Through The Looking Glass (Carroll Lewis); William Collins, 2017

Alice laughed. ‘There’s no use trying,’ she said: ‘one can’t believe impossible things.’ ‘I dare say you haven’t had much practice,’ said the Queen. ‘When I was your age I always did it for half an hour a day. Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.’

In Carroll’s celebrated sequel to Alice in Wonderland, Alice passes through a mirror and enters a looking-glass world where order is turned upside down. From her guest appearance as a pawn in a chess match with the Red Queen to her meeting with Humpty Dumpty, Tweedledum and Tweedledee, Alice is greeted by nonsense characters whose poems, such as ‘The Walrus and the Carpenter’ and ‘Jabberwocky’, are as famous as Alice herself.

The subject of many film and TV adaptations, Through the Looking Glass showcases Carroll’s wit and humour, as well as his great skill at creating an imaginary world full of the fantastical and extraordinary.