Review: Splintered by A.G. Howard

Title: Splintered (Splintered #1)
Author: A.G. Howard
Demographic : Young Adult
Genre: Fantasy, Adventure, Romance, Retellings

Splintered by A.G. Howard is a spectacular book, a retelling of Alice's Adventure in Wonderland with a twist of all the characters in a more dark and gloomy adventure.

A quick blurb from Goodreads:

Alyssa Gardner hears the whispers of bugs and flowers—precisely the affliction that landed her mother in a mental hospital years before. This family curse stretches back to her ancestor Alice Liddell, the real-life inspiration for Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. Alyssa might be crazy, but she manages to keep it together. For now.

Alyssa is taken on a journey to help her mother and break a curse that has ruined her family. By doing so, she has to venture into the place she never thought to exist. There's talking bugs, man eating flowers and a seductive moth. Can't get any better than that. With the help of Jeb, her best friend and Morpheus, a forgotten friend, she needs the courage to help her mother before it's too late.

I seriously didn't know what to expect when reading this book, I don't have much knowledge of the original Wonderland book and just recently watched Burton's movie version of it so I still came at this book with a surprise. The first chapter really brought me in although in general it did take me awhile to finish the book as I was hesitant about the supposed love triangle but it turned out better then I thought.

First, can I say that I love Jeb. He's the Alpha boy that I always wanted to have, in fiction anyway. He's this possessive, caring, and in control guy that helps out Alyssa as she takes on the task of breaking this curse. Sometimes he could be a bit much with handling her but that seriously made me fall for him more than Morpheus. I can get the jist of why people would choose him but he was a bit more manipulative for my taste. The romance with Jeb made me swoon a lot as I enjoyed that he was very much involved with Alyssa, and cared for her while knowing when to let her care for him also. I love how the attraction is so obvious with his growls and appraisals of her, -shivers- definitely an Alpha boy. 

The detail Howard explains of all her characters is magnificent, she has a way with words that drew her characters in my mind with such a display, I really couldn't help but applause her writing style. Her darker elements to the original characters of Carroll's book was well done, as she gave them a more grotesque way of looking, comparing them to how a child would really see it and going from there.

I never read any other books from her but I will definitely be checking out the sequels and other upcoming books because this to me was a can't miss kind of book. Definitely recommended to those who wants a good tale of adventure with the twist of the Wonderland characters and a heap of fantasy involved. And of course the romance heh.

My Rating: 5 stars

Love the ending. I usually rate by how well the book was and if I was content with how everything went, and the ending did just that. The pacing wasn't slow and I was more enthralled as I continued reading. I kinda wished it ended there but I have to have more of Jeb and hope the love triangle doesn't get too tangled up in the sequels.

Romance Rating: 5 

This is just my own rating of how much I believed the characters and how the overall romance went. I loved it so much! There was a lot of levels of intimacy that I don't really get much from other young adult books I've read and I loved how Howard put more in here. True, there were some scenes with Morpheus too, but I still enjoyed it even though I'm still trying to warm up to him.

Recommended: Yes!

I know this won't be everyone's cup of tea but I think people should still try it out just because it's really engaging for fantasy readers and the details are phenomenal. I think people will be more upset about the love triangle like I did in the beginning, but its point blank obvious who's it going to be so I don't mind as long as that person (Jeb) is the endgame. Will be hitting the sequel up soon!