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Growing up royal is not as pleasant as it may appear. Alice was often lonely when she was small since there were no other children around. Being rather clever, she once altered her clothes to look common and then managed to sneak out of the house to play in a nearby park with some other girls. But her grand day out ended in the police station! Still, her resourcefulness and daring would pop up again and again as she grew and would prove invaluable as her adventures became ever more dangerous.
Written for his granddaughters and great-nieces at the pace of a chapter every three months over a span of ten years, Garner's novel chronicles the life of a princess from early childhood to university and eventually marriage. But what makes this novel so intriguing is that as the book progresses and his audience gets older, the author's storytelling begins to take on more mature tones. For example, the initial chapters have all the cuteness and value reinforcement that is typical in early elementary literature for girls. There's even a pony named Poppsy. Then Garner begins to introduce magical elements. At first these are rather tame and on the order of some of the things the other, more famous Alice encountered in Wonderland, but eventually they become darker. By the end of the book, Alice is saving her father from an assassin, is under the protection of a goddess, and is having out-of-body experiences.
Garner's book began as a gift of love and a way to keep his family connected, but it is a gift to all of us.