Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West

Rich in detail and highly imaginative. Slyly humorous. Slow moving in parts. ( )

I have finally finished the life story of the Wicked Witch of the West, and I really enjoyed it. It gave me a different perspective on the witch herself, whose name was Elphaba, and put her in a sort of humane light. At one point, she had been friends with Glinda, the good witch, so that was a surprise. But over all, I enjoyed learning of her family life, and school days. A very good story, for fans of the land of Oz. ( )

I am usually intrigued by retellings of classic stories from the point of view of the antagonist or another minor character. This is what initially drew me to "Wicked." I had also heard the book is nothing like the musical, and since I may get to see the musical for the first time soon (fingers crossed!), I decided to put the book on my "Currently Reading" list sooner rather than later.

As many others have mentioned, Maguire's writing drags along in a lot of spots. This prevented me from enjoying the book as much as I could have. However, I don't think the premise of the novel - "The Wizard of Oz" from the Wicked Witch of the West's point of view - is bad at all. The author leaves a lot of the questions we have about particular characters unanswered, which in turn allows us to consider larger themes (such as good versus evil) in a variety of ways. This ambiguity is the mark of a good writer.

I've concluded that "Wicked" is to "The Wizard of Oz" as "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead" is to "Hamlet," in that in each retelling, things just happen to a lot of the characters, and they cannot make sense of all of the goings-on. If you've experienced the "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern" and "Hamlet" in addition to the "Wicked"/"Wizard" pair, then maybe you get what I'm talking about. Not everyone understands "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern" - indeed, it took me a couple viewings of the film version to understand it - so maybe not everyone is going to "get" "Wicked." However, even if Maguire's was aiming for a "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern" effect, his slow writing in spots prevents it from being as smart as the adaptation of Shakespeare. ( )

Actually, below a star, how it was possible to create an award-winning musical from this is beyond me. It breaks the premise that the book is always better. ( )

This book took me forever to get through and I was very disappointed. I saw the Broadway musical and I loved it so when I heard it was a book I had to check it out. It was not at all what I expected in many different ways. When the book started it was just a lot more blunt about life, which is fine, but as it went on there were more chapters that were just unnecessary and frankly disturbing and had no place in the plot. And not in that 'Oh, good heavens to Betsy! Did that young man just engage in inappropriate sexual activities?' It seems when Maguire could not think of repugnant scenes to add, simply for shock value, he rattled on about politics for pages before abruptly, and without any explanation, jumping 5, 6, 9 years at a time. I found it hard to care about most of the characters and many of them did things that did not seem to fit with their character.
This book was quite a disappointment and I'll probably not read the rest of the series. I do not recommended reading this book.

(07/11/2013)
*page 324*
I mostly liked this book so far but it's started to get a bit boring and slow. Also there are a lot of really unnecessary and frankly disturbing parts. No one want's a page long description of someone having diarrhea, or a threesome with a tiger, or a creation story about a goddess's urine. Sorry but no, you're not being edgy you're just being gross. This is defiantly not what I thought it was going to be.

(07/11/2013)
*page 325*
I noticed that my numbering is off because my edition is not listed and a typo. But I had to post an update of this book's continued disturbing unnecessary existence. I'm not sure what I am even reading anymore because it keeps skipping around in years without warning, and then just slaps some horrible scene in just for shock effect. Why is it necessary to put a 9 year old playing with her mother's nipple? It's not.

(07/11/2013)
*page 500*
This book went from trying to be too intelligent to being a painfully corny madhouse. ( )