Alice in Wonderland by Lewius Carroll (1865)

I am almost done with my semester of reading Victorian British fiction with my son, and I am kind of sorry to see it end--and really sorry to see it end with this book.  Other than the Rudyard Kipling book, this was my least favorite of the bunch.  I think that if I had approached it as a work of science fiction I would have found it more enjoyable.  As it was, I would recommend sticking with the film versions of the story--even the very poor Tim Burton version would be preferable, to my taste, and the very fun 2009 mini-series 'Alice' would be far superior.

Alice is a somewhat irritating girl, who is altogether too gullible, as she drinks potions marked 'Drink Me' without pause to think.  On the up side, when she shrinks and grows and falls hopelessly lost into the ground below, she really doesn't panic, so there is a lot to be said about that.  She is just not nearly charming enough to carry off the book, for my taste.  The writing is light to the point of flippancy, and if it weren't for all the mixed messages it might be a good book for young adults--as it is, the loosely veiled drug references would seem all to tempting for a teenager to avoid seeing.  The ending is a bit of a surprise, given that it is omitted from all the screen versions that I had forgotten it completely.