The Collectors' Society (The Collectors' Society #1) by Heather Lyons

The Collectors' Society by Heather Lyons
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

The Collector's Society is a new adult modern day fairy tail retelling.

Whilst the book has multiple mentions of other literary works and it characters, it focuses mainly around Alice from Alice in wonderland and Finn from 'Adventures of Huckleberry Finn'.

The story begins with Alice who is institutionalized for reasons we will find out later on in the story. She is about to be released when a man comes to her in dire need of help. Alice reluctantly agrees to assist him in order to save loved ones she thought to have left behind for good. Though helping him means she gets thrown into a world and truth she had never imagined. She gets paired up with Finn, who is second in command in the Collector's Society and who's collective goal it is to ensure other worlds and their timelines are kept safe.

~ A doorway can lead a person into new spaces, and can allow in loved ones, enemies, new acquaintances, or horrible things that we never dare dream about. They can remove us from that we've just left, or present us a firm wall of acceptance we may or may not wish to embrace.

She finds out that not only is she brought to life by a book, but that there are catalysts to represent them which can be destroyed, wiping out the entire world with it.

 

We follow the pair and other members of the team in their quest to uncover who is behind multiple timeline deletions ( and also responsible for Finn's mothers death). And during this we find out more about why Alice left Wonderland behind. We get to wander through some other classical stories and have them meld together in a contemporary way.

~ So now we are wandering down a long corridor towards Van Brunt's office, and it's obvious Finn's doing his best to try to engage me when I can tell he'd rather me go back upstairs, or at least go find Mary and do something patently idiotic and wasteful of my time, like decorate his former partner's flat. Sexist, indeed.

Alice and Finn make a fantastic couple too. Neither of them are without their issues but their honesty toward another and ability to understand each others boundaries makes reading about their developing romance a real pleasure. I can not help but wanting them to have their happily ever after.

The white king is also a nice enigma to the book. Even though I'm generally not a big fan of 'love triangles', this is done is such a way I could not help but appreciate the sentiment and additional emotion it brought to the characters. Ouch my bleeding heart!

~ I would never undo our past; I would never wish our love had not flourished. His presence in my life has shaped me to be who I am now, just as I shaped him. But whilst neither of us would undo our shaped past, we cannot go back and live it once more, either.

It is all written from Alice's POV which worked well however I would have also loved to know what went on in the other characters minds at times. I did snoop and found out that part two is from both Alice's and Finn's POV which has me very excited (and is waiting on reader right now!!!!). All is written in current tense but the use of language and sentences have been adapted to Alice's original time which I find a very nice addition to the overall character and feel of the book.

In addition to this, I totally digged the humour that is found throughout. I have got to hand it to Heather Lyons, she did a fantastic job in combining all aspects I love into this series.



Would I recommend it?
Absolutely, whilst I would not let a young teen read it due to some mild sexual content, it is a perfect book for any fiction/romance/fantasy lover. There is action, humour, hot chemistry and some great twists.