Alice's Adventures in Wonderland & Other Stories [Leather Bound]

This is a large leatherbound edition of Carroll's work, from Barnes & Noble. It is their newest reissue of the book, released in January of 2010. Besides the two Alice books(which retain the classic John Tenniel illustrations), this edition also has the following:

- Sylvie & Bruno
- Sylvie & Bruno Concluded
- The Hunting of the Snark
- and "...all of the poetry, essays, phantasmagoria along with a substantial collection of the miscellaneous writings"

The cover of the book is a very lovely mixture of pink and black and gold, with a very whimsical illustration of Alice. If all you have is a paperback copy, then it's definitely worth to 'upgrade' to this particular edition.

I ordered this book because I have always been a fan of Alice in Wonderland, the cartoon as well as all the adaptations. However, I am ashamed to admit, at 22, I have never read the book. I just received it yesterday in the mail, and it is just a beautiful book! My husband almost didn't want me to read it because he says it should be on display! It has a beautiful pink hardcover with the picture in black and gold. The pages are gold gilded and there is one of the classic golden ribbon bookmarks attached to the binding. The book is about 2.5 inches thick. Consisting of:

Introduction
I. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
II. Through the Looking Glass
III. Sylvie and Bruno
IV. Sylvie and Bruno Concluded
V. Verse
The Hunting of the Snark
Early Verse
Puzzles from Wonderland
Prologues to Plays
Phantasmagoria
College Rhymes and Notes by an Oxford Chiel
Acrostics, Inscriptions, and Other Verse
Three Sunsets and Other Poems
VI. Stories
VII. A Miscellany
Index of First Lines of Verse

I was a little weary of purchasing this book, because I was worried the writing would be somewhat cryptic. I started reading this morning, have gotten about 30 pages in, and has been a fairly easy read!! I am not usually a fan of Introductions; however, I found this one rather informative, and made understanding of the text. It's definitely worth the buy, and would be a fond family heirloom!!

Bottom line up front: this is a very nice looking book, inside and out. It looks great sitting on the shelf, the typesetting is good, and the illustrations aren't too small. It has some fairly minor issues in terms of manufacturing quality (which is why it gets 4 stars instead of 5), but these are more than made up for by the low cover price (typically about $20-25 at the time of this review; watch out for scammers trying to sell it for more!).

This book is part of a line of "premium" editions of classic literature published by Barnes & Noble. It has a fancy cover, gilt edging to the pages, and a ribbon bookmark, but typically sells for about what you'd expect to pay for an edition in trade paperback format. The way they're able to accomplish this is by cutting corners on manufacturing quality. The book I received, for example, had some unevenness in the page trim (not enough to be too unsightly, but it was noticeable). But don't be too put off by that statement... when you're paying 1/5 of the price that most sellers of premium editions would charge (I'm thinking of Easton Press, as an example), you have to expect some short cuts.

The cover art is very appealing and makes the book stand out from others on the shelf, both for the pink color and the whimsical artwork. Since most people buy premium editions in order to have them look good on the shelf, this is an important feature, and in my opinion this edition succeeds admirably in that department. The interior art consists of classic Alice illustrations that are typically about 1/3 of a page in size. The art is crisp and clear (no blurry lines). The page layout and typesetting is standard hardcover book quality, as you'd expect. The most noticeable deficit is in the evenness of the page gilding, some of which stems from the previously mentioned uneven page cuts. Again, I emphasize that that this doesn't really detract from the overall appearance of the book... it's just something that you notice if you inspect the edge.

I can't say how durable this book will be in the long run; I expect it will be comparable to most hardcover books. If you want to buy a nice copy of Lewis Carroll's works, perhaps to read to your children and then pass down to them when they have children of their own, I don't think this would be a bad choice.