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A review by manic_bibliophile
The Looking Glass Wars by Frank Beddor
1.0
Were it not for the fact that I don't like to DNF books, I would have stopped at the 200 page mark and gladly thrown this book in the recycle bin. I almost did exactly this more than once while reading.
As a rule, I tend to be incredibly lenient when it comes to children's and middle grade books, and I keep in the back of my mind to read them as a parent or teacher would; does this book benefit a child's reading experience, will it enable them to think critically or creatively about what they're reading? Even if this is not the case, I rarely find a kid's book that wouldn't have at the bare minimum an entertaining premise. This isn't on the behalf of the kids, because kids aren't dumb when it comes to stories they like, but I do this for the author's benefit. They wrote these books with kids as their audience, so as long as the story is good, it's my opinion to never rip into their book unless I personally feel it absolutely deserves it.
This is my take. This is not against anyone who loves this book - please continue to love it as fiercely as possible.
That being said, this book gave me an extreme sense of whiplash with the inconsistencies and lack of information that is absolutely required for worldbuilding at every reading level. From the first descriptions, I couldn't tell if Wonderland was supposed to be a steampunk world, a high fantasy world, or an amalgamation of different time periods with a little steampunk scattered throughout, and spent a good amount of time scratching my head trying to figure it out. But whatever, it'll get more apparent, right? (It didn't.)
On a similar note, the worldbuilding itself was so so so awful. Like, there was a moment when I was twenty pages from the end where I knocked my book down and saw the map at the beginning of the book that I'd completely forgotten about, and I thought to myself, Huh. Wonderland is supposed to be a lot bigger than it's been described.
To give a broad sense of my reading experience for this and cut my review down, I felt frustrated and like I was being given the roughest of drafts for an idea that could have absolutely worked and been a great read. The story was bland and uninteresting and cushioned in almost 200 pages of filler that was a struggle to get through. The plot, when we got to the actual plot, was rushed and terribly executed. The characters were the weakest point for me, like either stick with the Wonderland inspiration or don't, but the attempt at having a middle ground between the two with characters like The Mad Hatter being the polar opposite of his namesake juxtaposed with the Queen of Hearts being a twisted yet apparent version of hers was a huge let down. All in all this book just came across as a lazy alternative fanfiction rather than a fully formed and fleshed out inspired retelling.
The one positive that I can say about this book from an adult perspective is the thing that I've seen mentioned a few times as a negative, and that is the scene with the Cheshire Cat character - aptly named The Cat. Amazing. - wherein he delivers lines straight out of Taxi Driver to a cluster of trees and shrubs that are mocking him. "Are you talking to me? I don't see anyone else around so you must be talking to me."
Shut the front door.
As a rule, I tend to be incredibly lenient when it comes to children's and middle grade books, and I keep in the back of my mind to read them as a parent or teacher would; does this book benefit a child's reading experience, will it enable them to think critically or creatively about what they're reading? Even if this is not the case, I rarely find a kid's book that wouldn't have at the bare minimum an entertaining premise. This isn't on the behalf of the kids, because kids aren't dumb when it comes to stories they like, but I do this for the author's benefit. They wrote these books with kids as their audience, so as long as the story is good, it's my opinion to never rip into their book unless I personally feel it absolutely deserves it.
This is my take. This is not against anyone who loves this book - please continue to love it as fiercely as possible.
That being said, this book gave me an extreme sense of whiplash with the inconsistencies and lack of information that is absolutely required for worldbuilding at every reading level. From the first descriptions, I couldn't tell if Wonderland was supposed to be a steampunk world, a high fantasy world, or an amalgamation of different time periods with a little steampunk scattered throughout, and spent a good amount of time scratching my head trying to figure it out. But whatever, it'll get more apparent, right? (It didn't.)
On a similar note, the worldbuilding itself was so so so awful. Like, there was a moment when I was twenty pages from the end where I knocked my book down and saw the map at the beginning of the book that I'd completely forgotten about, and I thought to myself, Huh. Wonderland is supposed to be a lot bigger than it's been described.
To give a broad sense of my reading experience for this and cut my review down, I felt frustrated and like I was being given the roughest of drafts for an idea that could have absolutely worked and been a great read. The story was bland and uninteresting and cushioned in almost 200 pages of filler that was a struggle to get through. The plot, when we got to the actual plot, was rushed and terribly executed. The characters were the weakest point for me, like either stick with the Wonderland inspiration or don't, but the attempt at having a middle ground between the two with characters like The Mad Hatter being the polar opposite of his namesake juxtaposed with the Queen of Hearts being a twisted yet apparent version of hers was a huge let down. All in all this book just came across as a lazy alternative fanfiction rather than a fully formed and fleshed out inspired retelling.
The one positive that I can say about this book from an adult perspective is the thing that I've seen mentioned a few times as a negative, and that is the scene with the Cheshire Cat character - aptly named The Cat. Amazing. - wherein he delivers lines straight out of Taxi Driver to a cluster of trees and shrubs that are mocking him. "Are you talking to me? I don't see anyone else around so you must be talking to me."
Shut the front door.