Classics Review: Alice in Wonderland

Premise: After following a strange rabbit down a super-deep hole, Alice finds herself in a magical land. During her time there, Alice interacts with a variety of strange creatures.

Title: Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
Author: Lewis Carroll
Length: 92 pages (depending on the edition)
Genre: Fantasy
Series or Stand Alone: Book 1 of 2
Content appropriate for: Grades 6-8

Three adjectives that describe this book: strange, challenging, confusing

I am in the middle of the Classics Club challenge to read 50 classics books in 5 years. My list is comprised entirely of children's books. I really enjoyed The Wizard of Oz, and for some reason I expected Alice in Wonderland to be a similar experience. Wrong Wrong Wrong. So hold onto your hat, because I'm about to get very blasphemous.

Okay, enough stalling - here's my review:

Alice in Wonderland is strange. That's the main thing. Over the course of 100ish pages weird things happen. It almost reads like Lewis Carroll was just trying to figure out what the weirdest things were that could happen, and then he put those exact things all together in a book with absolutely no sense-making. Case in point:

List of Weird Things in the Book
* Swimming in a lake made of your own tears
* Rocks become cakes
* Dancing with lobsters
* Dancing with lobsters actually means throwing them in the ocean
* A baby that's really a pig
* Everything you eat or drink makes Alice (no one else...) grow or shrink over and over again

Apparently Alice in Wonderland is actually an example of a genre called Literary Nonsense. Maybe if I had known that, I would have been prepared for the insanity and lack of plot. But I, erroneously, expected a great story. Instead, it's just a collection of weird characters and strange events.

Most frustrating for me, was that large chunks of the story consisted of poems which Alice tries to recite. She makes mistakes each time, which she sees as proof that she must have changed. These pieces would make more sense if I actually knew the original poems. That way I would be able to spot the mistakes that Alice makes.

Ultimately, I'm not sure how to rate Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. It's a classic. Lots of people love it. It is a shining example of Literary Nonsense. But it is also bizarre, with no plot and almost no coherent world-building.

Magic and Mystery Collide in Bad Magic

Premise: After a graffiti incident at school, Clay is sent to a camp for struggling kids on an isolated volcanic island. When Clay meets the other campers and discovers ruins occupied by a ghost, he vows to get off the island.

Title: Bad Magic
Author: Pseudonymous Bosch
Length: 400 pages
Genre: Mystery / Fantasyish
Series or Stand Alone: Book 1 in a new series
Content appropriate for: Grades 5-8
Format: Digital ARC provided by Little Brown Books via Edelweiss
Publication Date: September 16, 2014

Three adjectives that describe this book: mysterious, strange, twisty

Bad Magic, is a wildly unique mystery with an intriguing solution. I especially enjoyed all the book-love - one setting is a library, one character is a book nerd, and there are frequent discussions of Shakespeare's The Tempest.

Pseudonymous Bosch is well-known for his Secret Series, in which he makes heavy use of authorial intrusions, similar to those used by Lemony Snicket in the Series of Unfortunate Events. I enjoyed the first few books in the Secret Series, but became annoyed by the over-the-top jokey tone by the end of book 2.

Bad Magic, however, represents a shift for the better for Bosch. He still uses intrusions to keep things fresh, but they are toned-down and refreshing when compared to The Secret Series. Those books were silly, this one was mysterious and effective.

Review: We Were Liars

Premise: Four teens, part of a wealthy American family, spend every summer on the family's own island. They are the best of friends. Then, the summer when they are 15, something happens. Cadence isn't sure what it was... but she was discovered half-naked in the ocean with no memory of the event. Two years later she hasn't heard from her cousins and she's freaking out. Now she is dedicated to figuring out what happened.

Title: We Were Liars
Author: E. Lockhart
Length: 240 pages
Genre: Realistic Fiction
Series or Stand Alone: Stand Alone
Content Appropriate For: Grades 9-12
Format: Digital ARC provided by Random House Children's via NetGalley

Three adjectives that describe this book: mysterious, intriguing, strange

This book is definitely getting a lot of buzz right now. And this might be a case where the buzz actually hurts the book. The author makes it clear right up front that there is a big twist at the end... and the buzz is confirming that.

The problem with that tactic is that the reader is on the look-out for the twist from the very beginning. You spend the first three-fourths waiting for it and feeling frustrated that it isn't there yet. And when it comes, it might not be quite as effective because all you can think is, "Oh! That's the twist."

But the twist really did surprise me. I knew it was coming, but I was still surprised. So I guess that's something. When I finished We Were Liars I was thinking, "5 stars!" The ending packs a powerful punch.

But then I remembered the choppy writing style. 4 stars?
And that only the protagonist was developed beyond simple caricatures. 3.5 stars?
And that the first three-fourths was so slow.... 3 stars?

So let's try some pros and cons -

Classics Review - The View From Saturday

Premise: A group of 4 quirky sixth graders shocks everyone, even their teacher, by making it to the championship round of the Academic Bowl.

Title: The View from Saturday
Author: E.L. Konigsburg
Length: 176 pages
Genre: Realistic Fiction
Series or Stand-Alone: Stand-Alone
Content Appropriate For: Grades 5-7
Format: Paperback in school library

Three adjectives that describe this book: strange, sweet, disappointing

The View From Saturday won the Newberry Medal in 1997. It is required reading in classrooms all over the United States. It also has lots of die-hard fans. Last week when I read it, I was wholly disappointed, and even a bit disgusted.

Okay, maybe disgusted is too severe. Either way, this review is not going to be pretty. Here's the deal, as I see it -

The Night Gardener

Premise: Molly and Kip are barely surviving when they are offered a job as servants at the supremely creepy, derelict Windsor estate. The people living there are pale, with sunken dark eyes. And the house is visited each evening by a mysterious "night man" who tends a strange tree. Soon Molly and Kip find themselves enmeshed in an ancient curse that threatens the lives of everyone at the Windsor estate.

Title: The Night Gardener
Author: Jonathan Auxier
Length: 368 pages
Genre: Fantasy, Horror, Mystery
Series or Stand Alone: Stand Alone
Content Appropriate For: Grades 5-8
Format: eARC courtesy of Amulet books via NetGalley
Release Date: May 20, 2014

Three adjectives that describe this book: gripping, dangerous, spooky

Oh man this book is terrific! The creepiness builds steadily until the unbelievably dark seems totally plausible. That's one reason why I typically avoid scary stories - they seem so fake that it's hard for me to buy in to them. In this case, however, Auxier has crafted a tale that is wholly believable. He does it by starting with mundane and carefully adding the creepy, ghost elements.

Be warned, though, this book is not for the faint of heart. The idea of a creepy man walking around your house at night, standing over your bed, is sure to give some readers nightmares. Not to mention the collection of violent deaths and super-creepy-soul-stealing tree.

Wonderfully written, beautifully paced, and populated by a cast of richly interesting characters, The Night Gardener kept me totally glued to the page.

This post is part of the A to Z Challenge.

The Well's End by Seth Fishman

Premise: Mia Kish's elite boarding school is put under quarantine when a deadly virus sweeps across campus. In an attempt to escape the virus, Mia and her friends head out into the snow, pursued by soldiers in hazmat suits, seeking answers at an underground facility where Mia's father is the director. Where did this virus come from? Can it be stopped? And how is Mia's father involved?

Title and Author: The Well's End by Seth Fishman
Length: 352 pages
Series or Stand Alone: Cliffhanger ending indicates a possible sequel
Content appropriate for: Grades 9-12
Format: Digital ARC provided by Putnam Juvenile via NetGalley
Publication Date: February 25, 2014

Three adjectives that describe this book: adventurous, strange, unexpected

The Well's End is not easy to classify. At times it felt like 4 different books:
1. The first section of the book reads like your typical boarding school drama: There are cliques. There's a party with lots of drinking and making out. There are antics.
2. The second section feels like a medical thriller: There are symptoms and dead bodies. There are creepy people in hazmat suits. There's the desperate desire for a cure.
3. The largest portion of The Well's End is a run-for-your-life escape story. The characters are being pursued through treacherous terrain and deadly cold. They must escape, and survive, and escape some more.
4. The last quarter of The Well's End was a science fiction info-dump. We get all kinds of reveals and background information thrown at us in long expository tellings. People are explaining things!

While reading this book I had a lot of conflicting experiences. At first I found it really annoying. I started highlighting all the times the author mentioned alcohol, drugs, intimate encounters, and brand names. I highlighted over 20 places. The whole boarding school section was overdone. It definitely had the feel of an adult writer trying to appeal to teens. Later, as the characters were escaping the school, I was drawn into the action. The plot filled with adventure and life-threatening moments. Then came the info-dumping at the end and I found myself checking out again.

This book was all over the place.

The good: A unique premise, fast-paced adventure, unexpected reveals
The bad: Uneven pacing, flat characters, awkward (fake?) romance
The neutral: A cliffhanger ending that was SO cliffhanger-y it seemed lazy, as though the author couldn't figure out how to end it so he just stopped writing. I'm sure he is hoping for a sequel, and some people enjoy a cliffhanger, but I found it frustrating.

Overall, when I first finished The Well's End I had really mixed emotions. There were times that I loved its action packed mysteriousness. But other things really annoyed me, and the plot was uneven. Still, I think a lot of people will like this book. TeenReads recommended it, and some people have called it a favorite. It just didn't work well for me.

3 stars

Odd, Weird, & Little is Odd and Weird

Premise: Toulouse is a new student, just arrived from Canada. And he is weird. He wears an old-timey suit, carries a briefcase, and writes with a quill pen. Woodrow is glad that someone weirder than him has joined their class, but he can't decide if he should be friends with Toulouse or not. If they're friends, the bullying will get worse. If not, the bullies may focus on Toulouse instead of him.

Title: Odd, Weird, & Little
Author: Patrick Jennings
Length: 160 pages
Series or Stand-Alone: Stand-alone
Content appropriate for: Grades 3-5
Format: Digital ARC thanks to Egmont USA and netgalley.com, Publication date January 28, 2014

Three adjectives that describe this book: strange, disappointing, fanciful

I think I may be in the minority in my views of Odd. Weird, & Little. The reviews that I've read gush on about how wonderful it is to read a book about being yourself, even when faced with bullies.

I mean sure, that stuff is in there. But here's the thing. The main character is an owl. An owl. And nobody realizes it until the end. They keep wondering - how did he get up in that tree? Why can he turn his head around so far? Why are his eyes so large? I mean - Come on!

The Strange Story of Man Made Boy

Premise: Sixteen-year-old Boy is the son of Frankenstein’s monster and the Bride. Since Boy and his family live in a secret enclave of monsters hidden under Times Square, it’s important they maintain a low profile. Boy’s only interactions with the world are through the Internet, where he’s a hacker extraordinaire who can hide behind a layer of code. When conflict erupts at home, Boy embarks on a cross-country road trip with the granddaughters of Jekyll and Hyde, who introduce him to malls and diners, love and heartbreak (This is a shortened version of the premise at Goodreads.com)

Title: Man Made Boy
Author: Jon Skovron
Length: 368 pages
Genre: Science Fiction / Fantasy
Stand Alone or Series: Stand Alone
Content Appropriate For: Grades 9-12 (lots of language)
Format: Digital ARC provided by Penguin Young Readers via NetGalley

Three adjectives that describe this book: strange, nerdy, disappointing

The premise of this book is genius - creative, intriguing, and just plain cool. Unfortunately, the execution didn't quite live up to my expectations. My theory is that Jon Skovron loved this book/premise so much that he added in every possible detail he could imagine until there were so many that the text became garbled with nonsense. This would have been a great story with more judicious editing.

The Boy Who Swam With Piranhas

Premise: After Stanley's uncle makes life unbearable and commits the ultimate betrayal, young Stan has no choice but to leave home. When Stanley is swept up by the carnival he discovers new ways of living, mysterious happenings, and a tank full of piranhas. Now Stan must search inside himself for his true destiny.

Title: The Boy Who Swam With Piranhas
Author: David Almond
Length: 256 pages
Genre: Realistic Fiction (with fantasy elements)
Series or Stand Alone: Stand Alone
Content Appropriate For: Grades 3-6
Format: ARC provided by publisher via NetGalley

Three adjectives that describe this book: intriguing, fanciful, strange

After reading quite a few gushing reviews of this book, I feel kind of bad about finding it to be so meh. Don't get me wrong, I really enjoyed The Boy Who Swam With Piranhas, but there were a few annoying flaws and I'm not sure it will grab middle grade readers - the intended audience.