Z is for Zombieland and Other Retellings #atozchallenge

Posted April 30, 2018 in A-Z Challenge / 7 Comments

Throughout April I’m taking part in the Blogging from A-Z Challenge.  I’ll be posting every day (except Sundays) on my chosen theme of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and “Through the Looking-Glass.

Letter Z

I can’t quite believe that today is the last day of the challenge! I’ve really enjoyed doing all the research for my posts this month. Do look out for my reflections post later this week.

For the letter Z (another tricky one) I’ve decided to share some info about Alice in Zombieland and some of the other retellings. I’m guessing most people reading this are familiar with the various TV and film adaptations but you may not have heard so much about the books. Retellings are really popular right now and Alice in Wonderland has inspired lots of fiction, particularly in the young adult fantasy and horror genres. Below are some of the retellings that appeal to me.

 

Alice in Zombieland by Gena Showalter

Book cover for Alice in Zombieland

She won’t rest until she’s sent every walking corpse back to its grave. Forever.

If anyone had told Alice Bell that her entire life would change course between one heartbeat and the next, she would have laughed. From blissful to tragic, innocent to ruined? Please. But that’s all it took. One heartbeat. A blink, a breath, a second, and everything she knew and loved was gone.

Her father was right. The monsters are real.

To avenge her family, Ali must learn to fight the undead. To survive, she must learn to trust the baddest of the bad boys, Cole Holland. But Cole has secrets of his own, and if Ali isn’t careful, those secrets might just prove to be more dangerous than the zombies.

Goodreads Link

 

The Looking Glass Wars by Frank Beddor

Alyss of Wonderland?Book cover for The Looking Glass WarsWhen Alyss Heart, newly orphaned heir to the Wonderland throne, flees through the Pool of Tea

rs to escape her murderous Aunt Redd, she finds herself lost and alone in Victorian London. Befriended by an aspiring author named Lewis Carrol, Alyss tells the violent, heartbreaking story of her young life. Alyss trusts this author to tell the truth so that someone, somewhere will find her and bring her home. But he gets the story all wrong. He even spells her name incorrectly!

Fortunately, Royal Bodyguard Hatter Madigan knows all too well the awful truth of Alyss’ story – and he’s searching every corner of our world to find the lost princess and return her to Wonderland, to battle Redd for her rightful place as the Queen of Hearts.
The Looking Glass Wars unabashedly challenges our Wonderland assumptions of mad tea parties, grinning Cheshire cats, and a curious little blond girl to reveal an epic battle in the endless war for Imagination.

Goodreads Link

 

Heartless by Marissa Meyer

Book cover for HeartlessLong before she was the terror of Wonderland—the infamous Queen of Hearts—she was just a girl who wanted to fall in love.

Catherine may be one of the most desired girls in Wonderland, and a favorite of the unmarried King of Hearts, but her interests lie elsewhere. A talented baker, all she wants is to open a shop with her best friend. But according to her mother, such a goal is unthinkable for the young woman who could be the next queen.

Then Cath meets Jest, the handsome and mysterious court joker. For the first time, she feels the pull of true attraction. At the risk of offending the king and infuriating her parents, she and Jest enter into an intense, secret courtship. Cath is determined to define her own destiny and fall in love on her terms. But in a land thriving with magic, madness, and monsters, fate has other plans.

 

Goodreads Link

 

Splintered by A.G. Howard

Book cover for SplinteredAlyssa Gardner hears the whispers of bugs and flowers—precisely the affliction that landed her mother in a mental hospital years before. This family curse stretches back to her ancestor Alice Liddell, the real-life inspiration for Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. Alyssa might be crazy, but she manages to keep it together. For now.

When her mother’s mental health takes a turn for the worse, Alyssa learns that what she thought was fiction is based in terrifying reality. The real Wonderland is a place far darker and more twisted than Lewis Carroll ever let on. There, Alyssa must pass a series of tests, including draining an ocean of Alice’s tears, waking the slumbering tea party, and subduing a vicious bandersnatch, to fix Alice’s mistakes and save her family. She must also decide whom to trust: Jeb, her gorgeous best friend and secret crush, or the sexy but suspicious Morpheus, her guide through Wonderland, who may have dark motives of his own.

Goodreads Link

 

Insanity by Cameron Jace

Book cover for Insanity

 

After accidentally killing everyone in her class, Alice Wonder is now a patient in the Radcliffe Lunatic Asylum. No one doubts her insanity. Only a hookah-smoking professor believes otherwise; that he can prove her sanity by decoding Lewis Carroll’s paintings, photographs, and find Wonderland’s real whereabouts. Professor Caterpillar persuades the asylum that Alice can save lives and catch the wonderland monsters now reincarnated in modern day criminals. In order to do so, Alice leads a double life: an Oxford university student by day, a mad girl in an asylum by night. The line between sanity and insanity thins when she meets Jack Diamond, an arrogant college student who believes that nonsense is an actual science.

Goodreads Link

 

There are of course many more Alice in Wonderland retellings and you can find a good list here.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this series of posts. Thank you all for reading and commenting, your support means a lot to me!

 

Before you go…

Have you read any of these books or would you like to? 

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7 responses to “Z is for Zombieland and Other Retellings #atozchallenge

  1. Good job on ‘Z’! I’m not too excited about zombies, but some of the other books look really fun. I’m intrigued by the kind of mirror image story — The Looking Glass Wars.

  2. Thanks so much for this roundup. I know a few of the ones you mentioned above, but the one that really intrigues me, I never heard before: The Looking Glass Wars. I’m going ot see it out.

  3. No sure what happened, but my comment didn’t seem to stick. Just wanted to say I loved the Looking Glass Wars, and saw a stage adaption of Alice in Zombieland, but the rest are going on my TBR.

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