The novel opens with Alice's cat, Dinah, grooming her kittens. Alice gently scoops up a black kitten and scolds it for poor manners. As she half talks to herself and half sleeps, Alice imagines going into the Looking-glass House behind the mirror surrounding the fireplace. One thing leads to another, and Alice finds herself in the Looking-glass room.

Carroll immediately situates readers in the fantasy using the rules of chess. Alice finds herself in a chess game where anything can happen. Invisible to the Red King and Queen, Alice discovers that her enormous size enables her to move the Queen like a chess player would make a move. She brings the Queen, and then the King, next to their crying child. The zany action unfolds.

Familiar paraphernalia makes the story believable: the Red and White Kings and Queens, the pawns, and the garden-like chessboard. The unfamiliar events add...