Book Review: Unhinged (Splintered #2) by A.G. Howard

Amulet
Published Jan. 7, 2014
400 Pages

This is book two of the Splintered series. If you haven’t read the first one check out the review here.

It has been a year since Alyssa has been down the Rabbit Hole and literally all hell has broken loose in the real world and in Wonderland. Her mother is being overprotective, Jeb doesn’t remember anything about Wonderland, graduation and prom is approaching and mostly importantly the Red Queen is in the real world.

All Alyssa wants to do is graduate and go to London with her boyfriend for school. But Morpheus needs Alyssa to save Wonderland if she doesn’t the consequences can be UN-fixable. 

If you saw my review of the first book, you will understand that I really didn’t care for Alyssa or Jeb for that matter. I still don’t. Actually I think I dislike them more in this book and I honestly didn’t think that was possible.

Alyssa is a selfish girl. All she cares about is Jeb. For the past year she has disregarded her duties as Queen of Wonderland and because of that the Red Queen was able to take control and destroy so much.  Her selfishness throughout the book is so sickening, reading this book was a struggle.

Alyssa also decides not to tell her mother most of what happened. So there is a struggle between Alyssa and her mother. Alyssa doesn’t trust her and her mother is fighting that. I also did not understand this because Alyssa went into Wonderland to lift the curse to save her mother and yet now she can’t even be near her.

Finally, my biggest issue was if Alyssa couldn’t understand something or didn’t like the way things was going it was Morpheus fault. Really? You have a evil Queen destroying Wonderland and hunting you down in your real world and it is the guy who sacrificed his life for you fault?

Not feeling this book. Overall it gets: 2 Pickles

Book Review: Splintered (Splintered, #1) by A.G. Howard

Amulet Books
Published Jan. 1, 2013
371 Pages

Alyssa Gardner is the great-great-great daughter of Alice Liddell, the woman who inspired Alice in Wonderland written by Lewis Carroll. It is known that the women in the family are crazy but so far Alyssa has been able to contain that craziness.

That is until a routine visit with her mom (who is at an asylum) takes a turn for the worst and Alyssa discovers that not only is the family cursed but there is more to the story then what Lewis Carroll told and there is a way to break the curse on her family.

So down the rabbit hole Alyssa goes but wonderland is a lot creepier than she once read and in order to survive she needs her crush Jeb and a former childhood friend Morpheus, who is all grown up.

This story was creepy. Kudos goes to the author for freaking me out. The story was an awesome read. I was heavily invested into this story and I loved every minute of it. The details was perfect. The suspense and drama came towards the middle of the book, which was no problem at all.

However, I was pissed off. Jeb is controlling and Alyssa is an idiot. The only character that made sense was Morpheus. Alyssa is in love with Jeb. Jeb loves Alyssa but decides to baby her considering that her mother is in an asylum and Alyssa is emotional. Alyssa allows Jeb to control her every move when they are in wonderland. She doesn’t stand up for herself and she is constantly looking for Jeb to save her. Seriously! THE ENTIRE BOOK SHE REFUSES TO GROW A PAIR TO JEB.

I couldn’t stand their relationship and to be honest still don’t understand why the heck Jeb was in wonderland with her anyway. The only time Alyssa stands up for herself is when Jeb has been gone for about three chapters. My issue with this is Jeb is the one she should have stood up to. I couldn’t stand their relationship.

Morpheus was my man! Loved everything about his character; even though he was being portrayed as a villain in the middle and towards the end he was the most loveable character in the story. Everything he did had a purpose which is exactly how it should be.

One other thing I didn’t like about the book was this love triangle/final decision. Why can’t we get a story in which the female lead doesn’t have it both ways? It bothered me that Alyssa was able to get exactly what she wanted because to be honest she,one, didn’t deserve it and two, has responsibilities to take care of. This is why there is always a second book . . . because she’s not taking care of home.

Despite all of this I loved this book and it receives a 8 out of 10, which is pretty high considering I hated the main characters.

Love, Tanya