Title: A Blade So Black
Author: L.L. McKinney
Published: September 25th, 2018
Pages: 384

Quick synopsis: Alice trained to battle monstrous creatures in the dark dream realm known as Wonderland with magic weapons and hardcore fighting skills. But she still has a life in real-world Atlanta. Keeping the Nightmares at bay is turning into a full-time job. But when Alice's handsome and mysterious mentor is poisoned, she has to find the antidote by venturing deeper into Wonderland than she’s ever gone before. And she'll need to use everything she's learned in both worlds to keep from losing her head . . . literally.

Goodreads Rating: 3.77
My Rating: 3.50

Would I recommend?: Yes
Why?: A Blade So Black is every YA book of 2017 rolled into one. It has contemporary romance, a fairytale retelling, and it even addresses issues with race in the US. This book has it ALL. With all of this, the complexity of the storyline is incredible! At first I was concerned I wouldn’t be able to keep up, but I realized that if anything, it just adds that much more to the book and Alice’s development.

Aside from the kicking-ass-in-Wonderland parts of the book, I really enjoyed reading about the very REAL life of Alice. Alice is a normal teenager growing up in Atlanta with her mom. She’s struggling with school, falling in love, and sneaking out WAY past curfew; things that every teenager deals with. But she also can’t stop thinking about the black teenage girl who was shot and killed by a police officer. This is unfortunately a very real life for many people living in the U.S. today. Racism in America needs to be addressed by more people, more authors, and I give much praise to LL McKinney for doing so.

On a separate note, the beginning of A Blade So Black was fantastic, but once we got to the “main conflict,” I was a little disappointed it wasn’t bigger than it was. I expected something catastrophic and maybe some shenanigans with Hatta, but that unfortunately did not happen. Instead, it was a minor conflict that Alice had to solve with the help of a few of her new friends. I think my biggest disappointment - and why I lost interest with that part of the book - was because Hatta wasn’t involved. I found Hatta to be such an important role to this book and he wasn’t used enough.

The only thing I would change about the writing style would be to make the narrative 1st person. If we could see directly into Alice’s mind and hear her direct thoughts, I think Alice could’ve developed into an even more powerful and relatable character, especially with the more serious topics touched upon in the book.

Overall, this was a very fun read that is completely different from literally any other book.