Furthermore by Tahereh Mafi

My rating: 3 of 5 stars
Received: Publisher
Publication Date: August 30th, 2016
Publisher: Dutton BFYR
Point of View: 3rd Person & Feminine
Recommended Age: 13+
Pacing: Normal
Genres & Themes: Middle Grade, Magic, Alice in Wonderland

BLURB:

There are only three things that matter to twelve-year-old Alice Alexis Queensmeadow: Mother, who wouldn’t miss her; magic and color, which seem to elude her; and Father, who always loved her. The day Father disappears from Ferenwood he takes nothing but a ruler with him. But it’s been almost three years since then, and Alice is determined to find him. She loves her father even more than she loves adventure, and she’s about to embark on one to find the other.

But bringing Father home is no small matter. In order to find him she’ll have to travel through the mythical, dangerous land of Furthermore, where down can be up, paper is alive, and left can be both right and very, very wrong. It will take all of Alice’s wits (and every limb she’s got) to find Father and return home to Ferenwood in one piece. On her quest to find Father, Alice must first find herself—and hold fast to the magic of love in the face of loss

Am I the only human in this world who can’t help but think of Alice in Wonderland when she looks at this cover and proceeds to read the blurb?

And yet, this is marketed as inspired by The Secret Garden and The Chronicles of Narnia. I don’t know about Narnia, but I don’t see why this would resemble The Secret Garden more than Alice in Wonderland.

Come on, the main character’s name even is Alice and in the book she is described as odd. And let’s not forget that the land of Furthermore is as strange as Wonderland.

Which is why I was so disappointed when we weren’t introduced to the crazy Queen of Furthermore who literally eats visitors.

For an adventure book, this is a good one. It’s original enough to keep the reader’s attention and let’s not forget the two very loveable main characters. I don’t think anyone else would have been a better heroine than Alice. She was made for this book. Well, you know what I mean.

The writing, however, is such a hit or miss. You’re probably already familiar with Tahereh Mafi, as she did write the dystopian Shatter Me series. So you know she has a tendency to use repetition in her writing to make it a little more poetic?

Well, she does the same thing in this book, except with much more exaggeration. Read the first chapter, you’ll see if this is for you or not. I personally did not mind it at all, because I did think this was some kind of retelling of Alice in Wonderland, so I actually welcomed the peculiar writing style.

Again, such a shame we didn’t meet the Queen of Furthermore. Oh well, next time, I guess.

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