First of all, the Dutch edition of this book is GORGEOUS. That spine.. oh gosh.

Secondly, you are going to bake if you read this book. At least, I did.

Let me show you the gorgeous spine and my home baked cake: https://www.instagram.com/p/BQOWeiLBXm2/

OK now over to the book. I've heard from a lot of people that you get more references and stuff if you've read Alice in Wonderland (or seen the movie) before you read this book. Now, Alice in Wonderland does not really spark my interest, so I decided to read this book without reading/watching AiW first. And let me tell you: this is still a good read! Most of you know the big storyline from Alice in Wonderland, and have an idea of the setting and the style of the story, and that is enough to get the references and see how well done this is.

In the beginning, it was a bit slow for me. I had trouble getting into the story. But once it was rolling, I was really curious to find out how this storyline fitted the Queen of Hearts from AiW. And it is an amazing story. It really suits the stamp of classic, fairy tale. It is not really a retelling, it is more of a prologue to AiW.

The idea of telling the story from the perspective of the evil queen reminded me of the movie Maleficent, which I really enjoyed. if you enjoyed this movie or this book and has not seen/read the other, I highly recommend it :) And I want this book to be made into a movie btw.