Wonderland

Wonderland is one of the Bookworlds of the Dreamlands. Because Wonderland has been so popular for so long, it has many ways to access it from both the Waking World and the Dreamlands. Its borders are open and indeed it is one of the very few parts of the Dreamlands that is still expanding.

Most of Wonderland is in the Underworld, accessed from a rabbit hole that leads directly to Wonderland from the surface in an idyllic corner of Kornweal.

Wonderland was originally entered by a young girl Dreamer named Alice. Just as Kuranes is the dream-name of a human from the Waking World, so too "Alice" is the name of a young girl from the Waking World. In the case of "Alice" her real name is remarkably close to her dream-name. Perhaps because modern dreaming was still in its infancy when Wonderland was discovered.

Alice's adventures are chronicled in chapters as is normal for Bookworlds.

### **Chapter One – Down the Rabbit Hole**:

Alice,
 a seven-year-old girl, is feeling bored and drowsy while sitting on the
 riverbank with her elder sister. She then notices a talking, clothed White Rabbit
 with a pocket watch run past. She follows it down a rabbit hole when
suddenly she falls a long way to a curious hall with many locked doors
of all sizes. She finds a small key to a door too small for her to fit
through, but through it she sees an attractive garden. She then
discovers a bottle on a table labelled "DRINK ME," the contents of which
 cause her to shrink too small to reach the key which she has left on
the table. She eats a cake with "EAT ME" written on it in currants as
the chapter closes.

### **Chapter Two – The Pool of Tears**:

Chapter Two opens with
Alice growing to such a tremendous size her head hits the ceiling. Alice
 is unhappy and, as she cries, her tears flood the hallway. After
shrinking down again due to a fan she had picked up, Alice swims through
 her own tears and meets a Mouse,
 who is swimming as well. She tries to make small talk with him in
elementary French (thinking he may be a French mouse) but her opening
gambit "Où est ma chatte?" ("Where is my cat?") offends the mouse and he
 tries to escape her.

### **Chapter Three – The Caucus Race and a Long Tale**:

The sea
of tears becomes crowded with other animals and birds that have been
swept away by the rising waters. Alice and the other animals convene on
the bank and the question among them is how to get dry again. The Mouse
gives them a very dry lecture on William the Conqueror. A Dodo
 decides that the best thing to dry them off would be a Caucus-Race,
which consists of everyone running in a circle with no clear winner.
Alice eventually frightens all the animals away, unwittingly, by talking
 about her (moderately ferocious) cat.

### **Chapter Four – The Rabbit Sends a Little Bill**:

The White
Rabbit appears again in search of the Duchess's gloves and fan.
Mistaking her for his maidservant, Mary Ann, he orders Alice to go into
the house and retrieve them. Inside the house she finds another little
bottle and drinks from it; immediately she starts growing again. The
horrified Rabbit orders his gardener, Bill the Lizard,
 to climb on the roof and go down the chimney. Outside, Alice hears the
voices of animals that have gathered to gawk at her giant arm. The crowd
 hurls pebbles at her, which turn into little cakes. Alice eats them,
and they reduce her again in size.

### **Chapter Five – Advice from a Caterpillar**:

Alice comes upon a mushroom and sitting on it is a blue Caterpillar smoking a hookah. The Caterpillar questions Alice and she admits to her current identity crisis, compounded by her inability to remember a poem.
 Before crawling away, the caterpillar tells Alice that one side of the
mushroom will make her taller and the other side will make her shorter.
She breaks off two pieces from the mushroom. One side makes her shrink
smaller than ever, while another causes her neck to grow high into the
trees, where a pigeon mistakes her for a serpent. With some effort,
Alice brings herself back to her normal height. She stumbles upon a
small estate and uses the mushroom to reach a more appropriate height.

### **Chapter Six – Pig and Pepper**:

A Fish-Footman has an invitation for the Duchess
 of the house, which he delivers to a Frog-Footman. Alice observes this
transaction and, after a perplexing conversation with the frog, lets
herself into the house. The Duchess's Cook is throwing dishes and making
 a soup that has too much pepper, which causes Alice, the Duchess, and
her baby (but not the cook or grinning Cheshire Cat)
 to sneeze violently. Alice is given the baby by the Duchess and to her
surprise, the baby turns into a pig. The Cheshire Cat appears in a tree,
 directing her to the March Hare's
 house. He disappears but his grin remains behind to float on its own in
 the air prompting Alice to remark that she has often seen a cat without
 a grin but never a grin without a cat.

### **Chapter Seven – A Mad Tea-Party**:

Alice becomes a guest at a "mad" tea party along with the March Hare, the Hatter, and a very tired Dormouse
 who falls asleep frequently, only to be violently awakened moments
later by the March Hare and the Hatter. The characters give Alice many
riddles and stories, including the famous 'Why is a raven like a writing desk?'.
 The Hatter reveals that they have tea all day because Time has punished
 him by eternally standing still at 6 pm (tea time). Alice becomes
insulted and tired of being bombarded with riddles and she leaves
claiming that it was the stupidest tea party that she had ever been to.

### **Chapter Eight – The Queen's Croquet Ground**:

Alice leaves the
tea party and enters the garden where she comes upon three living
playing cards painting the white roses on a rose tree red because The Queen of Hearts
 hates white roses. A procession of more cards, kings and queens and
even the White Rabbit enters the garden. Alice then meets the King and
Queen. The Queen, a figure difficult to please, introduces her signature
 phrase "Off with his head!" which she utters at the slightest
dissatisfaction with a subject. Alice is invited (or some might say
ordered) to play a game of croquet with the Queen and the rest of her
subjects but the game quickly descends into chaos. Live flamingos are
used as mallets and hedgehogs as balls and Alice once again meets the
Cheshire Cat. The Queen of Hearts then orders the Cat to be beheaded,
only to have her executioner complain that this is impossible since the
head is all that can be seen of him. Because the cat belongs to the
Duchess, the Queen is prompted to release the Duchess from prison to
resolve the matter.

### **Chapter Nine – The Mock Turtle's Story**:

The Duchess is
brought to the croquet ground at Alice's request. She ruminates on
finding morals in everything around her. The Queen of Hearts dismisses
her on the threat of execution and she introduces Alice to the Gryphon, who takes her to the Mock Turtle.
 The Mock Turtle is very sad, even though he has no sorrow. He tries to
tell his story about how he used to be a real turtle in school, which
the Gryphon interrupts so they can play a game.

### **Chapter Ten – Lobster Quadrille**:

The Mock Turtle and the Gryphon dance to the Lobster Quadrille, while Alice recites (rather incorrectly) "'Tis the Voice of the Lobster". The Mock Turtle sings them "Beautiful Soup" during which the Gryphon drags Alice away for an impending trial.

### **Chapter Eleven – Who Stole the Tarts?**:

Alice attends a trial whereby the Knave of Hearts is accused of stealing the Queen's tarts. The jury is composed of various animals, including Bill the Lizard, the White Rabbit is the court's trumpeter, and the judge is the King of Hearts.
During the proceedings, Alice finds that she is steadily growing larger.
 The dormouse scolds Alice and tells her she has no right to grow at
such a rapid pace and take up all the air. Alice scoffs and calls the
dormouse's accusation ridiculous because everyone grows and she cannot
help it. Meanwhile, witnesses at the trial include the Hatter, who
displeases and frustrates the King through his indirect answers to the
questioning, and the Duchess's cook.

### **Chapter Twelve – Alice's Evidence**:

Alice is then called up
 as a witness. She accidentally knocks over the jury box with the
animals inside them and the King orders the animals be placed back into
their seats before the trial continues. The King and Queen order Alice
to be gone, citing Rule 42 ("All persons more than a mile high to leave
the court"), but Alice disputes their judgement and refuses to leave.
She argues with the King and Queen of Hearts over the ridiculous
proceedings, eventually refusing to hold her tongue, only to say, "It's
not that I was the one who stole the tarts in the first place", in the
process. Finally, the Queen confirms that Alice was the culprit
responsible of stealing the tarts after all (which automatically pardons
 the Knave of Hearts of his charges), and shouts, "Off with her head!",
but Alice is unafraid, calling them just a pack of cards; although Alice
 holds her own for a time, the card guards soon gang up and start to
swarm all over her. Alice's sister wakes her up from a dream, brushing
what turns out to be some leaves and not a shower of playing cards from
Alice's face. Alice leaves her sister on the bank to imagine all the
curious happenings for herself.

Although Alice did not return permanently to the Dreamlands, unlike Kuranes, almost all the characters she met still live and thrive there. Several of them also appear well outside Wonderland from time to time.