Rating: 
Summary: Intriguing
Review: I have yet to read the last book of the trilogy, but found the first two books quite unique to any of the other Anne Rice I have read. The Claiming of Sleeping Beauty was the first erotica book that I have read, but I found it adventurous and humbling. I have had many guy friends say how much they enjoyed the book, and agree with their observation that if the author was not Anne Rice, it would be porn. She has a great way of putting the situation in a civilized, yet fantasizing manner. I found it hard to put the books down and recommend them to any Anne Rice reader.
Rating: 
Summary: Never-ending Spank-Fest. Where's the Sex?
Review: Although I would say the book is worth reading simply to be able to say you did, I have to worn you: It would be half as long if the spanking sessions were taken out. No,.. I'm not talking about spanking along with sex. I'm talking about pages and pages of descriptive spanking. And where is the sex? Oh! There it is! Those 3 sentences in the last chapter! Although I can say the book WILL turn you on and will push you through to the end, I found myself skimming over entire pages as I thought, "Dear God,.. not another spanking." It just got old after a while.
The main thrust of the story is a beautiful and brilliant concept, but i could've written better. Makes you wonder what goes on behind Anne's closed doors.
Rating: 
Summary: Worst Book Ever!
Review: This book turned me off right from the start. It contains scene after scene of sadistic violations and assorted methods of torture, nonconsensual of course. I thought of it as similar to one long rape scene from a prison movie, made even more loathsome by telling us as readers, to want the slave to identify with the oppressor.In actuality this book deserves zero stars. Of all the books I have read, this one ranks right at the bottom of the list.
Rating:
Summary: So very good...
Review: This of course was my first read of AR's sleeping beauty trilogy and it was a great place to start out with. The storyline is slight but in all,you stay turned on throughout the whole book and I couldnt keep myself from eating it up, I have since read it many times.....definitly move on to Beauty's Punishment, it only gets better
Rating:
Summary: Excellent erotica
Review: This book (along with it's sequels) is simply an outstanding piece of erotic fiction for those who have a taste for the darker sides of life and love. It is well written and hypnotic... a true must-read!
Rating: 
Summary: Very different!
Review: From the start of the book it catches your interest. It's an alternate twist to the term "happily ever after". This book was my first erotica. I must warn though, it's not romantic. It's hardcore and for sex fanatics. So go ahead and purchase it! Get the whole series, it's fascinating and never boring!!
Rating:
Summary: not what I unexpected but somewhat boring
Review: I was expecting the typical BDSM type story with loving doms and beautiful slaves and what fun they have but there is here an undercurrent of something else. Something cruel and inhuman and immoral worked into the narrative. That aside, it is really quite a boring book. There is very little sex, hetero anyway. Beauty hardly gets any. Most of the hardcore action deals with the male slaves only, especially the horrific ordeal of Prince Alexi. It is as if Anne Rice was afraid of pushing the envelope for fear it may offend her own sensibilities and other women readers. I see this same consideration in her vampire novels and Exit to Eden. My other complain is that Rice seems to me to have very little talent for description. She may have a great imagination but the literary skill for describing scenes visually and realistically does not seem present. For example she would describe intercourse as someone just sticking it in, but a better writer would have delved into how it felt, what it looked like, the sounds the participants made, and so on. There is no irony or anything particularly striking about her prose. I am not a great reader but in recalling books by Updike and Styron, I could almost smell the sex as if I was the same room.
Rating:
Summary: Introduction to Kink
Review: This book rivals the writings of "Marquis De Sade"....almost. It's a AMAZING introduction to different forms of sexual deviance! Everything from pony play, gay, spanking, food, bondage, and "rape". the book is a massive turn on for those who dare to step outside the normal. It's truely impressive erotica, those new to extreme forms of sexual deviance...beware it's extreme.
Rating: 
Summary: I didn't see the sex everyone else says is in there
Review: Ummm, maybe I got some altered copy of the book...really, everyone claims there is just sooooo much sex in this novel, but when you get down to it, not a whole lot of sex happens. Yes, the prince does awaken Beauty with more than a kiss, and yes, that is as early as page two of the novel, however, if you really notice it, the majority of the acts described are not sexual, but more along the lines of physical torture, domination, and submission. They just seem sexual as the slaves are all naked. I found the lack of sex in the book more disturbing than anything else. The book seemed more like a description of boot camp (breaking you down to build you back up) than anything even remotely sexual.
To those offended by the notion of women being servants, one must also consider what time period is represented in the story. Ann Rice may have written this is post-NOW, post-Gloria Steinem America, but it is neither this century or this country in which the story is set. Ironically, I like how this fairy tale is not all about "and they lived happily ever after". It is when little girls' heads get filled with that bogus line the REAL disappointment happens!
Rating:
Summary: Lambent emotionalism collides with onanistic symbolism
Review: While I have not yet read this book (I am currently reading Nieztche's The Geneology of Morals and Lisa Jackson's tour de force Hot Blooded (I can't wait for the sequel Cold Blooded, coming to stores July 02), )I could not help but notice the obviously jejune misinterpritations of the previous reviewers. Feeling myself indebted to Rice for her consistently erudite and perspicouos prose, I immediately set out to confute the aforementioned nugatory scribblings. Even for those of us who have not read the book, it is abundantly clear that the ostensible sado-masachistic themes of this work function on a higher level as a suppurating mechanisim, lancing the boil of society's obdurate plutocrasy. The callipygian protagonist, Beauty, represents the plebian sycophant's heartrending struggle for approbation in conflict with the desire to extripate his repressively scrofulous satrap. In a beautiful dual metaphor, this move also captures the tension between the despotic domination of the overweening Freudian superego and the subaltern ego. But that's only what I think; check it out for your own self.
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