A delicious riff on Alice in Wonderland spun from cotton candy itself. This book is incessantly adorable and twee and overdone. However, it finds footing and just a teensy bit of needed acid in the all-too-real emotions of the characters. Alice Queensmeadow finds herself tethered to a very annoying boy who may be the key to finding her missing father. Alice and Oliver made a smart, sharp team as they navigate the curious world of Furthermore. They each possess differing degrees of tenderness and selfishness, cleverness and recklessness. In short, they act like twelve-year-old kids. Mafi's wildly inventive nature does owe something to Lewis Carroll, but her craft is also evidently of her own making, too. The kids traverse through towns called Slender and Still and Left. An all-knowing and occasionally sardonic narrator holds back crucial information until it is absolutely needed and also helps the reader understand the world. There's a fair smattering of magic, a good deal of friendship, and a pinch of perilous plots. (Was that sentence too much for you? If so, this book might not be for you.) 
 I wish I had a ten-year-old at home because this would make for a fabulous read-aloud.