Easter may have hit on the first weekend in April, but the bunnies are still abounding this spring. Particularly if you love reading books of all kinds from fantasy to manga to…a cocktail book? Yes, and all for the joy of reading!
After Alice by Gregory Maguire
Many might know Maguire from his bestselling Wicked series which, thanks to the musical and movie, is pretty much everywhere. Yet, Maguire has taken on many well known stories, and given them his own darker spin. His own trip down the rabbit hole through the eyes of a young girl named Ada came out in 2015 coinciding with the 150th of Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. Like the title indicates, Alice’s briefly mentioned friend Ada fell down the rabbit hole not long afterAlice. Is this the best Alice in Wonderland inspired book? Not by a long shot. It starts out pretty slow and wordy, and isn’t a happy quirky whimsical romp that is a Wonderland staple. It is, is an interesting insight. Ada is nothing like Alice (who we don’t even see until the end of the book FYI). She’s a very stoic and reality-based. She also has mobility issues having to wear a brace. Once you get past the initial slog of the beginning, it does pick up a bit towards the middle. It also gives us a perspective that shows even a familiar tale will be different through another set of eyes.
The Dead Rabbit: Mixology and Mayhem by Sean Muldoon, Jack McGarry and Jillian Vose
Yes, I am including a what appears on the surface to be a cocktail book. Well, it actually is a cocktail book, but is also a slice of gritty New York history and the establishment of what has been named The World’s Best Bar more than once. A couple of Irishmen came to New York and started an Irish bar. That’s nothing new, but it was their imaginative twist on on the theme that make this book a cool read. Their graphic novel menus that tell a violent story of the rabbit headed 20th century spirit of notorious Dead Rabbit gang leader-turned-prize-fighter-turned-senator, John Morrissey. I admit I didn’t buy this book for the recipes at all, although there’s some good stuff in there. I wanted the complete tale of The Rabbit starting from the resurrection of Morrissey’s spirit in 1978 Hell’s Kitchen. The art is stylized and dark with plenty of blood and a bit of nookie. Think Peaky Blinders or Gangs of New York style storytelling interspersed with a good recipe for drinks like one called a Psycho Killer.
Beastars by Paru Itagaki
I may have recommended this manga series sometime ago, but this month is a great time to remind you of it. Paru Itagaki’s full 22-issue manga series is out and available, so you can read the entire story. This year the anime adaption is also reaching it’s final season. You can binge all three seasons after the reading the series is if you want. An easy way many explain this series is “Zootopia for grown ups,” and Itagaki admittedly first come out after the Disney movie. She even said she was inspired by it. However, it is much deeper. It takes place on a college campus, where our wolf protagonist Legoshi is a soft-spoken theatre student. Of course, in the animal world, there’s going to be the obligatory carnivore/herbivore tension. It gets worse when an herbivore student is killed and devoured. Legoshi meets the book’s female lead, Haru, a dwarf rabbit. Needless to say his feelings are…conflicted. This is part crime thriller, part love story and part study of human nature…through anthropomorphic animals. I know it sounds weird, but it is a really good story.
Before April scampers away, make sure to pick up and enjoy one of these rabbit centric reads, because no matter the month, escaping into a book is always in season.