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Cara Hoffman

Author of So Much Pretty

8+ Works 624 Members 38 Reviews

About the Author

Image credit: Pen Parentis

Works by Cara Hoffman

So Much Pretty (2011) 404 copies
Be Safe I Love You (2014) 109 copies
Running: A Novel (2017) 43 copies
Bernard Pepperlin (2019) 32 copies
RUIN (2022) 23 copies
Nike (2004) 1 copy

Associated Works

Kink: Stories (2021) — Contributor — 201 copies

Tagged

Common Knowledge

Birthdate
1969-02-08
Gender
female
Nationality
USA
Education
Goddard College (MFA)

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Reviews

First off, the Alice in Wonderland motif is very temporary and very fleeting in the story.

If you like Alice in Wonderland then this book will not please you quite as much as you think, if you dislike Wonderland then you will probably enjoy this book because it only has an intro about it. I feel like some people pick this book up expecting it to be an entirely Wonderland tail when it's really basically the first chapter.

Bernard Pepperlin escapes Wonderland within the first chapter by the means of being shoved into a boiling pot of tea and for some reason not dying, or maybe he has died and I just haven't found out. As somebody who has handled hot tea as well as boiling water I want to say this boy is lucky to be alive, but I have no idea how he survived being submerged in it for that long.

The dormouse has an even worse life than can be imagined, it's implied that he's spent over two hundred years trapped in a tea party with no time moving. And all of this time no one has ever cared about him nor asked his name. So he existed with his name Bernard Pepperlin and nobody ever asking about him because they're too busy poking him with needles and dunking him and boiling water as well as slattering him with random condiments.

The abuse of this boy is bad.

The power of bad singing can make time so offended because time is a sentient being, the Mad Hatter and the March Hare have both cause time to stop by being so brutal and rude as they are, along with the full implication that the Mad Hatter has been contaminated by poisonous lead and other chemicals that have slowly seeped into his brain and caused it to rot. This is briefly glossed over but is actually a horrific thing that is true and historically correct and it shocked me that it was in this book.

Time has hit itself at the bottom of a teapot and as such, Bernard Pepperlin is the only one to encounter it because he is both small enough to be shoved into boiling water and also small enough to fit into the teapot.

Things go from bad to worse with him ending up and basically New York City which is a terrible place with a lot of animals that are not understand by humans, but somehow exist among them. The story from there is complicated and also confusing. It feels like it took a page out of Shrek. Not a bad page, but one of those weird pages that needs a little bit more explanation.

One thing I did enjoy was that there are references to little things kids can learn, for example IV the lizard is cold-blooded and starts to slow down because it's cold outside. And then they need to keep her warm otherwise she'll fall asleep.

I definitely was not ready for the bad guys to carry knives, and actually use the knives that's definitely a bit of a surprise in a kids book.

I also was not expecting there to be dozens of murders in this book but I guess I should expect that from all kids books at least because a lot of the ones I've read have had so much grisly murder and so many terrifying saints. Oddly enough the worst scene for me was probably either when they we found out the flowers were sentient and therefore when they were eaten they were screaming in pain. Or that they bleed.

All in all, there are several red herrings and moments that go nowhere but it's good in a lot of ways, it's not a perfect book but it's a very nice book. There's so many loose ends that I guess we're just supposed to gloss over them, like will Wonderland ever be fixed, will Bernard ever help those two ill people who he really does want to help but then ignores. And what happens when he time skips?

This book was a good read and even ignoring the plot holes and problems it has a very nice ending. I wasn't expecting so many broken bones and amputations and such a simple looking book but it definitely delivered a little bit of horror.

All in all, I would recommend Bernard Pepperlin to be read at least once.

4.3 stars.
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Yolken | 4 other reviews | Jan 29, 2023 |
Note: I accessed a digital review copy of this book through Edelweiss.
 
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fernandie | 4 other reviews | Sep 15, 2022 |
You've probably heard of Bernard Pepperlin but never knew his name before. Bernard Pepperlin is the name of the Dormouse in Alice and Wonderland and gets to have his own adventure in this new book by Cara Hoffman. It's a cute book full of adventure and whimsical characters. It was a quick book to read outloud.
 
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FrontierGirl | 4 other reviews | Jul 3, 2022 |
i decided to read this book because i saw someone say that the author got told that it was "too angry". the world doesn't like angry girls. and it especially doesn't like angry girls who won't shut up. i am often an angry girl; so, i grabbed the book. i had a vague idea of the plot going in, but i didn't expect everything i read. i guessed a few of the twists, some not until right as they were being revealed, but that's not what's important about this book. many of the lines hit me hard (as a pretty socially conscious woman, not a lot of it was new information) but they still hit me regardless. but, what jumped out at me the most, was,

It would hardly be rational to accept that I live inside a thing made of flesh that people capture, hide, and then wait in line to rape.

and,

Wendy White was raped, killed, and dumped. Men raped her, men killed her, men dumped her, men found her, men are examining her remains, men are looking for the men who did it. Then the men who did it will be represented in court by men, and a man will make the decision based on laws men made throughout the legal history of this country.

this is an angry book. it's angry for a damn good reason.
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banrions | 21 other reviews | Dec 7, 2021 |

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