I wanted to like this. I love fairy tale retellings, and I'm a fan of the authors...but this just didn't do it for me. The perspective used wasn't reader-friendly for me.

While it had some interesting ideas, I wasn't invested enough in the story or characters to finish reading this.

I loved this book so much! I loved the characters and the world! I would and have recommended this book to all my friends! Again, awesome awesome book!

I like a good villain story but I have to be able to connect to them for it to be enjoyable and that just wasnt the case here. I didnt end up finishing the book.

A little disappointed but a good twist on Alice in Wonderland. This just wasn't for me.

I enjoyed this retelling of alice and wonderland. The premise was interesting and I liked the writing

A great twist in the original Alice in Wonderland story. Down the rabbit hole had some fantastic twists and leaves you wanting more.

I don’t request very many books on NetGalley – maybe one or two that catch my eye every three weeks or so, or books from authors that I love.

Often, however, I’ll “wish for” a title that’s not available to request. In the last few days I somehow seem to have been approved for everything I’ve requested! Down the Rabbit Hole is one of those titles. While it’s put me in a bit of a reading frenzy, I’m thrilled to have been given the chance and want to thank NetGalley and the publisher for granting my wish.

I only wish this book had lived up to my expectations.

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I love Alice in Wonderland retellings, most especially darker ones. I’m always eager to see what a new author can bring to an existing tale to re-invigorate the characters or setting. This author brought a sibling – the idea that Alice had a twin sister, Lacie.

The Alice that Crane introduces us to is unrecognizable. I rather think that was the point, but I don’t think she’s a well thought out character. Raised by the Red Queen, she’s become just as mad as her adoptive mother. She’s also become just as cruel – meting out the same types of punishments that their citizens have come to fear.

That doesn’t seem so bad, right? Wrong. When the book is narrated from Alice’s perspective, the only thoughts she has are about her forbidden love for a stable-hand, Landon, and constant thoughts about a very badly worded prophecy that involves the twins themselves.

This prophecy manages to drive the narrative forward at what feels like a snail’s pace while somehow almost never managing to address it directly. Then, when it is addressed, it was such an eye-rolling scene that I thought my eyes were going to stay stuck in the back of my head.

The idea of Alice being a twin is interesting, but Lacie’s voice is not much better than Alice’s. Before she falls into Wonderhills, her voice seems like any teenager. Believable. But afterwards, her character devolves into simply questioning everything around her without ever receiving or thinking of any answers. She also (surprise!) gets a love interest who she’s completely smitten with as soon as they lock eyes for the first time.

He’s also the man her sister is instructed to marry. Because love triangles improve everything. Yikes.

Honestly, I found the narrative confusing and pretty boring. Throughout the entire book, I wondered how much longer I had to be reading it. Though it was a short read, coming to the end was as much a relief as finishing an epic novel in old English. The writing was pretty messy, concepts jumbled, and characters uninteresting. Even the tease of a cool concept (Earth is a dreamland) was mentioned a few times but ultimately lost in the mess that was this book.

I wondered if the novel was supposed to be confusing, considering the story, but if that was the case it was just a bad decision as I got absolutely no enjoyment from it.

The secondary characters are one-dimensional and boring, and even when they had slight backstories I didn’t give them a second thought. Oh, Red Queen and White Queen had bad stuff happen to them? Mad Hatter is even crazier than assumed? Did. Not. Care.

If you’re looking for a stellar (or even vaguely good) Alice retelling, this is not the book for you.

I tried several times to make progress with this book but I just could not push through. The concept was interesting, but my goodness was Alice terrible. I couldn't sympathise or connect with her in any way and it was so hard for me to read a book where I just really did not like the main character. I tried, I really did, but this one just did not click for me.

The concept for this book is intriguing; paired with such a beautiful book cover, it could have been a masterpiece. This was meant to be a reimagining of Alice in Wonderland -- I know there are dozens out there, and I picked one up last year that left me quite satisfied -- but unfortunately I did not enjoy the writing style.

While the naming of the characters was clever (Lacie as an anagram of Alice - nice!), I found myself unable to connect with any of the characters. While Alice is described as being mad, she sounds more like a spoiled, power-hungry little girl. Lacie, the Red Queen, and the White Queen also weren't very developed characters, and I won't even bring up the several love interests. I felt like they could have been fleshed out a lot more in order for the reader to create some form of emotional attachment to them.

The plot itself was captivating, and honestly, is what kept me reading. The prophecy, the world-building, the positioning of the characters themselves within the story are all elements that were well-done. Unfortunately, this fresh story was put aside for pages on end to include love triangles for almost every character, which made the book suffer in my opinion.

Also, I am not sure if I received an ARC or not, but there were several mistakes in the book that had me question the editing. I saw some instances of character jumps: Alice becomes Lacie, the White Queen becomes the Red Queen for one paragraph when it's clear that the wrong character is being referenced. A thorough reread would be necessary.

Nonetheless, this book received some good reviews from several other readers, so it may just

Down the Rabbit Hole by Julia Crane is like an Alice in Wonderland reimagining crossed with Three Dark Crowns by Kendare Blake, although unfortunately, I don’t think it lives up to the expectations.

The story is fair - Alice is not who we imagine her to be, nor is Wonderland. There’s a prophecy in play and the lives of everyone Alice cares for are at stake. That’s a great premise to begin with, and there are definitely aspects of this story that I was really interested in, especially the idea of dimensions and magic that Crane has written into her book. The overall execution of the plot, however does feel to be lacking, and there were times when I wasn’t sure what was going on and had to reread sections a few times to sort it out.

Neither main protagonist - Alice or Lacie - were particularly engaging. Both girls, seventeen going on eighteen, came across as much younger their actions and attitudes were quite jarring in context. They both accepted a lot of new information very quickly and Alice in particular was able to master new skills quite quickly as she was required to. There were a lot of relationships being thrown out there, including one unfortunate case of instalove.

That said, many of the side characters were quite interesting to read about - the Red and White Queens and the Mad Hatter particularly. We don’t find out much about them by the small scenes we were given were great and left me wanting more. As this appears to be the first book in a series, I may follow up on the second book to see if any of these characters are fleshed out more.

The ending fell a little for me, too, and appeared to have been too easy. I would expect that in future books, there would have to be some complication with how everything was resolved, but it was almost a fairytale ending for the main characters involved.

Ultimately, this book really wasn’t for me, which was disappointing because I do love Alice in Wonderland retellings and reimaginings. Overall I gave Down the Rabbit Hole 2.5 out of 5 stars.

DOWN THE RABBIT HOLE began with an intriguing idea but proved to be a lighter read than expected that rather failed to fully captivate me. This story is so full of imagination, creativity, and unique twists on an old tale but fun though it was to read I can’t help but wish for something more. I enjoyed it but it did not quite win me over.