A review by karathagan
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum

adventurous funny hopeful lighthearted fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes

3.5

First time reading the classic. The Wicked movie came out and a friend gave me that book; I wanted to get a taste for the original world first. I have a digital collection of the ~14(?) books by LFB, will probably read a couple more and then watch Wicked, then read it.

This was a cute kids' book and I can see why it is a classic. So many lessons: the characters with a perceived deficiency variously 1) worked extra hard to make up for it, effectively removing the deficiency and even being better than people without the deficiency, 2) blamed the loss for everything and viewed it as the single reason they weren't successful at everything, 3) only needed a small tangible token to go right back to the same actions but feeling better about it. Widely relatable, I imagine.

I didn't quite understand why Dorothy was so eager to go home - the vague sentiment was never convincing. I love the green glasses (and figured them out immediately), but would hate to see the grime on them from being worn 24/7/365. There were definitely enough interesting worlds or settings to supply many books and I'm looking forward to a couple more. The Hummel figurines town was hilarious.