'Alice in Brexitland' to publish ahead of general election

Ebury has acquired an Alice in Wonderland themed political parody telling the story of Brexit. 

In Alice in Brexitland, "a young British voter finds herself thrown into a magical realm of post-truth politics, where up is down, black is white, experts are fools and fools are experts". The book is written by TV comedy writer Lucien Young and illustrated by Ollie Mann, in the style of the original Tenniel illustrations. It is timed to publish in hardback on 1st June, just ahead of the general election (£7.99) on 8th June.

Parodying a host of politicians, it features characters such as "'Dave' the Camerarabbit, who Alice follows down the Brexithole", Nigel Farage as the "inanely grinning Cheshire Cat" Jeremy Corbyn as the "Corbyn-pillar, smoking a hookah all day on his toadstool and being no help to anyone", Theresa May as the "hard-Brexit-pushing Queen of Heartlessness", the nonsensical "Tweedleboz and Tweedlegove" and Trump as Trumpty Dumpty, "sitting on a wall he wants the Mexicans to pay for".

Anna Mrowiec, the book's acquiring editor, said: "The Brexit debacle is so rife for parody, and it’s amazing how well Lewis Carroll’s rhetoric works for the politicians of today. What Lucien has achieved is much more than ‘greetings card’ publishing – it’s a very funny, very clever, wonderfully illustrated book that I think is really going to chime with a lot of people right now."

Young said: "It's been a delight getting the chance to balance the absurdity of modern British politics with the relative sanity of Lewis Carroll. I'm excited for people to read the book and, if its release should happen to bring down the government, this will all have been worthwhile."

The book follows other parodies poking fun at modern politics, including Christmas number one Five on Brexit Island (Quercus) and Howard Jacobson's Pussy (Jonathan Cape), another fairy tale for grown-ups, telling the story of how a boastful dunce becomes the leader of the free world.