L. Frank Baum (1856–1919)

The third book in the Oz series, but the first I read. Baum has a wonderful imagination, unlike anything else I know - he can conjure up total nonsense but describe it so vividly that you totally get what he's saying, and combined with his delightful wit, his stories are fun and magical.

However, if he has a flaw, I'd say it was in his characterisation - in that, there isn't enough of it. He fills his stories with dozens of wacky characters, but they have very little personality between show more them. His heroes may be very sensible or very silly, but they are nearly all incredibly brave and calm.

As much I enjoy the story of Ozma Of Oz, which is often quite eerie, at no point in the story do I ever worry about Dorothy, because she never worries. Baum explains this by saying that due to her previous adventures she really can't be shocked any more, but considering the almost continuous stream of dicey situations she gets into, she remains zen and mostly unbothered at all times, which really renders her rather dull. It takes away a lot of the excitement that should be building, and there is only one moment at the very end of the book, when she becomes concerned for Uncle Henry's health, that any emotional stakes are played at all. I guess this is because it is a children's adventure, and Baum didn't want his readers getting upset, but I always liked a book that could make you cry as well as make you laugh.

Still, it's a neat and fantastical story that's certainly worth a read if you don't know it, though perhaps more for a younger audience. I've had my book for many many years. I like how Baum writes strong female role models (pretty revolutionary for his time) and also how much the characters genuinely care for each other, come what may. show less

I don't remember this as one of my favorite Oz books, and it's easy to see why: though I always loved Baum's journey plot, in this one the journey has no stakes, as it is simply a way to keep Uncle Henry and Aunt Em occupied while they acclimate to living in the Land of Oz. But it's by no means bad, as Baum invents his usual variety of fanciful places with fanciful creatures to occupy the protagonists; I especially liked the two Defensive Settlements, despite how creepy I found their show more premises (apparently Ozites with undesirable social traits are concentrated in their own cities to keep them from irritating the majority of society). The book has two standout parts. The first is Em and Henry, who get what is really their best material in the entire series. Their attempts to fit into a world that wants to serve them, a premise they are so unused to, provides Baum with some nice fodder for character work. Em's battle with the Cowardly Lion is fantastic. The second, and best, part of the book is General Guph's visits to the various evil races he is bringing into his alliance against Oz. They're some of Baum's best creations, especially the Whimsies with their pasteboard heads. I wish the invasion plotline offered more narrative drive to the rest of the book, however; Ozma just watches it unfold on her Magic Picture and frets unhelpfully.

What struck me this time was how weirdly reminiscent some parts of the book were of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Dorothy's adventure in Utensia, where she's surrounded by strangely logical wordplay about utensils, reminded me of the sort of thing Lewis Carroll would engage in, and later on, Dorothy meets some oversized rabbits and engages in some shrinking and growing. Weirdest of all, however, is her petulant attitude towards the inhabitants of Bunbury when they had the audacity to be angry over the fact that Toto murdered three of their citizens and Billina pecked someone's eyes out. It's unusual for the girl who is generally conscientious, and her bad attitude here made me think of the Alice who had such clueless interaction with the animals in the Caucus-Race more than it did the Dorothy who carefully avoided doing any harm in the Dainty China Country. show less

This one might be my favorite. It has it all... new, interesting characters, a few dashes of genuine creepiness and danger, and great art too. I am noticing now that Baum was very careful to illustrate that Tin Woodman and Scarecrow are in a relationship, for anyone who wants to read between the lines. The core mechanics of this book are very, very solid--so much so that they were used for the creepy Return to Oz movie.

I had fond memories of this book, which I remembered as being my favorite of Baum's original fourteen Oz novels, and so when the Shanower/Young Marvel Oz comics ended one shy of it, I went on to it anyway. This is probably Baum's best plotted Oz novel since Marvelous Land, and best plotted journey-focused one since Wonderful Wizard itself, or maybe ever. Baum invents a new protagonist for the first time since Marvelous Land, and it does wonders: Ojo is a person in trouble in a way we haven't show more seen in these books in a long time, and it does well to create empathy for him, and thus energy for the story. Ojo's journeys across Oz are all motivated by attempting to cure his uncle of being a statue, and it makes things matter in a way they didn't for Dorothy in Road and Emerald City.

Plus, I've always loved Scraps the Patchwork Girl, and she delighted no less on this reread than any other. While Ojo is somber with responsibility beyond his years, Scraps is one of Baum's most childish characters, and that's what makes her fun-- everything is incredibly dramatic for her, as she pouts petulantly and bounds for joy in equal measure. Plus you get Oz's first real romance with her and the Scarecrow! Too bad Skottie Young never got to draw her (or the Woozy, or the Glass Cat, or the living phonograph) as I'm sure he would have done brilliantly, but you can't really go wrong with John R. Neill in any case. My 1990 Dover edition is in black and white, but is otherwise a pretty close facsimile of the original 1913 Reilly & Britton edition of the novel.

added April 2022:
I recently read this aloud to my three-year-old son. As I said above, this was my favorite of the Oz books as a child, so I approached it with some trepidation. Would my son like it?

I think he did; we made pretty rapid progress in it. To me, it recaptures the formula that made the first book work so well: it opens with a child in a difficult status quo, the child loses their parental figure and is forced to go on a journey to get them back, the child picks up a variety of strange companions as they travel, the group works together to overcome difficult problems, the group moves from strange location to strange location. Unlike in some of the mediocre Oz books, there's a clear goal and real tension; unlike in some of the mediocre Oz books, the characters solve their problems by thinking clever.

My main complaint would be with the ending: it's not clear to me why Ozma let Ojo go on his quest at all given that the Wizard can just solve all his problems for him. But one of the benefits of reading aloud is that things like this bother you less, because you're treating the story episodically. Yes, the ending doesn't entirely satisfy... but that's only one chapter out of about thirty. One thing I noticed reading aloud is that Ojo is always re-explaining who he is and what his quest is; something that's very useful when the book is stretched out across weeks to someone with the memory of a three-year-old.

Sometimes I verbally edit the books to fix continuity problems as I read them aloud, but I did not make any changes to this one despite the fact that in Marvelous Land we're told a Doctor Nikidik made the Powder of Life, who is dead according to Road, and here it's a Doctor Pipt who is very much alive. I just didn't care! (And really, it would be the earlier books one should edit.) On the other hand, the characters encounter a magical race called the "Tottenhots"; I edited the name out of my reading, just calling them creatures. Usually I read the Books of Wonder facsimile editions, and the Patchwork Girl facsimile controversially removed some of illustrations of the Tottenhots and revised some of the textual descriptions. However, in this case, I had the Dover, which makes no such changes, so I had to do it myself. (I've been upgrading my Del Rey and Puffin editions to Books of Wonder ones as we read, but the Dovers are almost like the originals except for different covers, and reproducing the color plates in black and white.)

When I finished, my wife asked if Scraps, the "patchwork girl" of the title, actually did anything... the answer is, honestly, not much; she's always there, but the plot driver is Ojo. I don't think Scraps really solves a single problem, though she does prove to be a great friend to Ojo when he is in trouble for stealing the six-leafed clover. But she's a delightful character to read aloud, especially the songs, and I gave her the same voice I gave Pinkie Pie when I used to read the My Little Pony comics aloud to my son. On other hand, this book showed up the limitations of my range of voices, as the Scarecrow and the Shaggy Man share some scenes! (When they are together, I pitch the Scarecrow a little higher, but otherwise they're the same voice.) My wife didn't think the "southern belle" voice I adopted for Bungle, the Glass Cat, was a good choice, but I liked it. show less