I can't say that I'm wild about the illustrations in this book. The convention of having Alice in a sepia toned world at the beginning and end and in a full colour world while in Wonderland is very overused. I'm slightly confused at Mr. Foreman's insistence that he is mimicking photographs (particularly with the sepia toned pages) because the watercolours are so far from being even a little bit photographic. It's cute that he used Alice Liddel as his model, but she seemed rather conventional as well. I don't know. This book just lacked the magic that so many other editions have captured! It felt like he was doing it because at some point every illustrator should do Alice (as he says in the afterward). To me, that isn't a reason.

I like that Mr. Foreman illustrated each pair of verses from "You Are Old, Father William". I always wonder, though, why that is commonly done with "Father William" and very rarely done with either "The Walrus and the Carpenter" or "Jabberwocky".

The tea party was interesting. I didn't feel like the rendition of the Dormouse worked and I very much disliked that the chairs all matched. I did like the pile of hats on the Mad Hatter's head as well as the face on the teapot.

The cards bugged me. The gardeners are supposed to be spades, but the picture clearly shows hearts! I think that is one of the cleverest details in the whole book and the illustrator messed it up!

I liked the Gryphon very much, but some of the others I wondered about. Why is the Cheshire Cat always striped? The text never mentions stripes. And why does the Mock Turtle always have goat/calf legs and a long tail? Again, the text never mentions such things! I just find it all odd.

Overall I don't think that I like these illustrations very much.

I'm not sure that I'm wild about the illustrations in this book. They don't seem at all inspired by photography other than that Alice is clearly modeled after Alice Liddel. The watercolour quality of the pictures is nice, but I almost would have liked them even a little less clear. Fewer clear lines and more blurriness. I'm not describing what I mean very well, but I hope you get the idea. Anyway, they don't feel terribly "wonderlandish" to me. They are too conventional in their way. I liked the picture of Alice leaning against the flower fanning herself, but so far that is the only picture that has stood out for me at all. I guess we'll see how the rest of the book goes!

Why must all introductions to this book be so much the same? They always discuss the boat ride where the story was first told and they always mention that Lewis Carroll himself as well as Tenniel have illustrated the story and that it is a classic of children's literature. Both this one and the last one discussed Carroll's fascination with photography. Both illustrators took Carroll's photography as inspiration, although this one points his illustrations in watercolours. I look forward to seeing the results Mr. Foreman achieved!