Alice in the Country of Hearts 1 by QuinRose and Soumei Hoshino: B-

From the back cover:
Wonderland is officially at war! And Alice is trapped in the middle of it all. Will she make it out alive? A little arrogant, stubborn, and determined to get back home, Alice isn’t fazed by these challenges… until she discovers that every man is gun crazy and weirdly in love with her. What’s going on in Wonderland?!

Review:
Based on a “female-oriented romance adventure game” developed in Japan by QuinRose, Alice in the Country of Hearts is a reimagining of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and features a girl named Alice (shokku!) who is forcibly whisked away down a hole by a white rabbit. He doesn’t stay a bunny for long, though, as he quickly transforms into a bishounen, declares that he loves Alice, introduces himself as Peter White, and forces her to drink a vial of medicine that commits her to playing “the game.” Justifiably, Alice thinks he’s a huge creep and runs off.

In quick succession, Alice meets a bevy of handsome fellows, the most important of which are Blood Dupre (a.k.a. the hatter), a mafia boss who looks just like her ex-boyfriend; somber Julius Monrey, a clock maker who offers some heavily edited explanations of what’s going on; and Nightmare, a dream demon who visits Alice in her sleep and provides the most useful information. All of the guys are inclined to love Alice and, indeed, seem to be prohibited from feeling love for anybody else. The world is divided into four areas and, aside from Julius’ neutral Clock Tower Plaza, everyone else is at war with each other and fond of engaging in shootouts without regard for public safety.

Alice is convinced that the whole world is a dream, but Nightmare tells her it’s not a world she created, but is instead a world she wished for. She’s quite dismayed to find she apparently wished for a world full of fairy tale castles and frilly clothes, but subtle references to her past suggest her ex-boyfriend fell for her more ladylike sister and that she is feeling lonely and unloved. Amorous declarations utterly fail to move her—she’s much more interested in the mysterious goings-on involving disappearing corpses and shadowy beings—but she can’t help being drawn to Blood, even though she knows he’s dangerous.

Because of Alice’s cleverness and strong personality—I love many of her lines, like “I didn’t realize I was so lame” and “I’m sick of your condescending crap! This place is freaking me out!”—Alice in the Country of Hearts is a lot better than it really has any right to be. The focus is much more on the mysteries of the world than romance, and a nicely ominous atmosphere is created, with several of the guys—and not necessarily the ones you’d suspect—concealing secrets from Alice.

On the downside, the narrative framework is clearly transplanted from a videogame. If Alice wants to return home, she must refill the medicine vial. And to refill the medicine vial, she must interact with the world’s inhabitants. This results in Alice walking back and forth between the four main areas in the world, encountering different hotties, witnessing bizarre happenings, and having to walk elsewhere to discuss what she just saw with someone. It feels exactly like playing an adventure game. Ask Julius about the creepy shadows? Yes/No

In the end, Alice exceeded my expectations but didn’t exactly knock my socks off. That said, I’m genuinely interested in reading the next volume, and I wasn’t expecting that outcome at all.

Alice in the Country of Hearts is published in English by TOKYOPOP. The series is ongoing in Japan, where four collected volumes have been released.

Review copy provided by the publisher.