Alice Queensmeadow was born "white as milk"--without any pigment--in Ferenwood, where color is magic and reigns supreme. As "smart and lively and passionate" as almost-12-year-old Alice is, she doesn't make sense to the planet-bright people of her fantastical world. Alice feels alone, even with her green-haired, brown-skinned mother whom she loves, but can't really like, "a prune of a person" who is constantly threatening her with outlandish punishments like "whisking" her into an elephant. When her father abandoned the family three years ago, "[t]he shock of loss unlatched [Alice's] armor, and soon cold winds and whispers of fear snuck through the cracks in her skin...." She would do anything to escape Ferenwood and find her father... even if means joining forces with her childhood nemesis Oliver Newbanks.
Alice careens wildly between brooding and optimism. Often she is full of joy, almost Pan-like. Her beaded, bejeweled clothes exhaust her, so she frequently removes them. She loves her body, and dancing, and eats flowers without honey because she wants to taste them "unmasked," the taste of truth. Will she ever find a place to blossom? With its fascinating heroine, companionable narrator, wit and Oz-like world-building, Furthermore by Tahereh Mafi (Shatter Me; Unravel Me; Ignite Me) is a surprising, sensuous, delicious fantasy to devour like Alice devours flowers. --Karin Snelson, children's & YA editor, Shelf Awareness