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March 27, 2024

Novel Lives

Book Publicity, Book Reviews, And Author Interviews

L.L. McKinney and M.R. Carey Lead Wonderland: An Anthology- Alice’s Adventures Reimagined- Edited by Marie O’regan and Paul Kane, An Anthology Out 9/17

Three weeks. Three Anthologies. The Fall is being very good to readers, indeed. September 10th sees the release of His Hideous Heart (Review Linked), September 17th, Wonderland: An Anthology and October 1st, Hex Life: Random Tales of Witchery. It is has been a pleasure reading all three. My review of Hex Life is coming!
Wonderland

Thank You to Titan Books for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Edited by Marie O’Regan and Paul Kane, Wonderland encompasses a wide range of genres (fantasy, folklore, horror, contemporary) formats (poetry and prose), and styles with which readers can pick and choose. Alice gives plenty of material to work with having first come into creation centuries ago and the authors chosen for the project came back with a wide scope of interpretations.
And while some of my author preferences are going to show on my favorite stories, I can’t help but love what I love. L.L. McKinney and M.R. Carey don’t dare disappoint. Both take readers on quite the fantastical, horrific and unique turn during their time in Wonderland.
When evil cretins from Alice’s world terrorize London, Bodie is there to defend it, in McKinney’s What Makes A Monster. McKinney is a perfect fit to this Anthology, currently in the midst of an Urban Fantasy retelling of Alice in Wonderland (A Dream So Dark releases September 24th).

She smelled and tasted blood, swiping it from her cheek and lips, spitting at the ground as disgust roiled through her.
A hunk of flesh lay at her feet, red and fresh, glistening in the low light. Some sort of organ Bodie couldn’t identify.

Carey’s turnabout in There Were No Birds to Fly is a psychological horror with characters from Alice’s canon story, but decidedly no Alice. Instead, the Walrus and the Carpenter take front and center in a story centering around fear and insipid human weakness that fuels nightmares.

The old woman’s skin began to boil away. There was no flesh beneath, no sinew or bone, only a white substrate that seemed to dissolve on contact with air. She sublimed away into smoke, smiling as she went.

Wonderland is a stellar addition to the Alice foray. It is also one of three reasons this fall has been served well by anthologies.

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