers 
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The Prince wakens Beauty from her century of sleep--and then, as his reward for saving the castle, takes her as his prize. He leads Beauty back to his kingdom, where foreign princes and princesses are trained to be sexual slaves, willingly submitting to the most "depraved" desires. The fairy tale premise strips the story of characterization and justifies an unbelievable land where Beauty and a hundred other royals undergo public and state-sanctioned humiliating display, oft-repeated spankings, and sexual encounters which never require consent. The Claiming of Sleeping Beauty has a few darkly erotic moments but quickly disintegrates into repetition, and lacks character growth which might grant it some sense of purpose. I do not plan to read the sequels, and I do not recommend this book.
Initially, the premise of Claiming appears to have beautiful simplicity, but this simplicity is its biggest downfall. An untouched Beauty, woken from endless sleep into vivid life by a Prince--the concept leads easily into sexual overtones. However, fairy tales are brief and reiterative, and trade character for archetype: the sleeping Beauty, the warrior Prince. Rice maintains both aspects. She cannot sustain the simple concept over a novel's length, and the story quickly becomes repetitious: humiliation, spankings, sex, humiliation, spanking, sex. Beauty believes that each instance is worse than the last, but it's hard for the reader to agree. Not much varies besides the order of events, and sometimes a slave is tied up for a while or there's a bit of sodomy, but other than that the book drives in the same circle until the end. Beauty and Prince have little characterization outside of their titles, and while Beauty eventually encounters characters with names and the ghost of an identity, on the whole characterization is kept to a minimum. Without characterization, there is no character growth and no one for the reader to identify with and care about, stripping the story of any sense of purpose.
To be fair, the whole book is not a cycle of simple repetition. Claiming has a few moments of dark eroticism, where the encounter is conceived in such a way that it is appealing to the sympathetic mind (which is to say that the content tends towards idealized sexual violence not unlike BDSM, and may not suit all readers). Such moments, however, are the exception rather than the rule. The number of spankings, each one just like the one before, is so exaggerated that one begins to wonder if Rice has a fetish. On a less humorous note, the variations on sex and punishment tread on the edge of objectionable--not because the two can't be intermixed, but because Rice intermixes them without stopping for consent. To a certain extent, the fairy tale setting justifies this: the Prince's kingdom is an absurd land stripped of characters and run on fetishized sex, wholly unbelievable and therefore excused from rational details like reasonable doubt and sexual consent. But the setting can't excuse the fact that the book begins when the Prince rapes Beauty to wake her and then orders her into slavery against her will. Nevermind the fact that Beauty is forever aroused by her trails--the fantasy of the entire book is still tainted.
There is ample room in literature for erotic fairy tales--especially for eroticism that reveals or revels in the darkness of human nature. (The Bloody Chamber by Angela Carter is a breathtaking example of such, and I highly recommend it.) The Claiming of Sleeping Beauty, bogged down by blank-faced characters and dozen of identical spankings, plummets where it should soar. The result is a novel with only moments of erotic interest, never thought-provoking or intriguing but instead unbelievable, repetitious, and slightly unsettling. Rice cannot maintain the concept over a mere 250 pages, and I doubt that the two sequels are any better--I don't plan to read them. I was disappointed by this book, and I don't recommend it.
Rated by buyers 
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Excellent retelling of a favorite fairy tale. This book is a classic in the erotica genre, and I would highly reommend to others who are fans of Anne Rice and her particular writing style.
Rated by buyers -
I have read a great deal of Anne Rice over the years, but in no way was I prepared for her Sleeping Beauty series! As in all of Rice's works, the language was intelligent and wonderfully descriptive, but unlike others... the storyline was a little dull.
I have always loved fairy tale retellings, so I was anxious to see what Rice would do with it.... I found out rather quickly that the story had very little to do with the fairytale and mostly just focused on the setting. Even the main characters (aside from the Prince and Beauty) were pretty far removed from any fairytale rendition, not to mention pretty one dimensional.
I also found that Rice spent a lot of time with the spanking, and I wonder if she took anytime at all to research BDSM to find other more interesting activities associated with it.... I mean, if you are planning on writing an entire book where that is the norm, shouldn't you be a little more up to speed on what other things that entails???
Although I am fairly open minded about my reading choices, this book included just a little too much shock and not enough substance for me.
Rated by buyers -
I picked up this book because I was looking for some erotica and I am fan of Anne Rice's other work, however I was extremely disappointed. As other reviewers have said, the "spanking" was so redundant it was annoying, the plot was non-existent and the narrative was only so-so.
Most importantly I was NOT aware when I bought this novel that it was so strongly S&M, nonconsensual acts etc. Some people may enjoy those fantasizes(as fantasizes ONLY) however, pain, the threat of infliction of pain and explict descriptions of forced sexual activity do NOT arose me in the slightest. Unless you are a fan of S&M I do not suggest you purchase this book.
Rated by buyers 
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This book was actually recommended for me here on amazon and I figured I give it a try....after all it's by Anne Rice and I love her books. However I realized after reading about a chapter that this definetley wasn't a typical Rice creation. It was better! Yes it's erotic and a little more sado. than I'm used to, which I've since discovered I like, but also it was such an interesting read. The book is a study on human emotion adn behavior and not the boring type of book that points out things like, "I felt sad, or lost, or devastated" which are obvious but relays humilitation, despair, release and ecstacy through detailed characters and their actions. I went on to read the other two books in the series within a week and when it was over I read them again. When a book has the ability to draw you in so much that you cry and laugh, blush and gasp along with the characters you know you've found a keeper and that's what this book did for me. Hope it does the same for you!
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