Reviewed by Vicki
TITLE: Vassily the Beautiful
SERIES: part of the ESTO universe
AUTHOR: Angel Martinez
PUBLISHER: Mischief Corner Books
LENGTH: 216 pages
BLURB:
Vassily Belikov, composer and pampered son of privilege, suffered neurological damage in the accident that killed his father. Resentful of being treated as an invalid, he lives as a recluse, dependent on his mother. That changes the day she brings home a new husband with two sons of his own.
When deep-space pirates capture Vassily’s mother, he’s left to the mercy of his cruel, amoral stepfather. Fighting addiction and his physical shortcomings, he’s forced to seek out the criminal mastermind Baba Yaga for a crucial piece of equipment. While she agrees to deal with him if he beats his Exoticus addiction, paranoia and mysterious intentions infuse her household. Drawn to her fierce, suspicious youngest son, certain his actions are all carefully observed, Vassily must find the courage to face both his fears and his desires if he expects to survive.
REVIEW:
Vassily the Beautiful is based on a Russisan fairy tale, Vasilisa the Beautiful. I am not familiar with Russian fairy tales, and initially didn’t read the story before I started Vassily. I did stop a quarter of the way in and read it, it’s a short story, available on the Internet for free and easy to find. If you aren’t familiar with it, it might be worth reading it before you read Vassily. At first I wanted to review this book based solely on it’s own, but I am glad I stopped and read Vasilisa’s story. It’s cool to compare Angel’s interpretation with the original!
So on to Vassily. It starts out darker than the other books of Angel’s I have read, it was hard for me to get in to at first. It is somewhere between Sci-fi and fantasy, with a big inclusion of Russian. Vassily is the pampered son of successful parents, injured in an accident that kills his father, leaving him fragile and damaged. His mother brings home a new father for him, and a couple of step brothers, and life as he knows it is over. His mother vanishes and he is left under the control of Boris (the BASTARD!) who turns out to be a drug manufacturer. Vassily becomes his guinea pig for an instantly addicting drug, and the scape goat for his step brothers. Up to this point I was struggling, Vassily is sweet and fragile, then is used and abused, his whole world crashing around him. It made me very uncomfortable, I didn’t dislike the story, but it was darker than I prefer.
This is where I stopped to read the fairy tale it is based on, and I’m glad I did. In the fairy tale, Vasilisa’s mother dies, father remarries and brings home a step mother and step sisters, her father takes off and leaves the sweet and beautiful Vasilisa with the step bitches. She goes on an adventure to find a light from Baba Yaga, and meets three horsemen (red, black, and white), eventually finding Baba Yaga. She uses a doll and her smarts to get herself out, home, and eventually married. This is obviously a simplified explanation, but I wanted to show the basic story compared to our Vassily. Vassily has the same family issues, then Boris sends him walking across the city to Baba Yaga. On the way he sees three men on flying motorcycles throughout his walk, one dressed in red, one in white, and one in black. He has to struggle to get to Baba Yaga, just like Vasilisa. The comparisions continue, this Baba Yaga assigns Vassily similarVassily tasks to complete, etc. The book started working for me at that point, once I got the concept and saw where we were going.
Sumerki is the other half of the romance with Vassily in this story and was harder for me to bond with. We don’t really get any background for him, he is very mysterious… I’ll briefly say he and his two brothers are the manufactured sons of Baba Yaga, each made with a different quality. One is big and bad-ass, one is nurturing and caring, one is the enforcer. Sumi is the fierce enforcer, not quite human, fairly cold and aloof. He’s a loner, has issues with being touched, and has a bit of a nasty attitude. He is not impressed with the drug addicted, sickly Vassily who shows up on their doorstep, and not interested in playing nurse for him. But that changes…
Enough plot! So this story was slow to draw me in. The way Vassily is treated at the beginning was hard for me to read, he is very sweet and innocent, it hurt me to see his world so destroyed. His physical issues and his drug addiction made me sad. I was honestly concerned the whole book would be that way… But it wasn’t at all. Once Vassily gets the help he needs, I thoroughly enjoyed the book. I am so glad I stopped to read the fairy tale so I could see how brilliantly Angel works in the bits from the traditional story, combining them with science fiction. Even Baba Yaga’s flying pestle and mortar, and her chicken leg hut. The extra characters were brilliant, I hated Boris, loved Pol and Ras, and Baba Yaga was a trip! Vassily’s neighbor Giorgio hinted at all sorts of fun, but we never really got to see him. I wasn’t sure about Sumi at first, he was a little harsh and cold, expecially to poor Vassily, but once I got to know him better, he grew on me, and I liked him with Vassily. They are actually a good match, each having issues the other can help deal with. I wish there had been just a little more sex between them, I liked what was there but I prefer a little more smut in my books. I would also have liked to see Vassily struggle with his addiction more. Once he detoxed it was a little easy…. There was an incident toward the end that showed how he’s feeling, but it all went awfully smoothly.
As always, Angel gives us a creative plot, witty dialogue, deep characters, and some lovely sex. The retelling of an old tale was fantastic, it worked very well. So buy this book, Google Vasilisa and read her story first, then read Vassily the Beautiful. It is worth it!
Rating: 
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