Frank Beddor's Blog, page 7

Imagination Part Two: Wonderland Beginnings

Imagine a world of blind people.  They can feel warmth, but not see light.  Days and nights would just be warm times and cool times.  As science on this world advanced, there would be a realization that warmth has a source, the sun, which rises and sets.  A mysterious, invisible disk whose motions control warm times and cool times.

The Earth’s sun provides our world with energy, fueling change and life, but what if Earth has a second, hidden star?  A star whose changes are not effected in spa...

The Red Queen’s Last Son: Prince Leopold

Prince Leopold, Duke of Albany (1853-1884), was the eighth and youngest son of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. Handsome, gentle, charmingly shy, he received more of his mother’s attention than he liked, and as a young man he decided that the best means for gaining his independence was through marriage.

Leopold suffered from hemophilia, however, which not only kept him from active participation in sports and the military (though he held honorary positions in the latter); it also hindered his...

Part One: Wonderland’s Imagination Empowers

“Imagination is more powerful than knowledge.”

-       Albert Einstein

Imagination is the lifeblood of existence. Here in our happy little home realm of Earth we are not only dependent on our Imaginations for liberation from the mundane, but also for all innovative progress. A great creative mind can be the difference between total disaster or awesome advancement.

But… Where does Imagination come from? And how does it actually work?

I followed the threads, and I am here to tell you: It a...

Wonderland Look-Alikes: Some of The People Lewis Carroll Got Wrong

Princess Alyss Heart’s history was a bloody tale, full of power and terror and even a glowing glimmer of hope. When Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (a.k.a. Lewis Carroll) heard the harrowing story, he was full of good intentions. Jotting down her story he tried to help the troubled foundling, adopted by his dear friends, to adjust to her own childhood in Victorian England.

The writer did his best, crafting a story of whimsy that amused children and adults alike—however, they did not amuse Alice Lidd...

WHY I LOVE ALICE: WONDERFUL WONDERLAND

My friend Lynne Henderson is a Wonderverse super-fan and Alice Aficionado supreme. I have had the pleasure of enjoying Tarty Tarts masterfully created by Lynne at the Comic-Cons we have both immersed ourselves into—and recently as I craved a taste of those sweet treats, I thought I should give Lynne a platform to explain her take on the magic of Alice In Wonderland.

Without further delay, please enjoy her fantastic collection of All Things Alice, and her moving explanation of the power that t...

Wonderland Warrior & Alice's Future King: Dodge Anders

Dodge Anders—son of Sir Justice Anders, head guardsman of Wonderland’s Heart Palace—was a commoner who lived amid great privilege, having the splendors of his father’s workplace for his playground. He idolized his father, and the direction of his life had been known ever since the age of three, when he toddled into the coat of Sir Justice’s uniform and saluted. 

His dedication to following his father’s path was apparent in much of his childhood play with his best friend, Princess Alyss Heart,...

Alice Is An Alyss’s Kind of Alice In Wonderland

As the Royal Scholar of Wonderland, I, Bibwhit Harte am tasked with peering through the Pool of Tears to see the myriad of creations inspired by Wonderland, from Lewis Carroll's fanciful novels, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland  and Through the Looking Glass first published in 1865, to the 1951 animated movie Alice in Wonderland from Disney to the very accurate 2006 New York Times best-selling series The Looking Glass Wars with Princess Alyss by Frank Beddor (https://frankbeddor.com/)

I have ...

The Mother of Alyss Heart, Queen Genevieve

For Wonderland’s Queen Genevieve, (White Queen) even the most festive occasions could be clouded by the less savory aspects of governing. Her daughter Alyss (Alice) celebrating a seventh birthday party at Heart Palace was, by contrast, making all economic worries, political concerns, and military threats feel more acute. 

Especially the military threats. 

Unconfirmed reports suggested that Redd (Red Queen) was growing more powerful, in the final stages of outfitting troops for an attack, a...

Where in Wonderland? Key Locations of The Looking Glass Wars

The Wonderland of The Looking Glass Wars is full of places that perhaps you know from Lewis Carroll’s (sanitized) Alice In Wonderland. However, the truth behind the fiction is far more epic, beautiful, and at times dangerous.

Here are but a few of the highlights a Wonderverse traveler would see upon stepping through the looking glass:

The Pool of Tears

Unlike the Pool of Tears as described by Lewis Carroll, “Alice” (Alyss) did not cry this body of water alone. A swirling, luminescent la...

The Globe and Mail: Through Alice’s Looking Glass Darkly 

This article now wears a banner at the top—“This article was published more than 17 years ago. Some information may no longer be current.” As much as it makes me marvel at the passing of time, the things that have indeed changed—it also draws my attention to how much is still “the same”.

The one thing I know is that: The Story of Alice in Wonderland will always endure, not by staying the same, but by growing along with us.

From pop culture to politics, she permeates our language and our cr...