Archenemy: This Alice hits close to home, but the wonder isn’t that great

Archenemy by Frank Beddor

Overall rating: This book has saved the looking glass wars series.

When you start a trilogy and you’re impressed by what you read in the first book, you have to finish it. Right? Archenemy , please try to ignore the super cheesy name, is the third and final book in the Looking Glass Wars trilogy. The Looking Glass Wars is a re imagining of Alice in Wonderland with a odd sci-fi twist to it. It has nothing to with Lewis Carol. It plays out very much like Syfy’s Tinman or Alice which are very big rip offs of these books.

So start off with, when I bought the book, the review said it was good. Yet I loved the first book and the second book was just a let down. It was mostly told from a political stand point. So this book had to be damn impressive to suck me back in. And it was.

In this book Alyss gets out in the middle of the action again. She’s not just standing around and giving orders in this book. (Like in the second one)

The book takes place after a machine WILMA, created by King Arch wipes out imagination. Alyss finds her self powerless. Redd does too. After Arch takes over the Queendon, they join forces to save the heart crystal that Arch wants to destroy. It is the source of imagination in Wonderland and Earth. Also the royal heat family has been using it for years and doing what they will with the power given to them. Because this has happened, the King and Queen of clubs are in a revolt against the idea of a single queen having nearly all the imagination. With all these sides taking offense, it is a battle for imagination.

Not only that. Through out the story, the caterpillar oracles pull different sides every which way making you wonder what their motives are. They say there will be a Ever queen. But nobody really knows what that means until the end.

The good. This book has saved the trilogy. After that second one, I was reluctant to read this one. But it is well worth the read.

The Bad. Even though this a re imagining of Alice in Wonderland, it really doesn’t gave us anything new other than what was in the original book. The original was new, fresh, smart and funny. This was entertaining but I just don’t feel ha the same charm the original did. But that may just right be me. Second, Frank Beddor needs to desperately change the name of this book. It’s as corny as they come.

So overall, just read it. It’s worth your while. It has a great climax. It’s not a literary classic, but it’s fun and that’s all that counts.

3 1/2 smoothies out of four.

P.S. check out my book and ebook website at Lelue’s Realm. Google it or go directly to http://www.freewebs.com/lelue/