Review: Some Kind of Wonderland by Tara St. Pierre!

Author: Tara St. Pierre

Genre: YA Fiction

Date Published: June 8, 2021

Page Number: 252

Sometimes we all need an escape down a rabbit hole.

Since her parents’ divorce, Allyson’s only source of comfort and refuge has been within the pages of Alice in Wonderland, which her father used to read to her every night. Now a quiet and shy teenager, she auditions for her school’s production of the story, despite having no previous acting experience. But no one knows Alice like she does—she’s memorized every word—and she believes that getting the part is the only way her father will return for her.

Instead, she is enlisted as an assistant to the stage manager, and she runs afoul of the drama queen cast in the role she desires. Shuffling between a full deck of actors, a fidgety time-obsessed director, and an over-caffeinated costume crew, can Allyson navigate the bizarre world of high school theater? And how will her mother feel when she finds out it’s that story?

As fiction merges with fact and her present reality uncovers past memories, what curious things will Allyson discover—and how much will she grow—along the journey through her own kind of Wonderland?

Review:

     Some Kind of Wonderland was an interesting story about a young girl finally coming into her own as a young adult. Allyson had latched on to the story of Alice in Wonderland in order to be closer to her father; but by the end of the book, she realized that the image of her family from her memories was tainted by childish innocence. Allyson’s character was unique and relatable in some sense, and by the end she was a completely different person from when she started, which is a reflection of her growth throughout the story. I really enjoyed the fact that you can see that she grew and changed whereas in some books the character change is very subtle. In Some Kind of Wonderland, her development is obvious but not out of the realm of possibility. The only issue I had with Allyson’s character was the fact that she could be overly childish in some scenes, and that threw me out of the story to question the believability of her action. 

     I also appreciated the storyline and Allyson getting out of her comfort zone, trying something new, and finding out that she loves it. From start to finish, I was invested in Allyson’s story and the pace of the plot made it easy to fall into. The characters just made it even more enjoyable. I would’ve liked to have seen Allyson‘s father just so that I can physically see him in the story after she’s come to all these realizations and grown, especially after he’s been such a big focus in her story. I wanted to see what he was like without Allyson‘s rose colored glasses on, but his lack of appearance in the end did not take away from the story at all. It just would have been an impactful interaction to see and would allow readers to clearly see how much Allyson has grown.

     Overall, I really liked the story. It was a great coming-of-age novel to show and explore growing up and shedding that childish view of the world, all the while cherishing your past and childhood.

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