Automated Alice
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | 4.23 (803 Votes) |
| Asin | : | 0517704900 |
| Format Type | : | paperback |
| Number of Pages | : | 223 Pages |
| Publish Date | : | 2016-09-22 |
| Language | : | English |
DESCRIPTION:
On a dull and rainy afternoon, in 19th-century Manchester, desperate to avoid the question of ellipses (on which her strict great-aunt Ermintrude is sure to test her this afternoon), Alice works on a jigsaw puzzle, only to find (frustratingly) that 12 pieces are missing from the picture of the London Zoo. Suddenly, in pursuit of the elusive bird, Alice falls into the workings of a grandfather clock and emerges in the Manchester of 1998-a world of automated wonders and inspired nonsense with a distinctly 19th-century flavor.Whippoorwill leads Alice along with a series of enigmatic riddles, and Alice soon encounters a part-man, part-badger named Captain Ramshackle, Professor of Randomology, and the logical side of her own self in the person of an automated garden statue name C
An interesting spin-off Alice in Wonderland has "inspired" a number of hacks to produce poor material, from movies to books to video games. Here, Jeff Noon manages to avoid re-treading the surreal cliches in which most "tributes" indulge.This book is a cross-pollination of Lewis Carroll's universe (from whence Alice originates) with Jeff Noon's universe (the setting of Vurt, Pollen, etc.) Noon (who has a distinctive style of his own) does a fair job of emulating Carroll's writing, but emphasizes the puns and wordplay tha. Gypsi Phillips Bates said Good Idea but Poor Delivery. Alice, of Wonderland fame, is visiting her Great Aunt Ermintrude and very unwisely lets her parrot, Whippoorwill, out of his cage. Whippoorwill flies into the grandfather clock, and Alice (dragging her doll Celia with her) climbs in after him but ends up in the future--1998 to be exact. The future is populated by people that are mixed breeds of animal and human, and is ruled by the frightening Civil Serpents. To return to her own time, Alice (and her now automated doll, Celia), must find Whippoorw. A Sweet TreacleI MeanTrequelerm If you've read any other Jeff Noon, you'll realise there are a ton of 'Alice' references in his writing. Being a BIG fan of Carroll's stories I enjoy picking up on these, and when I saw Noon had written a follow-up to Carroll's Alice stories, I was admittedly wary, but intrigued.Clearly the reviewer who wrote a wonderfully detailed review three sentences long has no idea who Lewis Carroll/Charles Dodgson was, or any concept of use of nonsensical verse, and probably not much appreciation for any so
Noon has now decided to link up with an imaginative precursor by introducing Lewis Carroll's Alice as the protagonist in a new adventure that draws on Carroll's through-the-looking-glass inversions of reality, and adds a Jeff Noon menace and edginess absent from Carroll's Wonderland. Jeff Noon's previous novels, Vurt and Pollen, have attracted a cult following with their psychedelic science fiction creation of the realm of "Vurt"--a region defined by illusion, dream and drug-induced fantasy. . Alice finds herself in 1998 Manchester when she enters an old grandfather clock, and soon becomes the prime suspect in the puzzling "Jigsaw Murders." Noon emulates Carroll's crazy wordplay throughout, and even adds his own illustrations inspired by those of John Tenniel, the famous interpreter of Alice