Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland
She fell into a world that made her question everything, especially herself. She came back knowing who she was.
First chapter free on launch day
About the Book
A bored child follows a waistcoated rabbit into a hole in the ground and falls, slowly, into a dream that has been running without her for some time. The world she lands in has its own logic, which it never explains and never apologises for.
She grows too large and too small, weeps a lake of her own tears, argues with a caterpillar, hosts no tea, and is sentenced before any verdict is reached. Every authority she meets is absurd. Every rule is invented on the spot.
Carroll wrote it for a child. It survives because the child in it grows up. By the time Alice declares the court a pack of cards, she means it. That is the whole book in one sentence.
Cast, Evidenced
Six principals, each grounded in Carroll’s text
Alice
The Protagonist
A well-brought-up English child of about seven, curious, polite, and increasingly ungovernable. She falls into Wonderland following a rabbit and spends the dream arguing her way back to herself.
“when the Rabbit actually took a watch out of its waistcoat-pocket, and looked at it, and then hurried on, Alice started to her feet”
SMMB canon card · Chapter I (m-002)The White Rabbit
The Harried Herald
Pink-eyed, forever late, perpetually fretful about the Duchess. He lures Alice into Wonderland and then ignores her entirely, which is the whole point. He carries a watch; time matters to him and to no one else.
“behind it was a little door about fifteen inches high: she tried the little golden key in the lock, and to her great delight it fitted!”
SMMB canon card · Chapter I (m-003)The Cheshire Cat
The Grinning Guide
The only creature in Wonderland who will state its rules aloud. He can appear and disappear at will, fading until only the grin remains. He tells Alice the truth about the place and then removes himself from the consequences.
“we’re all mad here. I’m mad. You’re mad.”
SMMB canon card · Chapter VI (m-020)The Hatter
The Mad Host
Quarrelled with Time and has been stuck at six o’clock ever since. Poses a riddle with no answer. Makes personal remarks about Alice’s hair. At the trial, he trembles and bites his teacup.
“Why is a raven like a writing-desk?”
SMMB canon card · Chapter VII (m-022)The Queen of Hearts
The Tyrant
A card-pack queen whose answer to every difficulty is to order a beheading. Her sentences are never carried out, her authority is hollow, and she knows it on some level: she collapses the moment Alice refuses to be afraid.
“Sentence first—verdict afterwards.”
SMMB canon card · Chapter XII (m-036)The Caterpillar
The Cryptic Sage
Seated on a mushroom, smoking at length, asking the one question Alice cannot answer. He gives her the tool to manage her own size but withholds the answer to the question of who she is. That is left to Alice.
“Who are you?” said the Caterpillar.
SMMB canon card · Chapter V (m-015)Launch Trailer
Trailer in production
A sixty-second film built from Carroll’s text in the Tenniel engraving register. No Disney palette. No animated anthropomorphism. The dream as Carroll wrote it.
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First chapter free. Launch-day price. No noise.
Thanks. This is a demonstration campaign, so nothing was sent.