The Looking Glass Wars

What an utter disappointment. The concept of a dark Wonderland is, of course, exhilarating, and the idea of fictional characters learning to grow up by association with the real world - particularly if they're children or teenagers - has a long and storied history in fiction.

Unfortunately, Frank Beddor is not really interested in these concepts, at least not from a literary perspective, and his writing style indicates a limited understanding of basic structural tenets of creative writing. As with most youth-oriented books that I read, I try to view it from the perspective of my cousins in that age group. This book, however, would barely satisfy them, written as it is in such a startlingly underplayed prose.

Beddor's main issues are show more threefold. First, his dialogue is woefully stilted, with all characters sounding like they walked out of the same Edwardian era children's book. Similar to my issues with the (overall more successful) Taran Wanderer series, characters speak in the same manner regardless of whether they are holding court or running from a maniacal killer. It severely limits audience engagement with the text, completely cutting side-swiping any attempts at paciness or narrative energy.

Second, the text has a bizarre approach to which parts of the narrative are crucial. While there are some beautiful ideas here (for instance, the Mad Hatter's decade spent searching for his mistress, where he becomes a kind of mythical figure in the lives of 19th century Europeans), many of the key character moments are rushed through (notably, young Alyss' relationship with Lewis Carroll) while we spend a tiring amount of time with the oppressed people back in Wonderland. I don't like to review works by saying what they should have done (honest, I don't!), but "The Looking Glass Wars" smacks of a missed opportunity to tell a cohesive story instead of a set of images.

Because, ultimately, that is the issue here. My third issue with the book encompasses all the problems (and occasional solid moments) mentioned above. Beddor wants to write a comic book or a graphic novel. There's a great concept here for a truly gorgeous visual world, one unifying Victorian decor with gothic fantasy. The story beats are adequate, if not extraordinary, but they would have made far more sense in a visual format. Instead, this feels as if a comic writer is trying to become a novelist by literally transferring the skills of one medium into another - and that almost never works.

I'm going to have to read a few of the rave reviews of this series in an attempt to understand what people see in this - perhaps they, too, have an overactive imagination and are able to overlay this empty husk of a story with some perceived depth from their own mind. I don't have any problem with readers doing that; we all have! (It's how many academics make a living, after all.) But it's always a shame when a book with an intriguing concept leaves me with such a sour taste. show less

Alyss Heart is a Princess in Wonderland who will one day become Queen. On the day of her seventh birthday however, Queen Genevieve's exiled older sister Redd attacks with her card soldiers and The Cat (her personal Assassin) in tow killing Queen Genevieve and her husband King Nolan. Alyss manages to escape aided by the Queen's bodyguard Hatter Madigan by jumping into the Pool of Tears. Alyss emerges alone in England in the 1800s, stranded with noone believing her tales of Wonderland. After getting caught stealing with a band of other orphans she is taken to an orphanage and eventually adopted by the Liddles.

One day she meets Charles Dodgson (the real name of Lewis Carroll) and takes a chance trusting him with her tale. When she starts show more to tell him about her best friend in Wonderland Dodge, he assumes that the character is based on him and decides to write a book which eventually becomes Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. She is furious he has trivialised her life with this ridiculous tale of Cheshire Cats, Mad Hatters and Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dee and refuses to have anything more to do with him. She starts to doubt herself and her imagination which is key to becoming Queen and becomes part of English society to be courted by a Prince.

Wonderland hasn't forgotten her however. In the 13 years she has been away Hatter has been wandering the world searching for her and eventually finds her. She is brought back to Wonderland which has become a cross between Nazi Germany and 1984 for a show down with her Aunt Redd. Alyss has her faithful companions beside her; Dodge, Hatter, General Doppleganger (who can split into two, General Dopple and General Ganger), her tutor Bibwit Harte (an anagram of White Rabbit), Molly and some of the white chess pieces. In Wonderland much is done using imagination and there is a fantastic battle between Redd and Alyss conducted Matrix style.

I can't say enough great things about this book. I loved it so much and am going straight off to start the sequel "Seeing Redd". A review at the start sums it up for me, "To say Beddor's revolutionary novel is an adaptation of Lewis Carroll's original would do justice for neither author". In a nutshell, The Looking Glass Wars is to Alice's Adventures in Wonderland what Wicked is to The Wizard of Oz. show less

I'll confess first thing that I did not finish this book. I had heard of it and thought it sounded fun, an expansion of Wonderland that would seek to preserve Carroll's wonderful cleverness and sense of random dreaminess. Well, it didn't.

The first problem is how the book thumbs its nose at the original story of Alice in Wonderland. The opening scene of this book portrays Charles Dodgson in a very ugly light, showing him as a liar and a thief. Beddor's whole premise is that Alice Liddell, Dodgson's muse, was actually a fugitive from Wonderland and was sorely disappointed with his "re-imagining" of her adventures. She calls him "cruel" for lying about her story, with some angry denunciations of the poetry. She thinks "he'd transformed show more her memories of a world alive with hope and possibility and danger into make-believe, the foolish stuff of children" (p. 3, my emphasis). Alice in Wonderland is, according to Alice, a "stupid, nonsensical book" (p. 4).

Wow, can't you just feel the respect for Dodgson here? Nice. You would think Beddor would show a little respect for the genius he's piggybacking. But no, to make his book work he has to make Dodgson look bad, so Beddor can tell the "real" story.

I can't get along well with a book that starts off by calling its source stupid, when that source has been an undisputed classic of children's literature for well over a century. Alice in Wonderland is not stupid, or nonsensical in a negative way; in fact, it's far more imaginative and clever than Beddor's lackluster, clichéd re-imagining could ever hope to be.

And Alice in Wonderland has far more interesting characters than The Looking Glass Wars. I started rolling my eyes when we read how the king loves his wife, the Queen, because of her (politically correct) strength and firm decisions — oh spare me. Lame! The characters have about as much dimension as paper dolls. Alyss is a brat and everyone around her is so stereotypical and boring, stock characters lifted ineptly from better works.

Don't even get me started on the abysmal prose. When we come to the first battle and Beddor starts writing about "adrenaline-induced war cries" and "agony-infused moans," I almost gave an agony-infused moan myself (p. 27). And these two doozies came in the same sentence, no less! You have to wonder if Beddor is TRYING to hurt his readers. Wouldn't "agonized moans" be so much better? "Agony-infused" makes me think of someone injecting agony into the moans with a needle. (Hand me that moan, would you? I've got to infuse it.) And the book is full of similar problems: jerky sentence structure, unintentionally funny word choices, and clichéd descriptions.

With the ugly disrespect for Charles Dodgson, the flat characters, and the horrible prose, I found I just couldn't force myself to keep going. It was quite a pity because I'd been looking forward to this series for awhile, and even waited until I had procured the second book before starting this one. That was a mistake! Both are going up on PaperBackSwap pronto, in hopes that someone else will be able to enjoy them. But I doubt it. show less

Thought you knew the story of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland? Well, think again, because that story was wrong.

The Looking Glass Wars is the first installment of Frank Beddor's clever retelling of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass. Here we meet Alyss Heart, heir to the throne of Wonderland, where all imagination in the universe is born from. On her seventh birthday, her deranged aunt, Redd Heart, storms Heart Palace, killing Alyss' father and mother, taking control of the kingdom that she feels is rightfully hers. Alyss' mother, Queen Genevieve, sends Alyss away with Hatter Madigan to the Pool of Tears, through which they escape to Earth, but are separated. Meanwhile, General Doppelganger and what few show more survivors that still back Alyss and White Imagination, begin their counterattacks against Redd and her forces of Black Imagination. Thinking Alyss dead, they called themselves Allyssians in tribute and for 13 years try to overthrow Redd.

During this time, Alyss is marooned on Earth, not knowing how to return to Wonderland and slowly loosing her powers of Imagination, where she is eventually adopted by the Lidells, and eventually she meets Charles Dodgson, who she feels will believe her tale when all others haven't. When he produces the book, Alice's Adventures Underground to her, she then realizes that he was her last hope, and begins to acclimate herself to life forever on Earth. Hatter Madigan eventually discovers here whereabouts and the two return to Wonderland, just in time to help reinvigorate the rebels and their fight against Redd.

The story is incredibly clever, and you will recognize all the characters from Lewis Carroll's stories here, but completely re-imagined. I love how Beddor takes Carroll's stories and completely reworks them into this civil war between the forces of White Imagination and Black Imagination in the first part of the book, then uses Alyss telling Charles Dodgson the story and his reworking this story into Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, and then Beddor taking the story even farther from there with Alyss' return to Wonderland and the eventual battle between her and Redd. It's a fast-paced story that moves right along almost immediately in the book and doesn't really let up throughout. Die hard Alice fans may or may not like the changes to the story, but as a huge fan of Carroll's original stories, I can honestly say that I loved these reworkings! show less

The sheer awfulness of this book defies all description. Frank Beddor definitely wins first prize for smuggest author of the century, hands-down. Do you want to know how bad it was? It was worse than the Tim Burton film, that's how bad it was.
Has this so-called author even read the original books? Judging from the extreme bastardisation of them, probably not. I'm guessing he's probably skimmed through the first one a bit, watched the Disney film, got drunk and attempted to write an actual novel. And failed miserably.
Beddor's pathetic attempts at metafiction are soon forgotten. I was not for one minute convinced that there was any grain of truth in what he was saying, especially when he gets his facts wrong IN THE PROLOGUE. The Tweedles show more only appear in Through the Looking-Glass, not Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Do the bloody research! And while he has done some research, he hasn't done nearly enough. Anyone up-to-date on Carrollian history can see through it easily enough.
Now, Beddor claims that his book contains graphic violence that may be unsettling for some readers. Apart from one solitary scene, it doesn't.
Beddor has made it clear he doesn't even like Carroll's books. So why bother deliberately insulting them and their fans? Beddor's smugness is disgusting, the way he barges in claiming his is the "true story of Wonderland" and Lewis Carroll's is inferior and false. And the way Dodgson is portrayed in the story... The less said of that the better.
Beddor has no knowledge of the books, their characters or themes. Many do not even appear, and when they do they barely even resemble the ones they were based on. Hatter Maddigan is for some reason a good guy. The Cheshire Cat is for some reason a bad guy. The White Knight (one of the most important characters) is depressingly wasted and characters like the Duchess do not even appear.
This book shall only be enjoyabe to those who have no knowledge of Wonderland whatsoever, as it shall otherwise cause extreme wallbangers the whole way through. Read a good Alice-inspired work instead, such as Pandora Hearts, Alice in Sunderland, Night of the Jabberwock or Automated Alice. Or the original books themselves.
Funny, isn't it, how a book that puts so much emphasis on the powers of imagination has so little imagination itself. show less

Summary: A retelling of Alice in Wonderland, with the pretense that Wonderland is real, and that one Mr. Charles Dodgson (Lewis Carrol) tamed the story down and turned it into a silly children's book. Alyss Heart, heir to the throne of Wonderland, is having her seventh birthday party when her banished Aunt Redd returns, killing Alyss's parents and seizing control. Alyss must flee for her life, winding up in our world, where she becomes Alice Liddell and forces herself to forget her previous life. However, Wonderland is slowly deteriorating under Redd's power, which is resisted only by a band of rebels, who must wait for Alyss to return, realize her full power, and reclaim the throne from her evil aunt.

Review: This book tries to do for show more Alice in Wonderland what Wicked did for The Wizard of Oz: remove the children's-story-fairy-tale aspects and make it into a real world. However, Wicked (more or less) succeeded at that whereas this book just... did not. The Looking Glass Wars suffered from exceedingly shallow characterizations, an overly facile resolution, a lack of a driving message, and an overabundance of "pointless imagination". There's a fine line to walk in the retelling of classic stories between changing not enough (boring, no point in doing a cover version that's the same as the original) and too much (risks tampering with parts that are good or essential). This book gleefully ignores that line as it goes skipping past; elements of Wonderland are changed, updated, and added seemingly just because they sounded cool, certainly not because they add anything to the plot.

This book kind of reads like it was written as a movie script - lots of fights and chases and explosions and pretty CGI effects in the background, while the more complex issues and emotions were quickly glossed over. I thought Alice's time spent in our world and her relationship with Dodge were the two most interesting (and mature) bits of the book, but whenever they started to get interesting, it'd cut back to another explosion. I wouldn't be at all surprised to see this optioned for a movie, and I'd probably go to see it, but in book form, it was lacking the complexity and depth (even considering that it was a YA novel) to really make it worthwhile.

Recommendation: Interesting idea and plenty of potential, but faulty execution. A quick read, but not one I'd really recommend if you're looking for anything beyond some Wonderland-themed fight scenes. show less

A fascinating retelling of the classic Alice and Wonderland, this book almost makes the original seem downright dull.

In a parellel universe, Princess Alyss is honing her powers of imagination in order to claim the throne. But the wicked Redd and her hideous assassin the Cat lie in wait for the young princess, hoping to unleash a terrible reign on Wonderland.

Into this amazing world, among such characters as the bodyguard Hatter Madigan, the handsome teenage soldier Dodge, and a host of card soldiers, the powers of imagination will be loosed amid this reworked fairy tale.

And when Princess Alyss falls down a portal and into our world...who knows who she'll encounter.

Creative, fast-paced, and with tons of interesting creatures and show more characters, you'll be at a loss as to which "Alice's" adventure is the real one. show less