Published by: Harper Teen, May 3rd 2016
Genre: YA, High Fantasy, Retellings
Pages: 320
Format: Ebook
As Princess of Wonderland Palace and the future Queen of Hearts, Dinah’s days are an endless monotony of tea, tarts, and a stream of vicious humiliations at the hands of her father, the King of Hearts. The only highlight of her days is visiting Wardley, her childhood best friend, the future Knave of Hearts — and the love of her life.
When an enchanting stranger arrives at the Palace, Dinah watches as everything she’s ever wanted threatens to crumble. As her coronation date approaches, a series of suspicious and bloody events suggests that something sinister stirs in the whimsical halls of Wonderland. It’s up to Dinah to unravel the mysteries that lurk both inside and under the Palace before she loses her own head to a clever and faceless foe.
Part epic fantasy, part twisted fairy tale, this dazzling saga will have readers shivering as Dinahs furious nature sweeps Wonderland up in the maelstrom of her wrath.
Familiar characters such as Cheshire, the White Rabbit, and the Mad Hatter make their appearance, enchanting readers with this new, dark take on Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.
This is probably the best Wonderland novel I've ever read. That being said ... I still didn't love it all that much.
The first half of the book was interesting because of the worldbuiling and the concept, because it was all shiny and new. But once that had worn off I was ... bored for lack of a nicer word. I started skim reading. That's not to say this book doesn't have good stuff, because it does - the writing is very good, the story is seriously imaginative, and the plot doesn't rely on the source material AT ALL. It was interesting to see a Queen of Hearts origin story, but ... she wasn't the villain I'd expected. Truth be told, she was a whiny teenager. Sure there were parts of malice but not enough to make me really interested in Dinah's character. The romance, too, felt a little dull to me but maybe that's because I was apathetic about the rest of the book. And the ending felt dragged out, to the point I just wanted it to be over.
Despite it having very little in common, this weirdly reminded me of Red Queen in parts. Not the story or characters, more the feel of the book. So if you loved that, you'll probably like this.
Good writing, and nothing really wrong with it, but I doubt I'll remember it.
Characters ★★☆☆☆
Setting/world ★★★★☆
Writing ★★★☆☆
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