Author: A.G. Howard
Genre: Fantasy
Series-Yes (Trilogy)
Brief Summary:
Alyssa Gardner’s family is cursed. Her mother is currently a resident of a psychiatric hospital, her great-great grandmother is Alice Liddell (the real-life inspiration for Alice in Wonderland, and Alyssa herself has been hearing the voices of plants and insects since she was a child. She lives with the fear that she will end up like her mother, who insists that Wonderland is a real place and not just the setting for a beloved children’s classic.
Alyssa will soon find out that sometimes truth defies logic, and the heart is a fickle creature of its own. Torn between two very different potential boyfriends, the poor girl must navigate not only the danger she faces in a fantasy-turned-reality but also where her loyalties (and heart) lies.
Here is what Goodreads has to say:
My take on things:Alyssa Gardner hears the whispers of bugs and flowers—precisely the affliction that landed her mother in a mental hospital years before. This family curse stretches back to her ancestor Alice Liddell, the real-life inspiration for Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, Alyssa might be crazy, but she manages to keep it together. For now.
When her mother’s mental health takes a turn for the worse, Alyssa learns that what she thought was fiction is based in terrifying reality. The real Wonderland is a place far darker and more twisted than Lewis Carroll ever let on. There, Alyssa must pass a series of tests, including draining an ocean of Alice’s tears, waking the slumbering tea party, and subduing a vicious bandersnatch, to fix Alice’s mistakes and save her family. She must also decide whom to trust: Jeb, her gorgeous best friend and secret crush, or the sexy but suspicious Morpheus, her guide through Wonderland, who may have dark motives of his own.
I love fairytale retellings, and this one was pretty good. It is a light=hearted read with enough action to keep you interested, though it dwelt too heavy on the romance aspect for my particular taste. As a story it was pretty good, but I don’t honestly know if I will finish the trilogy. It almost felt like near the end, Wonderland was just a backdrop for teen angst and ‘who gets the girl’. I’ll have to think on this one; if you decide to read it, please let me know what you think.
