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vgdesigns's review
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
4.5
Muchness
L.L. McKinney transports the reader into an entertaining and refreshing retelling of Alice in Wonderland in A Blade So Black. After the sudden death of her father, Alice Kingston awakens to the world of human fears turned into monsters. The mysterious Addison Hatta does his best to train her in how to defeat these nightmares. Wonderland is a land of dreams, but the reality of the endless battle before her may be too much to handle. Alice must work through her hurt, to save the world from its own horror.
L.L. McKinney jumps right into the action, laying down the world building foundation of the story quickly. After the death of her father, Alice is left with sadness, anger, and a “billion other emotions”. She struggles a lot with these consuming feelings, and repurposes them into fighting monsters. Though, she finds that she cannot fight fear with anger. And the choices she makes effect not only her, but her family and friends. Alice has an edgy and serious tone of voice. So brief warning for strong language, as well as throwing up, and nausea when she travels to Wonderland.
The handsome Addison adds some levity to all the seriousness, who Alice calls a “punk rock Prince Charming”. Addison speaks in Wonderland terms, which gives him a whimsical and slightly mad personality. He is a great encourager, showing Alice that she can be more than her fears. Alice’s friend Cortney Marrone’ keeps her grounded in reality, aka gossip, with the help of the handsome Chess.
This book is full of all the nostalgia, quirks, and characters needed in an Alice in Wonderland retelling. L.L. McKinney creates even more places and creatures inspired by Wonderland. Which gives this story some fun moments in between the darker aspects of the dream inspired world. With plenty of fun nerdy pop culture references.
L.L. McKinney transports the reader into an entertaining and refreshing retelling of Alice in Wonderland in A Blade So Black. After the sudden death of her father, Alice Kingston awakens to the world of human fears turned into monsters. The mysterious Addison Hatta does his best to train her in how to defeat these nightmares. Wonderland is a land of dreams, but the reality of the endless battle before her may be too much to handle. Alice must work through her hurt, to save the world from its own horror.
L.L. McKinney jumps right into the action, laying down the world building foundation of the story quickly. After the death of her father, Alice is left with sadness, anger, and a “billion other emotions”. She struggles a lot with these consuming feelings, and repurposes them into fighting monsters. Though, she finds that she cannot fight fear with anger. And the choices she makes effect not only her, but her family and friends. Alice has an edgy and serious tone of voice. So brief warning for strong language, as well as throwing up, and nausea when she travels to Wonderland.
The handsome Addison adds some levity to all the seriousness, who Alice calls a “punk rock Prince Charming”. Addison speaks in Wonderland terms, which gives him a whimsical and slightly mad personality. He is a great encourager, showing Alice that she can be more than her fears. Alice’s friend Cortney Marrone’ keeps her grounded in reality, aka gossip, with the help of the handsome Chess.
This book is full of all the nostalgia, quirks, and characters needed in an Alice in Wonderland retelling. L.L. McKinney creates even more places and creatures inspired by Wonderland. Which gives this story some fun moments in between the darker aspects of the dream inspired world. With plenty of fun nerdy pop culture references.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Cursing and Vomit
zombiezami's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
mysterious
tense
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
This book wasn't really grabbing me, but I kept going with it because I was genuinely interested in where the plot was going. I think I would've liked this more if it existed when I was in the target age demographic
Content Warnings
Graphic: Vomit, Injury/Injury detail, Gore, Blood, Violence, Murder, and Body horror
Moderate: Death of parent, Grief, Child death, Mental illness, Medical content, Police brutality, Terminal illness, and Stalking
Minor: Fire/Fire injury
e_flah's review
adventurous
dark
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.25
A Blade So Black was a gripping story that had me hooked from the very first page. McKinney's spin on Alice in Wonderland was the perfect blend of whimsical and dark. Alice was a lovable character who I enjoyed exploring this world with.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Death of parent, Grief, Vomit, and Violence
Minor: Police brutality
catapocalypse's review against another edition
adventurous
emotional
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Full disclosure: I won a free print copy of this book in a Goodreads giveaway!
I seldom read YA, but the premise of this book sounded super fun and the cover is beautiful! In the wake of her father's untimely death, Alice is attacked by a monster from another world. Wonderland is a world formed from the collective imagination and fears of humanity, and the latter risk becoming Nightmares that threaten both worlds. She's recruited to help battle these creatures, which she must balance with school, her social life, and being a good daughter. Then the return of an old villain believed to have been destroyed long ago threatens that balance, as well as that between the two worlds.
This is a high energy book, and Alice is a fun, endearing heroine! My fear with YA is often that the level of angst or energy of the characters may annoy me, but this book kept the characters realistic without becoming obnoxious. It mixes in heavier topics like grief and police brutality, but also revels in the whimsy of the Alice in Wonderland-inspired setting and the kickass action. Some of the names, like "Addison Hatta," are a little cheesy, but it felt like part of the fun.
As an adult reader, I am more aware of the flaws here and there. My main disappointment was the time jump at the start. I would have preferred a little more world building beforehand. Still, it wasn't hard to navigate the setting or story. If this had come out when I was a teenager, I can tell it would have been a major favorite for me, especially since I loved the classic Alice books! I had a great time with this!
I seldom read YA, but the premise of this book sounded super fun and the cover is beautiful! In the wake of her father's untimely death, Alice is attacked by a monster from another world. Wonderland is a world formed from the collective imagination and fears of humanity, and the latter risk becoming Nightmares that threaten both worlds. She's recruited to help battle these creatures, which she must balance with school, her social life, and being a good daughter. Then the return of an old villain believed to have been destroyed long ago threatens that balance, as well as that between the two worlds.
This is a high energy book, and Alice is a fun, endearing heroine! My fear with YA is often that the level of angst or energy of the characters may annoy me, but this book kept the characters realistic without becoming obnoxious. It mixes in heavier topics like grief and police brutality, but also revels in the whimsy of the Alice in Wonderland-inspired setting and the kickass action. Some of the names, like "Addison Hatta," are a little cheesy, but it felt like part of the fun.
As an adult reader, I am more aware of the flaws here and there. My main disappointment was the time jump at the start. I would have preferred a little more world building beforehand. Still, it wasn't hard to navigate the setting or story. If this had come out when I was a teenager, I can tell it would have been a major favorite for me, especially since I loved the classic Alice books! I had a great time with this!
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death and Grief
Moderate: Death of parent, Police brutality, and Blood
Minor: Child death and Vomit
girlonbooks's review
adventurous
emotional
funny
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
💔💔💔💔 (four stars as rated in hearts so broken because THAT ENDING 😭)
It’s no easy job slaying demons by night while maintaining the facade of normal teenager by day. And for Alice, whose mother is rapidly losing patience with never knowing her daughter’s whereabouts, the balance between those dueling identities hangs precariously. When Alice’s demon-slaying mentor and friend, Hatta, is poisoned and it’s up to Alice to save him, she must venture into Wonderland, abandoning her life in “the real world” at a rather inopportune moment. Will she and her cast of sidekicks be able to save their friend before it’s too late? And who is the mysterious and dangerous Black Knight who always seems to be a step ahead of them?
“Knowledge is power, and the world is set against you knowing anything, so when someone’s trying to teach you something, pay attention.”
It is impossible to remove a book from its context so my review of this book is going to consist mostly of what I realized and experienced while read this book in April of 2021. First, this book was published in 2018 – before most white people – including myself – payed much (if any) mind to anti-racism work, so let’s just be honest about that. I only recently discovered this series and because of that you are now reading this review in 2021, after the murder of Breonna Taylor, after a global protest movement began in the summer of 2020 and – as of less than 24 hours ago and after almost a year of demonstrations – Derek Chauvin was found guilty on all counts for the murder of George Floyd.
Let’s now go back a bit to when, upon A Blade So Black’s initial release, author L.L. McKinney was deemed a mean, angry Black woman by a bunch of fragile white reviewers who decided that, since McKinney had the AUDACITY to call out white people on issues of privilege and race on twitter it was within their right to tank the reviews of her book on Goodreads. This is pretty standard behavior by white supremacists, to be honest. It literally happens to authors of color constantly. I can think of several instances off the top of my head, but that is for another blog post.
Being brand new to #booktwt (book twitter) and relatively new to reviewing, I only learned about this a few weeks ago, just in time for another white author to absolutely lose her shit on reviewers (for giving her a 4.5 rating??), compare her own cancellation to the holocaust and rape culture respectively and then DEMAND that GR take down the negative reviews she received because of her behavior. GR eventually – because of course they did – obliged. The double standard here is absolutely infuriating and really only emphasizes the dangerous power of white fragility.
No such courtesy has ever been extended to L.L. McKinney or any other author of color (to my knowledge) when white supremacists have tanked their reviews. The third book in the Nightmare-verse series, A Crown so Cursed – the ARCs for which haven’t even been released yet, are already receiving 1 star reviews from the people who couldn’t handle being called out on their ignorance in 2018. As usual, Goodreads (and Amazon by extension) is completely silent about this.
If you peruse the one star reviews for A Blade So Black as I have done, you will quickly realize that there is basically one reason for any and all low ratings: white readers were made uncomfortable that this book challenges their idea of privilege or race AND that a Black woman dared to speak up about it. Now that white people, and white feminists especially, have had their big “anti-racism awakening,” where are the apologies for McKinney? Where is the accountability from the black-square-posters and hashtag-i’m-listening-ers that flooded her reviews with hate and threats less than three years ago?
A primary plot point of A Blade So Black is how the death of a young Black girl named Breonne – who was shot and killed at a football game – has shaken the city of Atlanta. Breonne was in high school, Breonne was minding her own business, and Breonne was murdered anyway. In the wake of Breonne’s death, Alice struggles with the responsibility to protect a world that doesn’t do anything to take care of Black women like her and Breonne; a world that, on the contrary, targets, exploits and abuses them. This theme by McKinney is absolutely incredible! I was blown away. We don’t even need to look at the murder of Breonne and say that it is of course reminiscent of the murder of Breonna Taylor. Because the fact is that Black men and women are murdered by police with such frequency that it was just a matter of time before one inexcusable murder or another mirrored Breonne’s. How maddening and disgusting is that!?!? In Breonne we see Atatiana Jefferson, Sandra Bland and – as of mere hours after the Chauvin verdict – Ma’Khia Bryant, a 16 year old girl who was shot by police after calling them for help.
The reality is that Black women are never going to make racism palatable enough of a topic for white fragility – not even if they write it BEAUTIFULLY in an incredibly original and innovative fantasy series as McKinney has done. with A Blade So Black. The fact is that, knowing this, white reviewers like me (and you if you are white and reading this) need to be louder in calling out white supremacist behavior when we see it in publishing, from authors, on blogs, booktwt, bookstagram, etc. It can’t come down to the labor of AOCs to squash an issue perpetuated primarily by whiteness and white people. We need to actually do better and that means stepping tf up. It means elevating marginailized voices. And yes, it may mean missing out on an ARC here or there because when you take a stand against white supremacy it typically denies you some opportunities. Do it anyway. You’ll survive, POC might not.
Realistically, Chauvin’s murder conviction does very little – if anything – to combat systemic racism. The guilty verdict only came about because of the constant protests, the incessant social media campaigns, the civil unrest, the good trouble – the movement led almost entirely by Black women, btw – and because, of course, the murder of George Floyd was caught on camera. So when I say white people need to step it up, what I mean is don’t you dare tell me you’re tired. Don’t you dare tell me you’re scared. Don’t you dare take your foot off the gas. We are only getting started and we need you.
“Promise me you’ll be careful. I know you already are, just”—she lifted her hand from Alice’s knee, made a fist, then forced her fingers loose to pat her knee again, squeezing—“even when you’re careful, even when you play by the rules, it might not be enough. Gotta go the extra mile out here.”
✨ Rep in this book: Black Protagonist, own voices, queer side characters
✨ Content warnings for this book: death of a parent, violence, racism, police brutality, death, war and battle
Content Warnings
Graphic: Blood, Child death, Death, Death of parent, Gore, Gun violence, Grief, Medical content, Murder, Police brutality, Racism, Terminal illness, Violence, and Vomit
whysomanysams's review
adventurous
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
lighthearted
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
3.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Grief, Murder, Violence, and Vomit
Moderate: Death of parent, Kidnapping, and Police brutality
Minor: Blood, Gore, and Racism
katejuniper's review
adventurous
emotional
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
I was sold this book as Alice in Wonderland meets Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I was much more interested in the latter than the former and this book definitely delivered. The balance between the superhero life and home/teen life was spot on and made sure the book was both tense and fun at the same time. Further to this, the inclusion of Brionne’s story was well interwoven and it grounded the magical elements of the story.
Now I might actually have to read the original Alice in Wonderland...but only after I finish this series in case of character spoilers!
A must read!
Now I might actually have to read the original Alice in Wonderland...but only after I finish this series in case of character spoilers!
A must read!
Content Warnings
Graphic: Violence, Racism, Vomit, Death, and Hate crime
delia's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
lighthearted
medium-paced
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
The epilogue is seals the deal. You're gonna want to read the sequel. Looking forward to delving more into the lore and world mythos. A solid "re-telling"
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death
Moderate: Vomit and Violence
Minor: Police brutality and Racism
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