Heartless
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4.0 • 2 Ratings
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- $10.99
Publisher Description
The #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Lunar Chronicles
'In Heartless, the nonsense that is Wonderland gets a reverential makeover, full of heart and its own idiosyncratic character.' Gregory Maguire, author of Wicked and After Alice
Long before she was the terror of Wonderland, the infamous Queen of Hearts, she was just a girl who wanted to fall in love.
Catherine may be one of the most desired girls in Wonderland and a favourite of the unmarried King, but her interests lie elsewhere. A talented baker, she wants to open a shop and create delectable pastries.
At a royal ball where Cath is expected to receive the King's marriage proposal, she meets handsome and mysterious Jest. At the risk of offending the King and infuriating her parents, she and Jest enter into a secret courtship.
Cath is determined to choose her own destiny. But in a land thriving with magic, madness and monsters, fate has other plans.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Before she was the Queen of Hearts in Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, she was Catherine, the spirited daughter of royalty, destined to wed the King of Hearts but determined to set up shop as a baker with her best friend and longtime maid. In this whimsical standalone tale, readers follow Catherine's simultaneous courtships with the jovial king and his court joker, Jest, whose earnest boyishness makes him far more charming than his royal boss. Caught between her own desires and her mother's stop-at-nothing goal to make her daughter queen, Catherine must decide how much she will risk for a future with Jest. Meyer's Wonderland is a fun and more refined version of Carroll's, and readers will enjoy the obvious parallels. Jest and Catherine have a playfully clandestine relationship, but it's a slow build-up to the inevitable clash between what Catherine wants and what reality demands. Meyer's worldbuilding is extensive and impressive, and the persistent threat of a destructive Jabberwock lends tension, but the story lacks the high-stakes danger that fans of the Lunar Chronicles have come to expect. Ages 12 up.
