Customer Reviews

Automated Alice

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

Automated Alice is a sequel to Lewis Carrol's two books about Alice. Instead of going down a rabbit hole or through a mirror, in this book Alice travels through a grandfather clock to Manchester England in 1998. However this is not the Manchester of our experience. It is a world populated by half-humans who ride on mechanical horses. Its computers are powered by termites called Computermites. Her adventures in this strange world bear enough resemblances to the original stories to make this an enjoyable sequel. Alice must figure out the puzzle of how to get back to her own time with the help of a parrot that speaks in riddles and an automated Alice with a termite brain. There are some wonderful word plays and mathematical concepts in the story. It is a short enjoyable tale that should please Alice fans of all ages. If you haven't read the original stories, skip this book.

Now I'd just like to point out that Jeff Noon is an astonishingly talented writer; his first two books, "Vurt" and the slightly more accessable "Pollen" both display a phenominal imagination which is admirably transferred to paper by Noon's considerable writing abilities. I know that sounds like hyperbole, but believe me: Jeff Noon has Talent.

...not that you would be able to tell from "Automated Alice". In this book, Lewis Carroll's Alice visits the English city of Manchester where she climbs inside an old granfather clock and finds herself swept away into the future, where animal people are being mysteriously "jigsaw murdered". Now this doesn't sound too bad - an Alice book with an adult bent - but Noon's writing style makes the whole thing a struggle. His Alice, for example, makes fatuous comments constantly, whether they are amusing or not. At least a fifth of the book is taken up by pointless and unfunny word-games that even Carroll would have avoided. Granted, there was a fair bit of silly word play in Carroll's books but he knew where to draw the line; Noon crosses it so far that he's just a speck of dust on the horizon.

In fact, aside from the protagonist and - good grief! - a scientific explanation for the Cheshire Cat's invisibility, there really is very little connection between Carroll's books and this one. The dreamlike quality of Wonderland and Looking-Glass, with their ever-shifting locations and nonsensical conversations, are replaced with a join-the-dots "plot" and some indecipherable bumph involving Lewis Carroll himself.

The whole book is nothing more than one huge pet project for Noon (tellingly, he appears in the book under the pseudonym Zenith O'Clock - High Noon, see? - and whines about how nobody liked his first two books) and like most pet projects should not have left the author's mind.

Still, the illustrations and cover are delightful, and Noon's subsequent work - especially Pixel Juice - is of equal, if not better, quality to Vurt and Pollen.

Sweet dreams.

Jeff Noon wrote this amazingly entertaining and imaginative book as a trequel to Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass. Alice suddenly finds herself transported to 1998 Manchester and becomes the prime suspect in the Jigsaw Murders, as she tries to gather the pieces and find her way back home to her own time and reality. As she is escorted on her journey by Celia, an automated version of herself, she makes the acquaintance of many strange creatures, all suffering from Newmonia (not to be mistaken for pneumonia). In true Carroll fashion, Noon uses crazy wordplay throughout often confusing not only the fictitious characters, but the unsuspecting reader as well. I found this book very delightful!

If you've read any other Jeff Noon, you'll realise there are a ton of 'Alice' references in his writing. Being a BIG fan of Carroll's stories I enjoy picking up on these, and when I saw Noon had written a follow-up to Carroll's Alice stories, I was admittedly wary, but intrigued.
Clearly the reviewer who wrote a wonderfully detailed review three sentences long has no idea who Lewis Carroll/Charles Dodgson was, or any concept of use of nonsensical verse, and probably not much appreciation for any sort of wordplay. Honey, you're missing out.
'Automated Alice' is a lovely tied-in sidetrack to the worlds of 'Vurt' and Noon's other novels. If you like either Noon or Carroll (or even better and highly probable - BOTH), chances are you'll like this. It's playful, very funny, and means only well. Don't overanalyze it, or take it too seriously - it's a fun read, and particularly good if you want to kill an hour but not with anything heavy-hitting that requires a high degree of cranial chewing. That's not to say there's nothing to analyze, but you don't have to to enjoy it. After all, that's what fiction's for.
I'm sure if Carroll was alive, he'd have a chuckle at this one.

Alice in Wonderland has "inspired" a number of hacks to produce poor material, from movies to books to video games. Here, Jeff Noon manages to avoid re-treading the surreal cliches in which most "tributes" indulge.

This book is a cross-pollination of Lewis Carroll's universe (from whence Alice originates) with Jeff Noon's universe (the setting of Vurt, Pollen, etc.) Noon (who has a distinctive style of his own) does a fair job of emulating Carroll's writing, but emphasizes the puns and wordplay that make Carroll's books so delightful to adults. Although it's a quick read, you're rewarded if you take the time to enjoy the wit.

Unlike many other Alice-"inspired" work, Noon has well-developed plot and a strong central theme he writes towards, one that is enhanced by the allusions to Lewis Carroll. The "Automated" Alice of the title is a robotic Alice; the differences and interactions between Alice Liddell, Alice "in Wonderland," and "Automated" Alice are used to form an interesting central metaphor.

I recommend this book highly. It's clever, fun, and intriguing.

Alice, of Wonderland fame, is visiting her Great Aunt Ermintrude and very unwisely lets her parrot, Whippoorwill, out of his cage. Whippoorwill flies into the grandfather clock, and Alice (dragging her doll Celia with her) climbs in after him but ends up in the future--1998 to be exact. The future is populated by people that are mixed breeds of animal and human, and is ruled by the frightening Civil Serpents. To return to her own time, Alice (and her now automated doll, Celia), must find Whippoorwill, her missing jigsaw puzzle pieces, solve the Jigsaw Murder of which she's been falsely accused and hopefully, discover the proper usage of the ellipses.

While Automated Alice promises much in it's early chapters, Noon is unable to deliver more than the occasional clever wordplay. The plot is unfulfilling, almost contrived at points. He tries hard to create the same bizarre feel that Carroll's books have, but is unsuccessful; instead Automated Alice feels frantic and unintelligible. The idea was great, but the delivery was poor.

Automated Alice as a sequel to the Lewis Carroll Alice books is an excellent idea, but unfortunately a poorly executed one. The plot is overly simplistic and the alternate world Noon describes is flat and never truly came to life. Noon does conceive of many strange creatures and landscapes, yet his descriptions are facile and never succeed in drawing the reader in to the world he is striving to create.

Noon tries very hard to make the his descriptions incongruous and intriguing, very hard to make Alice and her dialogue quirky and funny - so hard in fact that the reader can spot the joke (so called) from a mile away and is left trudging through page after page of obvious and uninteresting tedium. The word play, while somewhat clever, is excessively used, and really comes across as repetitive self indulgence on the part of the author as though he were saying "Ho ho, look at me, I'm so clever" to a group of 6 year olds. An author shouldn't have to tell us he is clever - show us!

I wanted to like this book. I loved the concepts. That's the problem - Noon's ideas are good in theory, but as the execution plays out it is extremely disappointing.

Jeff Noon has done a decent job of writing what could easily be consided a third "Alice" book.

Instead of having Alice travel to Wonderland, Noon places her in a very bizarre "modern day" Manchester. Now, having never been to Manchester, I can't say for sure that it is not like what Alice encounters, but let's just say that I'm pretty sure it's not.

Regardless, the whole book was oodles of fun, and I was quite sorry to see it end.

If you've read any of Jeff Noon's other novels, you know that he's maniacally brilliant and quite off-the-wall. Automated Alice doesn't do anything to dissuade readers of that notion.

Noon tries, rather successfully in my opinion, to write a third Alice story...one in which she finds herself in present day Manchester, England after climbing through a grandfather clock. Noon uses Carroll's fine use of language and wordplay to create this very entertaining story which does fit into the Manchester he created with Pollen and Vurt.

This is a story written as only Noon could write it. Some will say it's a rip-off and a poor imitation of Carroll but I think it's a great tribute and a fun read.

Automated Alice by itself is a very confusing read, but if you are a fan of Jeff Noon, and more importantly have read "Vurt" and "Pollen" then you will be right at home in this tale. This book actually falls into the vurt world in a slightly different order than one might expect, being a flashback to before "Vurt" and "Pollen" take place. Automated Alice starts out very "childlike", but progresses to become a part of the Manchester from the first two novels. A subtle fact that is lost on most readers is that the "Automated Alice" is Celia Hobart, a very key player in the world of Vurt. Jeff Noon has written two more novels since Alice that haven't been released in the US. "Nymphomation" and due in October is" Pixel Juice". Nymphomation picks up not long after "Automated Alice" leaves off, and "Pixel Juice" will be after "Nymphomation". I guess what I am saying is that as a stand alone novel, people can be somewhat confused, but as a piece in the growing "Vurt" universe it is a wonderful novel filling in a few more gaps while opening others. If anyone is interested in finding out how to order "Nymphomation" and "Pixel Juice" feel free to e-mail me and I will tell you how.