Anika Jespers, a homesteader’s daughter on a Gaian colony, thinks she’s destined for a dull existence on her family’s farm. But when her father makes an impossible bargain with their neighbor, one of the alien Zhore, she faces a future different from anything she could have possibly imagined. The familiar story of Beauty and the Beast takes on new life in this SF romance novella, with the Beauty a homesteader’s daughter and the Beast an alien on a faraway colony world. (The Gaian Consortium Series, Volume 2) Beauty & the beast, galactic empire, colonization, space opera, alien human romance, science fiction romance, SF romance