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A review by nicolemhewitt
Furthermore by Tahereh Mafi
5.0
This review and many more can be found on my blog: Feed Your Fiction Addiction
This is an ADORABLE middle grade read, filled with colorful descriptions of magical happenings and set in the topsy-turvy, sometimes baffling world of Furthermore.
What Fed My Addiction:
Furthermore.
If you read the blurb of this book, you will know exactly what to expect. Not only does it do a fantastic job of describing the plot, it sets the tone for the book. Just reading the description of Furthermore makes me smile – and I was grinning pretty much the entire time as I read about Alice’s journey through the peculiar land. It is just as odd as it sounds in the blurb – and that’s what makes it wonderful! I never knew what to expect next. Neither did Alice. I loved that the journey through Furthermore was dangerous and thrilling, but the book is still perfectly suitable for a middle grade audience because of the light, whimsical tone.
High stakes.
The story in this book is similar to Alice in Wonderland in that so many strange and wonderful things happen to Alice (hmmm … I just now realized the name thing … I wonder if that was intentional) and she’s thrown into a confusing world with so many unknown rules. Breaking those rules can often have life-altering (or life ending!) results. Alice and Oliver have to keep their wits about them and sometimes rely on pure luck. The stakes are doubly high for Alice, who desperately wants to find her father before it’s too late – and it becomes more and more apparent as the book goes on that her father is in grave danger in this impossibly crazy world!
Alice.
I loved Alice’s tenacious drive to get to her father at all costs and her endless optimism, even when things are difficult. Her journey is poignant because she discovers so much about herself along the way. Alice is used to thinking of herself as ugly and unwanted – a colorless girl in a world that values color (which represents magic) above all else. She has only ever felt loved by her father – but that’s probably at least partially because she has trouble loving herself. Alice’s personal journey is just as compelling as her travels through Furthermore.
What Left Me Hungry for More:
Rushed ending.
This is actually a pretty big negative, and I struggled with my rating because of it. After nearly 400 pages of whimsical adventure and danger, the book is wrapped up in about ten pages. Even my 12-year-old daughter mentioned that she felt the ending came out of nowhere – you didn’t even realize that Alice was near her goal, and suddenly everything was over, fixed almost instantly with very little fanfare. It was really quite jarring and more than a little disappointing.
As I mentioned, this book was very difficult for me to rate because I felt so disappointed in the ending. Still, I ended up deciding that the journey was worth it. The fact that my daughter instantly asked me after she was finished reading if there would be another one was another big bonus for me – she wasn’t ready for the journey through Furthermore to end! (I couldn’t find any reference to another book, by the way, but Mafi definitely left things open for a future foray into this world – while still wrapping up the current story.) In the end, I decided that I was so enchanted with most of the book that I would only take off a half star for the ending, and I settled on 4.5/5 Stars.
***Disclosure: I received this book from the publisher via BEA16 in exchange for an honest review. No other compensation was given and all opinions are my own.***
This is an ADORABLE middle grade read, filled with colorful descriptions of magical happenings and set in the topsy-turvy, sometimes baffling world of Furthermore.
What Fed My Addiction:
Furthermore.
If you read the blurb of this book, you will know exactly what to expect. Not only does it do a fantastic job of describing the plot, it sets the tone for the book. Just reading the description of Furthermore makes me smile – and I was grinning pretty much the entire time as I read about Alice’s journey through the peculiar land. It is just as odd as it sounds in the blurb – and that’s what makes it wonderful! I never knew what to expect next. Neither did Alice. I loved that the journey through Furthermore was dangerous and thrilling, but the book is still perfectly suitable for a middle grade audience because of the light, whimsical tone.
High stakes.
The story in this book is similar to Alice in Wonderland in that so many strange and wonderful things happen to Alice (hmmm … I just now realized the name thing … I wonder if that was intentional) and she’s thrown into a confusing world with so many unknown rules. Breaking those rules can often have life-altering (or life ending!) results. Alice and Oliver have to keep their wits about them and sometimes rely on pure luck. The stakes are doubly high for Alice, who desperately wants to find her father before it’s too late – and it becomes more and more apparent as the book goes on that her father is in grave danger in this impossibly crazy world!
Alice.
I loved Alice’s tenacious drive to get to her father at all costs and her endless optimism, even when things are difficult. Her journey is poignant because she discovers so much about herself along the way. Alice is used to thinking of herself as ugly and unwanted – a colorless girl in a world that values color (which represents magic) above all else. She has only ever felt loved by her father – but that’s probably at least partially because she has trouble loving herself. Alice’s personal journey is just as compelling as her travels through Furthermore.
What Left Me Hungry for More:
Rushed ending.
This is actually a pretty big negative, and I struggled with my rating because of it. After nearly 400 pages of whimsical adventure and danger, the book is wrapped up in about ten pages. Even my 12-year-old daughter mentioned that she felt the ending came out of nowhere – you didn’t even realize that Alice was near her goal, and suddenly everything was over, fixed almost instantly with very little fanfare. It was really quite jarring and more than a little disappointing.
As I mentioned, this book was very difficult for me to rate because I felt so disappointed in the ending. Still, I ended up deciding that the journey was worth it. The fact that my daughter instantly asked me after she was finished reading if there would be another one was another big bonus for me – she wasn’t ready for the journey through Furthermore to end! (I couldn’t find any reference to another book, by the way, but Mafi definitely left things open for a future foray into this world – while still wrapping up the current story.) In the end, I decided that I was so enchanted with most of the book that I would only take off a half star for the ending, and I settled on 4.5/5 Stars.
***Disclosure: I received this book from the publisher via BEA16 in exchange for an honest review. No other compensation was given and all opinions are my own.***