Cece Louise

I've read everything Cece has written, and this book outshines them all. So much wow! I've missed her fairytale world, and in To Escape a Wonderland, Cece jumps through her fairytale world into another fairytale world - Wonderland, but like you've never seen it before. It's a place of beauty and nightmares, where time is altered and yet ticking away, a place where your past comes back to haunt you while simultaneously creating space for memories to be redeemed. This is, above all, a story of redemption.

Aviva, a healer, has spent years regretting the role she played in her sister's death and the murder of a just and good king. Sir Bayne, a knight, also has regrets, even more than what readers learned in The Jabberwocky Princess. I should also note that we met Aviva in Saving Vengeance, so both of the main characters and some portion of their backstory is known to avid readers, however, as with all of Cece's books, this can be read as a standalone. You just won't want to stop with a single book once you learn there are more amazing books with these characters. But I digress, so back to my spoiler-free review...

Aviva and Bayne are thrown together almost as soon as the book starts. Kartoff, the most evil of all evil knights, finds them and forces them to take him to the last living Jabberwocky. The Jabberwocky kills and, even worse, turns people to madness, trapping them in their minds, trapping them in Wonderland. Cece's Wonderland is a magnificent place, like living in a dream in which your subconscious takes your strong memories and integrates them together with Lewis Carroll's fantasies. It's fantastic and frightening and amazing and dangerous and wonderful all at the same time. Of course, I wanted them to escape, but at the same time, I couldn't wait to see what happened next.

The romance was also beautiful. Two people who carry tremendous weight help each other make peace with their pasts and learn to see themselves through the eyes of someone who can see them for so much more than their past - something everyone needs in their lives. I'm so thankful for people like that in stories and in real life.

"Time is a peculiar thing. No one knows how much is promised to us—how many turns of the clock we get until it winds no more.

"Yes, time is perhaps the strangest gift we’ve been given. So easy to squander, yet so hard to pass when we most want it to. We’re so often late for things that truly matter, yet right on time for things that don’t. We wait unceasingly for the future, then lament how quickly the past is gone."

Reading this book made me think of all the things I'm so thankful for. The gift of Wonderland, and of a good story, is the reminder that time is limited and precious and we should make the most of what we have been given. I did say it was a story of redemption. Perhaps even for us.

I received an ARC from the author and reviewed the book because it's absolutely fabulous and demanded that I do so. :)… (más)

Originally I had won and ARC of this novel as part of librarything. And I recently rediscovered it. This is a sweet gothic romance, with hints of the paranormal. There is a bit of a mystery there, with a little dash of intrigue. The story is told in dual POV between Calia and Brone. Calia, a miller’s daughter, bears a striking resemblance to the lost princess Marilee, and she contrived a plan to pretend to be royal and wed the prince of a nearby kingdom. Prince Brone of Ebonwood is reluctant to be married again (he lost his first wife, Deidre, in a terrible accident) and so isn’t too thrilled about an arranged marriage. Calia travels to the kingdom for the “wedding.” And that’s when things start to unravel. There’s a bit of the “fake dating” trope, as Calia and Brone are in “close proximity” with one another. Later, Calia finds Princess Deidre’s diary, and decides to solve what really happened to the Princess. Overall, this book contains a sweet romance, some gothic romance mystery vibes, and a little hint at the paranormal.… (más)