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A review by brooke_review
Ever Alice by H. J. Ramsay
2.0
Alice, former frequent visitor of Wonderland, is now 15 years old and in a mental asylum for talking about her adventures in Wonderland with the White Rabbit, Red Queen, Mad Hatter, and all the rest as if they really happened. No one believes that Wonderland is a real place full of whimsy and madness. No, they just believe that Alice has, in fact, gone mad herself.
When Alice, desperate to leave the asylum, agrees to an experimental procedure (think lobotomy) to cure her of her madness, she changes her mind at the last minute when the White Rabbit - named Ralph in this story - shows up to save her. Alice escapes to Wonderland where she learns that the Red Queen, named Rosamund, is up to her old antics of beheading everyone in her sight and throwing tantrums, except she has gotten much worse. It seems there is a plot to assassinate the Queen, and Alice quickly finds herself in the center of a scheme to rid Wonderland of its wicked Queen.
Sounds like an exciting premise, right? Unfortunately Ever Alice by H.J. Ramsey fell far down the rabbit hole for this avid Wonderland fan, with my #1 complaint being that this just did not feel like Wonderland. Where's the whimsy? Where's the fanciful characters? Where's the fun? This book could have essentially taken place in any other fantasy world BESIDES Wonderland. The novel read as if the author had applied some baseline Wonderland knowledge to her plot, but that she even fell short in that. Ramsey over-relied on making words mean the opposite of their actual definition - in fact, this is practically the only whimsy she inserted into her story - making this fantasy novel feel tired and trite. The application of opposite meanings was even used incorrectly in some places, such as calling a character's actual birthday his unbirthday, when in fact, an unbirthday is any day of the year that is not your actual birthday.
Furthermore, the storyline was just not exciting. Alice, as a main character, was a bore - the girl who was full of wonder and curiosity is no more, leaving behind an insecure young woman who is fully distracted from her assignation plot by the half-hearted advanced of semi-attractive young men. Getting through this book was like plodding through a swamp, and the only time it truly caught my interest - and thus saved the novel somewhat for me - was the twist ending *SPOILERS AHEAD* where we learn that Alice, in fact, did NOT escape her experimental procedure and was thus lobotomized, leaving her trapped inside her mind - in Wonderland - forever.
Thank you to NetGalley for an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.
When Alice, desperate to leave the asylum, agrees to an experimental procedure (think lobotomy) to cure her of her madness, she changes her mind at the last minute when the White Rabbit - named Ralph in this story - shows up to save her. Alice escapes to Wonderland where she learns that the Red Queen, named Rosamund, is up to her old antics of beheading everyone in her sight and throwing tantrums, except she has gotten much worse. It seems there is a plot to assassinate the Queen, and Alice quickly finds herself in the center of a scheme to rid Wonderland of its wicked Queen.
Sounds like an exciting premise, right? Unfortunately Ever Alice by H.J. Ramsey fell far down the rabbit hole for this avid Wonderland fan, with my #1 complaint being that this just did not feel like Wonderland. Where's the whimsy? Where's the fanciful characters? Where's the fun? This book could have essentially taken place in any other fantasy world BESIDES Wonderland. The novel read as if the author had applied some baseline Wonderland knowledge to her plot, but that she even fell short in that. Ramsey over-relied on making words mean the opposite of their actual definition - in fact, this is practically the only whimsy she inserted into her story - making this fantasy novel feel tired and trite. The application of opposite meanings was even used incorrectly in some places, such as calling a character's actual birthday his unbirthday, when in fact, an unbirthday is any day of the year that is not your actual birthday.
Furthermore, the storyline was just not exciting. Alice, as a main character, was a bore - the girl who was full of wonder and curiosity is no more, leaving behind an insecure young woman who is fully distracted from her assignation plot by the half-hearted advanced of semi-attractive young men. Getting through this book was like plodding through a swamp, and the only time it truly caught my interest - and thus saved the novel somewhat for me - was the twist ending *SPOILERS AHEAD* where we learn that Alice, in fact, did NOT escape her experimental procedure and was thus lobotomized, leaving her trapped inside her mind - in Wonderland - forever.
Thank you to NetGalley for an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.