Title: Literary Wonderlands: A Journey Through the Greatest Fictional Words Ever Created

Edited by: Laura Miller

Publisher: Black Dog and Leventhal Publishers 2016

Genre: Nonfiction - Literature

Pages: 319

Rating: 5/5 stars

Reading Challenges: A to Z - L; I Love Libraries 

A glorious collection that delves deep into the inception, influences, and literary and historical underpinnings of nearly 100 of our most beloved fictional realms.

Literary Wonderlands is a thoroughly researched, wonderfully written, and beautifully produced book that spans four thousand years of creative endeavor. From Spenser's The Fairie Queene to Wells's The Time Machine to Murakami's 1Q84 it explores the timeless and captivating features of fiction's imagined worlds including the relevance of the writer's own life to the creation of the story, influential contemporary events and philosophies, and the meaning that can be extracted from the details of the work. Each piece includes a detailed overview of the plot and a "Dramatis Personae." Literary Wonderlands is a fascinating read for lovers of literature, fantasy, and science fiction.

Random library pick that I really loved! This collection of essays explore 98 works of of fiction involving amazing created worlds. While I recognized most of the works (and have read a good chunk of them), I loved reading about the origins, meanings, and interesting facts about each one. Miller organizes the works chronologically with references to previous works and other well-known works. I loved reading these short essays so much that I decided to create a new perpetual reading challenge for the works presented. 

Next up on the TBR pile: