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Mirror Mirror
Looking through her antique mirror, 13-year-old Jo discovers that she can see into Louisa's world, a world many years before her time. To her surprise, Jo discovers that it is also possible for her and Louisa to step through the mirror into one another's time.
At first, the mirror is a source of wonder and delight, but the two girls quickly discover that they must alter the past so they can avoid a catastrophe in the present.
While they struggle through the layers of space and time, Jo discovers Nicholas - a boy whose identity is a mystery - living in Louisa's time. Captivated by each other, Jo and Nicholas work together to save their friends and to find a way of spanning time so they can remain together.
At first, the mirror is a source of wonder and delight, but the two girls quickly discover that they must alter the past so they can avoid a catastrophe in the present.
While they struggle through the layers of space and time, Jo discovers Nicholas - a boy whose identity is a mystery - living in Louisa's time. Captivated by each other, Jo and Nicholas work together to save their friends and to find a way of spanning time so they can remain together.
- GenresFantasyTime Travel
216 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1996
43 people want to read
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December 2, 2025
I got one! I got one!
Okay, so before I begin the review, a little explanation of HOW I obtained a physical copy of this ultra-rare out of print book is probably warranted.
I was searching everywhere for this book. This search was not going great, to put it mildly.
Barnes and Noble supposedly has this book listed in its store databases (though not online) but that means exactly nothing since they can't request or order a copy; they can just inform you that if you ever build a time machine and go back twenty years they'll be able to sell it to you for $5.99 -- yay.
As I unfortunately am sans keys to the TARDIS at present, I resorted to rummaging through antique shops in my area. I found a lot of dolls that were manufactured when I was a child (was made to feel extremely old) but still this book eluded me. I tried the crappy secondhand shop across the street from me that thinks it's a chic boutique (they get a lot of used children's books dumped off there); nada.
I then proceeded to piss off the local (and not so local) librarians asking after this book.
Pro tip: if your local sassy old librarian who didn't want to help you in the first place misspells an author's name, don't correct her, that only makes it worse.
Anywho, I began to write emails to various booksellers, especially those in Australia and New Zealand. Some were very polite to me, others basically told me to take a hike when they discovered I was just some weirdo American wasting their time asking after a nearly thirty year old paperback.
Finally I stumbled across an online bookshop in Jacksonville FL and though my hopes weren't high, I thought what the hey I'll write them too, see what comes of it.
What came of it was THE BEST bookseller I've ever dealt with in my LIFE. Seriously, if you EVER get the chance to do business with Madison, who runs Agatha's Alley, DO IT! She is wonderful. I have no words to describe how wonderful. She actually managed to contact the AUTHOR, seriously Hilary Bell herself, and ask if SHE had a copy to send to her to sell to me! And she DID! She checked her storage, found a copy, and even signed it before sending it to Madison who then wrapped it up and sold it to me and sent it my way with a nice little note. It was so exciting a process! And now I have a little treasure which, as the rarest book I own, and signed to boot, will probably have to be ripped from my cold, dead hands prior to it ever finding a new home.
So that's my incredible story. I felt like a character in The Thirteenth Tale or Inkheart; it was magical.
Now without further ado, onto the review.
A brief summary of the premise for those unfamiliar with the show: a teenage girl gets a magic mirror as a gift from an elderly antique dealer and she discovers she can pass through it and visit another girl her own age who lives in the same house but almost a hundred years earlier. Together they try to stop a drum of poison from getting chucked down a neighbour's well. Also, said neighbor is holding Alexei Romanov (Anastasia's little bro) hostage next door.
(Aside: one thing that's really fun about explaining this show to someone completely unfamiliar with it is that it TOTALLY sounds like you're making it up...
The kid from Sound of Music threw Ralna from Journey to the Center of the Earth in jail, but don't worry it's okay because the demon-possessed girl from Scooby Doo smuggled her a key and Alexei Romanov came riding up on a horse to save her?
)
I LOVE THIS BOOK!
It was so worth waiting for and writing all those bookstores and getting glared at by librarians. I'd do it all again in a heartbeat!
Mirror Mirror definitely stands on its own as a delightful YA novel. I think I'd have really loved this even if I hadn't seen or heard of the show. I wouldn't go so far as to say it's BETTER than the show, simply because there are things I preferred in the show and things I preferred in the book, and other things I liked equally in both but for different reasons. Overall, I think the book is perfect for its medium as a book and the show is excellent as a TV show.
Prior to reading it, the only information I could find on differences between the show and the book online were that a) the old man looks different and b) Sir Ivor's horse is another colour from the one in the show.
Those are both true, but they're far, far from the ONLY differences. There are actually quite a large number of different details in the book though the main plot and resolution are ultimately the same.
First, yes, old Nicholas is described completely differently; he's like crypt-keeper levels of old, instead of just dainty old man old, and wears coke bottle glasses. But in spite of apparently being nearly blind the guy is a super ninja who catches the mirror when Jade almost drops it, which is really cool.
The horse is a different colour but that's not the ONLY thing different about that scene from the show: book!Nick actually manages to grab Jo, swing her on the horse, and take off before she even knew it was him.
In the show, Jo's last name appears to be spelled "Tiegan" (the surname doesn't appear in the credits, at least not that I could see to confirm this, but if you look at how the jail warden spelled Jo's name next to her cell key... Maybe my eyes are playing tricks on me, I do have really crappy eyesight so it's possible, but it definitely looks like the I comes before E...); in the book her name is "Teigan". She and Louisa (and apparently Tama as well) are also a year younger in this version, being only thirteen. Nicholas is still sixteen and there's no difference in how the Iredale family spells their name that I noticed.
Rather than Louisa giving Jo her dress to borrow, like in the show version, Jo just sort of helps herself like Susan Pevensie borrowing a fur coat from Professor Kirke's wardrobe while she's in Narnia.
(By the way, I made the above comparison BEFORE I realised Jo's mum in the show was the same actress as Helen Pevensie, I swear!)
Ani plays a slightly larger part in the book, as she helps Louisa and Tama break Jo out of jail.
Mia and Jesse are a bit sassier than their show counterparts. When Jade comments that the drum is just full of green slime, right before the poison sinks in, Mia actually tells her it looks the same as the view she has up her nose.
Book!Royce is a bit more savage too. He suggests sending the Coigleys desserts with poo baked in when they get his mom fired; and it, coupled with Andrew's almost complete nonreaction, as if this was a totally normal thing for his son to say, is utterly hilarious.
Considering book!Andrew unironically asks his kids what they think of a lonely singing toilet as a plot device for his new novel, maybe this IS just normal for their family.
The scene where Sir Ivor catches Jo trying to talk to Nicholas via the window and has her hauled off to jail is different as well. Book!Jo is actually on a tree branch talking to Nick and the branch breaks after he ducks back inside, and Campbell catches her when she falls. Because book!Campbell is also a low-key ninja apparently. She gets back in this same tree later on, when she has the key to Nick's room, and uses a broom handle to pass it to him instead of a fishing rod like in the show.
It's implied that when Nicholas and Jo dance outside during Sir Ivor's ball, Louisa and Tama dance, too, instead of just standing there holding hands.
Another interesting difference is that Jo doesn't find out about Nick's hemophilia before Louisa in the book; rather than insist on looking at his arm when she sees him wince, like in the show, here she actually misses/straight up doesn't notice the wince after she she smacks him on the arm. Louisa is the first one to notice his bruise and she and Jo learn about his being a hemophiliac at the same time.
When the girls bring the drum of cooking oil into the ball, book!Sir Ivor freaks out, just like Sir Gerald, unlike in the show where he's calmer and examines the contents spilling out; and book!Louisa is the one who tells him it's not the poison.
Mrs. Whitelaw is possibly a redhead in the book. She's described as having "gingery" eyebrows. Speaking of Mrs. Whitelaw, she's missing from chapter ten entirely (presumably away at market), and is not in the kitchen when the children finish their essay on the Roman empire. Not only does Jo not run into her, but Nicholas seems to enter the house through the kitchen (as opposed to the front door) and doesn't encounter her, Jo, or Louisa. Which does beg the question of where exactly WERE Jo and Louisa looking for Frid all that time if they didn't bother to check the kitchen?
Mrs. Whitelaw (apparently, she returned) is also the one who rats out Nicholas being in the Iredale house to Frid (who tells Sir Ivor), because she's mad Primrose is taking on all these charity cases, rather than Frid seeing Nicholas for himself through the open door of Louisa's room.
Book!Jo and book!Andrew (in 1995) never take a walk in Botanic Garden around the same time (in 1919) Nicholas, Louisa, and Titus are picnicking there. Instead of Jo coming back from this walk and discovering the chip in the mirror off-camera, like she does in the series, we see Book!Jo first notice the chip after the school meeting.
Catherine announces she's planning to quit her job over a spaghetti dinner rather than just calling the kids downstairs for the announcement, like on the series, and Jo throws her chair back before rushing upstairs, where she throws plastic darts while talking to Royce about how if they move she can't go through the mirror; in the show she's just lying on her bed, no darts.
Sir Ivor DOES check under the bed for the plank, rather than Nicholas getting it for him and handing it over, like in the show, but he misses Jo by an inch.
Sir Gerald's last name in the book is Munt.
Rather than Nicholas blocking Campbell from hitting Jo (Campbell actually succeeds in giving her a quick cuff here in the book), Nicholas tells him off for how he was talking to Jo when he thought she was a launderer. (Honestly this kind of seems like the lesser issue there, but A plus for effort, book!Nick 😆)
The conversation between Sir Ivor and Nicholas when he drops the ring into the drum takes place in the cellar instead of Ivor's study.
Ani and Louisa apparently don't switch clothes before Ani distracts Sir Ivor so Louisa can sneak on the train, unlike in the show.
When Tama unsuccessfully tries to follow Jo to 1919, he doesn't just slightly jolt the mirror out of alignment on its stand in the book, he straight up knocks it over and puts it back in the wrong place afterwards.
Kind of brings new meaning the the "I just bumped it a little" line in the show...
Then there are a number of littler snippets of details conveyed/hinted at in prose that aren't touched on in the show at all that I recall, including when the picture of the Romanovs in the encyclopedia was taken and what pets the Teigans/Tiegans have, etc.
The order of certain events and who said what and when are changed around somewhat too in various places.
Book!Jo isn't with Tama when he retrieves Nick's ring from the detoxified drum. Unlike how in the show she just sends him ahead of her, here in the novel she flat out has him go without her.
Also, rather than try to take his ring through the mirror, in this version Tama flat out tells Nick he won't be able to travel back with it and warns him Russia in the 1920s wouldn't exactly be fun for him even WITH the ring in tow, and that's when he decides to stay in 1995. (Good choice, pal.)
A couple of things from the show version are omitted completely. Nicholas doesn't hold up a sign reading "help" after signalling to Jo and Louisa; Jo just jumps to the conclusion he wants help from him flashing a reflective light in Titus's eyeballs. Which does make it a little weird when she's so vehement telling Louisa his dismissal of them on the stairs was "Bullshit" because he just asked them for help. (DID he, Jo? Did he, really? 😂) There's no mention of Jo having a nightmare while she and Nick are hiding after her jailbreak and Frid doesn't get eaten up by ants while spying on them. The latter of which did raise another plot hole in my mind: if Frid heard their plans earlier on, and knew Jo was going to the graveyard, why didn't he just tell Sir Ivor to grab her and Nicholas THERE? Seriously, they go through all the trouble of catching them at the ruined summerhouse and chasing Jo all the way to the graveyard when they could totally have skipped a step. Just saying.
In chapter fourteen, interestingly, Jo outright gives Royce money to buy dog biscuits, which strikes me as a little strange because (unlike in the show, where we don't see the Tiegan/Teigans with any pets) the book goes out of its way to mention the family dog once or twice. So wouldn't they have had dog food IN the house? In the show it's not stated where Royce GOT dog food from but considering the bag didn't look full, I kinda ASSUMED he got it from downstairs... Even though the Tiegan don't have a dog on the show?
This has no bearing on the plot whatsoever of course, I just found it oddly fascinating.
Also in chapter fourteen, instead of saying "No, I don't" when Louisa says Jo likes talking to Nicholas, she says "as if" which is just the most delightfully 1995 response ever.
Again, nothing to do with the plot, just a thing I noticed. 😁
As far as recommendations go, as a standalone book, not comparing it to other mediums, I definitely wholeheartedly recommend this one if you can find it; it's charming and well written.
And of the three YA books I've read where Alexei Romanov time travels (the other two being Risked and The Curse of the Romanovs), it's soooo obviously the best.
I hope (though it seems highly unlikely) this wonderful book comes back into print someday and can be as widely enjoyed as it deserves to be.
Okay, so before I begin the review, a little explanation of HOW I obtained a physical copy of this ultra-rare out of print book is probably warranted.
I was searching everywhere for this book. This search was not going great, to put it mildly.
Barnes and Noble supposedly has this book listed in its store databases (though not online) but that means exactly nothing since they can't request or order a copy; they can just inform you that if you ever build a time machine and go back twenty years they'll be able to sell it to you for $5.99 -- yay.
As I unfortunately am sans keys to the TARDIS at present, I resorted to rummaging through antique shops in my area. I found a lot of dolls that were manufactured when I was a child (was made to feel extremely old) but still this book eluded me. I tried the crappy secondhand shop across the street from me that thinks it's a chic boutique (they get a lot of used children's books dumped off there); nada.
I then proceeded to piss off the local (and not so local) librarians asking after this book.
Pro tip: if your local sassy old librarian who didn't want to help you in the first place misspells an author's name, don't correct her, that only makes it worse.
Anywho, I began to write emails to various booksellers, especially those in Australia and New Zealand. Some were very polite to me, others basically told me to take a hike when they discovered I was just some weirdo American wasting their time asking after a nearly thirty year old paperback.
Finally I stumbled across an online bookshop in Jacksonville FL and though my hopes weren't high, I thought what the hey I'll write them too, see what comes of it.
What came of it was THE BEST bookseller I've ever dealt with in my LIFE. Seriously, if you EVER get the chance to do business with Madison, who runs Agatha's Alley, DO IT! She is wonderful. I have no words to describe how wonderful. She actually managed to contact the AUTHOR, seriously Hilary Bell herself, and ask if SHE had a copy to send to her to sell to me! And she DID! She checked her storage, found a copy, and even signed it before sending it to Madison who then wrapped it up and sold it to me and sent it my way with a nice little note. It was so exciting a process! And now I have a little treasure which, as the rarest book I own, and signed to boot, will probably have to be ripped from my cold, dead hands prior to it ever finding a new home.
So that's my incredible story. I felt like a character in The Thirteenth Tale or Inkheart; it was magical.
Now without further ado, onto the review.
A brief summary of the premise for those unfamiliar with the show: a teenage girl gets a magic mirror as a gift from an elderly antique dealer and she discovers she can pass through it and visit another girl her own age who lives in the same house but almost a hundred years earlier. Together they try to stop a drum of poison from getting chucked down a neighbour's well. Also, said neighbor is holding Alexei Romanov (Anastasia's little bro) hostage next door.
(Aside: one thing that's really fun about explaining this show to someone completely unfamiliar with it is that it TOTALLY sounds like you're making it up...
The kid from Sound of Music threw Ralna from Journey to the Center of the Earth in jail, but don't worry it's okay because the demon-possessed girl from Scooby Doo smuggled her a key and Alexei Romanov came riding up on a horse to save her?
)I LOVE THIS BOOK!
It was so worth waiting for and writing all those bookstores and getting glared at by librarians. I'd do it all again in a heartbeat!
Mirror Mirror definitely stands on its own as a delightful YA novel. I think I'd have really loved this even if I hadn't seen or heard of the show. I wouldn't go so far as to say it's BETTER than the show, simply because there are things I preferred in the show and things I preferred in the book, and other things I liked equally in both but for different reasons. Overall, I think the book is perfect for its medium as a book and the show is excellent as a TV show.
Prior to reading it, the only information I could find on differences between the show and the book online were that a) the old man looks different and b) Sir Ivor's horse is another colour from the one in the show.
Those are both true, but they're far, far from the ONLY differences. There are actually quite a large number of different details in the book though the main plot and resolution are ultimately the same.
First, yes, old Nicholas is described completely differently; he's like crypt-keeper levels of old, instead of just dainty old man old, and wears coke bottle glasses. But in spite of apparently being nearly blind the guy is a super ninja who catches the mirror when Jade almost drops it, which is really cool.
The horse is a different colour but that's not the ONLY thing different about that scene from the show: book!Nick actually manages to grab Jo, swing her on the horse, and take off before she even knew it was him.
In the show, Jo's last name appears to be spelled "Tiegan" (the surname doesn't appear in the credits, at least not that I could see to confirm this, but if you look at how the jail warden spelled Jo's name next to her cell key... Maybe my eyes are playing tricks on me, I do have really crappy eyesight so it's possible, but it definitely looks like the I comes before E...); in the book her name is "Teigan". She and Louisa (and apparently Tama as well) are also a year younger in this version, being only thirteen. Nicholas is still sixteen and there's no difference in how the Iredale family spells their name that I noticed.
Rather than Louisa giving Jo her dress to borrow, like in the show version, Jo just sort of helps herself like Susan Pevensie borrowing a fur coat from Professor Kirke's wardrobe while she's in Narnia.
(By the way, I made the above comparison BEFORE I realised Jo's mum in the show was the same actress as Helen Pevensie, I swear!)
Ani plays a slightly larger part in the book, as she helps Louisa and Tama break Jo out of jail.
Mia and Jesse are a bit sassier than their show counterparts. When Jade comments that the drum is just full of green slime, right before the poison sinks in, Mia actually tells her it looks the same as the view she has up her nose.
Book!Royce is a bit more savage too. He suggests sending the Coigleys desserts with poo baked in when they get his mom fired; and it, coupled with Andrew's almost complete nonreaction, as if this was a totally normal thing for his son to say, is utterly hilarious.
Considering book!Andrew unironically asks his kids what they think of a lonely singing toilet as a plot device for his new novel, maybe this IS just normal for their family.
The scene where Sir Ivor catches Jo trying to talk to Nicholas via the window and has her hauled off to jail is different as well. Book!Jo is actually on a tree branch talking to Nick and the branch breaks after he ducks back inside, and Campbell catches her when she falls. Because book!Campbell is also a low-key ninja apparently. She gets back in this same tree later on, when she has the key to Nick's room, and uses a broom handle to pass it to him instead of a fishing rod like in the show.
It's implied that when Nicholas and Jo dance outside during Sir Ivor's ball, Louisa and Tama dance, too, instead of just standing there holding hands.
Another interesting difference is that Jo doesn't find out about Nick's hemophilia before Louisa in the book; rather than insist on looking at his arm when she sees him wince, like in the show, here she actually misses/straight up doesn't notice the wince after she she smacks him on the arm. Louisa is the first one to notice his bruise and she and Jo learn about his being a hemophiliac at the same time.
When the girls bring the drum of cooking oil into the ball, book!Sir Ivor freaks out, just like Sir Gerald, unlike in the show where he's calmer and examines the contents spilling out; and book!Louisa is the one who tells him it's not the poison.
Mrs. Whitelaw is possibly a redhead in the book. She's described as having "gingery" eyebrows. Speaking of Mrs. Whitelaw, she's missing from chapter ten entirely (presumably away at market), and is not in the kitchen when the children finish their essay on the Roman empire. Not only does Jo not run into her, but Nicholas seems to enter the house through the kitchen (as opposed to the front door) and doesn't encounter her, Jo, or Louisa. Which does beg the question of where exactly WERE Jo and Louisa looking for Frid all that time if they didn't bother to check the kitchen?
Mrs. Whitelaw (apparently, she returned) is also the one who rats out Nicholas being in the Iredale house to Frid (who tells Sir Ivor), because she's mad Primrose is taking on all these charity cases, rather than Frid seeing Nicholas for himself through the open door of Louisa's room.
Book!Jo and book!Andrew (in 1995) never take a walk in Botanic Garden around the same time (in 1919) Nicholas, Louisa, and Titus are picnicking there. Instead of Jo coming back from this walk and discovering the chip in the mirror off-camera, like she does in the series, we see Book!Jo first notice the chip after the school meeting.
Catherine announces she's planning to quit her job over a spaghetti dinner rather than just calling the kids downstairs for the announcement, like on the series, and Jo throws her chair back before rushing upstairs, where she throws plastic darts while talking to Royce about how if they move she can't go through the mirror; in the show she's just lying on her bed, no darts.
Sir Ivor DOES check under the bed for the plank, rather than Nicholas getting it for him and handing it over, like in the show, but he misses Jo by an inch.
Sir Gerald's last name in the book is Munt.
Rather than Nicholas blocking Campbell from hitting Jo (Campbell actually succeeds in giving her a quick cuff here in the book), Nicholas tells him off for how he was talking to Jo when he thought she was a launderer. (Honestly this kind of seems like the lesser issue there, but A plus for effort, book!Nick 😆)
The conversation between Sir Ivor and Nicholas when he drops the ring into the drum takes place in the cellar instead of Ivor's study.
Ani and Louisa apparently don't switch clothes before Ani distracts Sir Ivor so Louisa can sneak on the train, unlike in the show.
When Tama unsuccessfully tries to follow Jo to 1919, he doesn't just slightly jolt the mirror out of alignment on its stand in the book, he straight up knocks it over and puts it back in the wrong place afterwards.
Kind of brings new meaning the the "I just bumped it a little" line in the show...
Then there are a number of littler snippets of details conveyed/hinted at in prose that aren't touched on in the show at all that I recall, including when the picture of the Romanovs in the encyclopedia was taken and what pets the Teigans/Tiegans have, etc.
The order of certain events and who said what and when are changed around somewhat too in various places.
Book!Jo isn't with Tama when he retrieves Nick's ring from the detoxified drum. Unlike how in the show she just sends him ahead of her, here in the novel she flat out has him go without her.
Also, rather than try to take his ring through the mirror, in this version Tama flat out tells Nick he won't be able to travel back with it and warns him Russia in the 1920s wouldn't exactly be fun for him even WITH the ring in tow, and that's when he decides to stay in 1995. (Good choice, pal.)
A couple of things from the show version are omitted completely. Nicholas doesn't hold up a sign reading "help" after signalling to Jo and Louisa; Jo just jumps to the conclusion he wants help from him flashing a reflective light in Titus's eyeballs. Which does make it a little weird when she's so vehement telling Louisa his dismissal of them on the stairs was "Bullshit" because he just asked them for help. (DID he, Jo? Did he, really? 😂) There's no mention of Jo having a nightmare while she and Nick are hiding after her jailbreak and Frid doesn't get eaten up by ants while spying on them. The latter of which did raise another plot hole in my mind: if Frid heard their plans earlier on, and knew Jo was going to the graveyard, why didn't he just tell Sir Ivor to grab her and Nicholas THERE? Seriously, they go through all the trouble of catching them at the ruined summerhouse and chasing Jo all the way to the graveyard when they could totally have skipped a step. Just saying.
In chapter fourteen, interestingly, Jo outright gives Royce money to buy dog biscuits, which strikes me as a little strange because (unlike in the show, where we don't see the Tiegan/Teigans with any pets) the book goes out of its way to mention the family dog once or twice. So wouldn't they have had dog food IN the house? In the show it's not stated where Royce GOT dog food from but considering the bag didn't look full, I kinda ASSUMED he got it from downstairs... Even though the Tiegan don't have a dog on the show?
This has no bearing on the plot whatsoever of course, I just found it oddly fascinating.
Also in chapter fourteen, instead of saying "No, I don't" when Louisa says Jo likes talking to Nicholas, she says "as if" which is just the most delightfully 1995 response ever.
Again, nothing to do with the plot, just a thing I noticed. 😁
As far as recommendations go, as a standalone book, not comparing it to other mediums, I definitely wholeheartedly recommend this one if you can find it; it's charming and well written.
And of the three YA books I've read where Alexei Romanov time travels (the other two being Risked and The Curse of the Romanovs), it's soooo obviously the best.
I hope (though it seems highly unlikely) this wonderful book comes back into print someday and can be as widely enjoyed as it deserves to be.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
January 24, 2014
Awesome book. Recommended for all Mirror, Mirror fans!
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews